Follow-up: Reading GQ

In the mean time, I have “read” through the rest of GQ, finding there to be so little content that I spent about the same time turning unread pages as I did reading. The already discussed problems, with extreme amounts of advertising, an embarrassing picture-to-text ratio, poor writing, …, consisted through-out. I also got through roughly half of Wired, before giving up: Shallow, uninsightful, and very obviously written for those with only a fleeting knowledge of IT and related areas—very, very different from its image*. Better than the GQ, no doubt, but nothing that an IT professional, a hacker, a computer enthusiast, or similar should waste his time on. (Especially in Germany, where C’t, the likely best general computer magazine in the world, is available at every news stand.)

*It is possible, however, that this give-away was not representative for the normal edition, conceivably having been tailored towards GQ readers. (I am uncertain whether I have ever read Wired on another occasion.)

Not only do I see my opinion that GQ* is useless cemented, but I am forced to conclude that its main purpose is to sell products for third parties—even when we look at the officially non-advertising parts of the magazine. Now, that a magazine has some degree of “crypto-advertising” or is too kind to products for fear of losing official advertising is quite common. Here, however, the scope is so extensive as to erase the line between content and advertising.

*With some reservations for international variation. This was the German edition and an at least theoretical probability remains that other editions are better.

An interesting twist is that this alleged men’s magazine has a readership consisting of roughly 21 % women. Had this been a magazine with no ostensible targeting of a male audience, say one dealing with fashion or “lifestyle” in general, this would be unremarkable—if anything the female proportion would have been smaller than expected. For a men’s magazine? Not a good sign…

Knowing what I now know, I would be less embarrassed going up to the same cashier with a porn magazine* than with another GQ. She might or might not disapprove, but at least she will not think me an easily manipulated semi-illiterate with no grasp of good writing.

*Not that I would when the Internet is loaded with free-of-charge porn.

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Reading GQ

A few days ago, I picked up my first (and very likely last) copy of GQ in the German edition. I was motivated mostly by the combination of a GQ (of which I have long been mildly curious), a watch special (watches being a sometime interest of mine) and a “Wired” special, for the joint price of EUR 6.50.

Frankly, this is the most ridiculous piece of crap I have ever encountered. It is actually considerably worse than what I have always imagined* “Cosmo” to be. Even the infamous German “Bild-Zeitung” has more to offer. “Gentlemen’s Quarterly”? A more apt name would be “Valley Boys’ Quarterly”.

*Never read it, but it has very poor reputation outside of the bimbo community and somehow it has come to symbolize superficiality and lack of intellectual aspirations to me—the type of thing Carrie Bradshaw reads. Still, I honestly doubt that it can be as bad as GQ.

For starters, the amount of advertising is beyond what I had ever imagined. There is actually considerably more advertising than actual content (based on the 130 first pages out of 250). The first non-advertising item is found on page 21 (yes, twenty-one!). However, even this is just the table of contents. Moving on, the first real content is found on page 29…

As for the content it self, it is mostly superficial, poorly thought-through crap, littered with grammatical errors and stylistic disasters. Notably, it appears that the authors are unable to use conjunctions (“and”/“und”, “but”/“aber”, and the like) without terminating the preceding sentence—even when this leads to fragmentation, lack of coherence, and other problems that reduce readability far more than do long sentences. The proportions of images to text are certainly not on an adult level—and most images bring little or no value to the respective article. Many twelve year old children would be intellectually understimulated…

The specific articles featured are possibly not representative of GQ, seeing that this particular issue has the theme of “women”. However, the lack of quality is unlikely to be an exception and there are a number of truly awful examples of lack of knowledge and/or ability to think critically, even by the already low standards of journalists. For instance, four pages are spent on repeating the long-debunked feminist lie of women not receiving equal pay for equal work (see several other posts of mine)—those who think critically and look at the actual facts at hand know that any difference in pay arises from UNequal work, including differences in full-time and part-time work, years of experience, education level, relative prioritization of work and family, etc.

Another good example is a brief piece on vasectomies vs. tubal litigations: For some reason, the authors consider it “sexist” that more* tubal litigations are made than vasectomies. Looking at the cited factors like costs, the proportions could conceivably be irrational, but to call them “sexist” is to apply the type of mindless assumption of evil that drive the modern feminist movement. Too boot, the discussion consists of cherry-picking and overlooks two extremely strong arguments for why it is more rational to go with a tubal litigation: Firstly, a vasectomy performed at a typical age affects a far greater part of a man’s fertile period than does a tubal litigation of a woman’s. Secondly, about half of all marriages end in a divorce. If a man with a vasectomy remarries, going by typical preferences, he will be the one having to explain to the new wife that children are off the table, while a woman with a tubal litigation will have it far easier with her husband. The effects of the choice will be more with the chooser and less with an “innocent” third-party when a tubal litigation is chosen.

*Allegedly: I have not checked the numbers in independent sources, but would be entirely unsurprised if they were incorrect.

The woman-centric part stretches to roughly page 92*. The following 38 pages consists mostly of advertising (duh), including a 10-page block dealing exclusively with “Olymp” shirts. The rest includes a piece on Helgoland that is poor enough to have featured in an airplane magazine, and weird arrangements of images with minimal alibi texts.

*Within the parts that I have read/skimmed-in-despair. There is more to come, according to the table of contents.

For those who wonder: The watch special was OK, but not on par with the specialist magazines. I have not yet started on “Wired”.