Just how offensive is lad's mag Zoo?

Zoo magazine will close next month

Norks, bazoogas, tatas, funbags, jugs: Zoo magazine's writers display great versatility when it comes to describing breasts.

To be fair, a wide variety of descriptions are needed when you feature more than 40 pairs of the aforementioned "assets" in a single magazine issue.

Last month, Australian supermarket Coles removed the magazine from its stands, after a petition organised by 23-year-old Laura Pintur from activist group Collective Shout gathered 40,000 signatures.

In New Zealand, Family First jumped on the bandwagon, calling for a ban in supermarkets because "the magazine promotes a rape culture and objectifies women".

Now, McCoskrie and his fellow campaigners have scored an easy win - publisher Bauer Media announced the October 12 issue will be the magazine's last, following a collapse in sales.

There is no doubt Zoo objectifies women, but how offensive is the lad's mag really?

The Herald took a look at the worst of Zoo, so you don't have to.

Kylie Jenner is described on the cover as "making Kim look like Peter Dinklage", the first of many nonsensical and mildly offensive jokes.

Other topics fit for riposte include alcoholism, 9/11, drone bombing and Chernobyl.

The table of contents starts with the all-important category of "girls," followed by "news" with a picture of Jenner as the featured news topic. Good to see they're keeping readers abreast of world events.

Back to Jenner, apparently she's more attractive than her sisters, "now that the dark vortex of ambition has sucked the life out of their souls". Women with ambitions are such a turn-off.

A lad mag wouldn't be a lad mag without a few "old ball and chain" jokes: the Herald counted three jokes about tricking or escaping the clutches of your wife, four if you include an entire page riff on the disgust of Zoo's in-house "comedian" at being asked for coffee by a woman he had a one-night stand with. "Chicks are f***ed, eh," he ruminates (in a conversation with his penis, no less).

More than half the 70 pages feature cleavage of some kind and a lot of the language used to describe women's bodies is literally objectifying - cover star Gemma Lee Farrell is a "product of New Zealand" and Zoo makes sure the reader knows an American actress' cup size before her interview begins.

Conclusion: Zoo is crass and distasteful but, honestly, its attitude toward women is in some ways no worse than weekly gossip rags like News Weekly.
That's not to say Zoo has no problems; in fact, it's a reflection of the dire state of a lot of media and our general cultural acceptance of the casual objectification and vilification of women.

As feminist blogger Dr Deborah Russell said on TVNZ's Breakfast, banning the mag makes no difference to wider social discourse.

"It's about talking about the nature of sexual violence against woman instead of just leaping for the ban hammer."

Zoo is a magazine for men who don't see women as real people. All the women who actually get a voice in the mag fit the "cool girl" mould down to a T, a reflection of the desire many men have to sleep with women without actually having to acknowledge those women might have complicated inner lives of their own.

The only concern about Zoo going under is whatever readers it has left might turn to more violently misogynistic publications, like the UK lad mags containing quotes that were more derogatory toward women than those of convicted rapists.

Goodbye Zoo, you will not be missed.

Fact box:

Bad jokes: 50

Good jokes: 1 ("I'm really pleased with my new fridge magnet. So far I've got eight fridges" is dad-joke gold.)

Humanitarian disasters mocked: 3

Nonsensical picture captions: 4 (what does "these hips could sink ships" mean?)

Naked women: 41 (and that was being generously conservative)

Words used to describe breasts: 8

Definite lies about sexual prowess by readers/columnists: 4

- nzherald.co.nz