What Does the ‘Sports Illustrated’ Cover Teach Our Kids?“Hannah Davis’ r

What Does the ‘Sports Illustrated’ Cover Teach Our Kids?“Hannah Davis’ risqué Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue cover is a “dream come true” for her. But for the parents who now have to explain to their kids why the pretty lady is nearly taking off her bathing suit on a magazine — when some of those kids only recently learned to keep their clothes on at the playground — it’s a bit of a nightmare.The annual issue sparked controversy as soon as it was revealed on Wednesday, as it shows the 24-year-old model from the U.S. Virgin Islands sliding down a teeny bikini while standing, inexplicably, in the middle of a farm. A Washington Post piece, promptly asking if the cover goes “too low” with Davis’ bikini bottom, elicited a slew of condemning comments including: “Horrible message for young girls,” and “They should change the name to Sports Illustrated Playboy edition.” One commenter even accused the magazine of “contributing to the accelerating loss of innocence.” An Us Weekly poll reveals that 72 percent of their 12,000-plus voters consider the cover “porn.” And a similar survey on Yahoo Health found that 48 percent of respondents deem the cover “degrading.”“Confusing” is the term So Sexy So Soon co-author Diane Levin opts for. “Starting from young age, children are figuring out, ‘What does it mean to be a boy? What does it mean to be a girl?’” Levin, a professor of education in the Department of Early Childhood Education at Boston’s Wheelock College, tells Yahoo Parenting. Catching sight of all that skin, glorified on the newsstand at the grocery store, “becomes an important part of what they understand as to what it means to be girl and what people value,” she says. “It shows them girls are supposed to be pretty, and how you look is really important. It says, ‘Don’t think about what lies underneath, just focus on appearance. Being sexy is what’s valuable.’”Sexualized images like the SI cover can pose a problem for young boys, too. “The research tells us that when young boys see women in this way, they begin to think of girls and women as objects instead of complex people with whom they can develop mutual relationships,” says Jennifer W. Shewmaker, author of Sexualized Media Messages and Our Children: Teaching Kids to be Smart.Read the full piece here -- source link
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