To wonder if anyone else was banned from teenage magazines

[Dylaninthemovies1]

Completely random. But did anyone else’s mum ban them from reading certain magazines as a teenager? I wasn’t allowed to read More, just17, cosmopolitan or Marie Claire. In fairness the reason I wasn’t allowed Marie Claire was that I read an article about FGM when I was 10 and then got home and was a bit hysterical that this was in store for me. My mum had no idea that FGM was a thing until then.

I was only allowed to read shout, smash hits, the NME and melody maker.

Yabu: they weren’t banned in my family
Yanb: yes, they were banned in mine

I can’t remember if I was banned exactly but I do remember knowing my mum wouldn’t have wanted me to read them so if I bought them I hid them down the side of my bed.

I also remember being a young teen and reading an article in a magazine of my mum’s that was about sex. It made me feel all funny! Then I asked my mum if I could read it and she said no so I didn’t tell her I already had!

My mum adored my Jackie and read it from cover to cover!

Learnt everything I know from Just 17

I think More magazine was supposed to be aimed at older teens/early 20s which is why it was the naughtiest. I remember articles about drunken nights out and career advice, so it definitely wasn't aimed at the 12 year olds who actually got their hands on it! I seem to remember it had a mildly dirty short story every week which was oh so thrilling when you're not supposed to be reading it.

I think I was reading Cosmo by 16. That was the one that had the summer male nudes wasn’t it?

My mum made me take my J17 back to the shop and swap it when I was about 10 (I mean, it was full of sex related stuff and defo not aimed at me). I remember being highly embarrassed having to ask to swap it for Shout.

@Heffalooomia

My mother banned me from reading Jackie magazine because in her eyes it was too sexually explicit🤣 She was extremely weird and controlling though👀 🤦‍♀️

mine too! utterly ridiculous

More was banned thanks to the position of the month. But from ages 11 I was allowed J17 and the bliss and Sugar. Although I had to choose between bliss and sugar each month. Enjoyed spending hours reading them on a Saturday.
I think I still have the J17 scrunchie somewhere which came free with the first magazine I bought!

@Wowcherarestalkingme

Yes. My dad picked up a copy of one of my magazines (I forget which one it was) and the problem page was all about sex so I was banned from reading it.

Me too! I can remember being 15 or 16 and my DF sent me into the petrol station to get some snacks for the long drive to our caravan holiday, saying I could get a magazine to keep me entertained when we got there. I picked up a copy of More. When I got back in the car he asked what magazine I'd got so I handed it over. He has a quick flick and it opened on the problem page and there was something about sex. He went mad and sent me back into the garage to swap it for something 'more age appropriate'. The shame . I'd been reading it for a while as my DM let me but I'm not sure if she knew what was in it.

Yes I wasn't allowed bliss or sugar. Definitely not more a magazine (but I do think that was for people in their late teens early 20s with position of the week etc)
I was allowed shout and could have 3 posters up in my bedroom at a time but my parents had to check they weren't too sexual (they were posters of take that for goodness sake not from play girl)

@BarefootHippieChick

We had sex ed in the late 80s, I can remember watching some god awful 70s film of a couple making love and everyone in the classroom sniggering in embarrassment

We had the ever controversial Living and Growing . Circa 2002/3 . A wee cartoon of a couple thrusting surrounded by flowers, cupids and love hearts . I can’t remember learning much from it - something about ‘slipperiness’ and treating each other very tenderly .

At age 14 we had contraception lessons - complete with instructions on how to use a femidom and a diaphragm . In 2005 .

Being gay was never mentioned, nor parts of the body (beyond labelling an ovary, and a testicle) nor was sex for pleasure, masturbation, sex that wasn’t intercourse, parenting, consent ... it was all just ‘reproduction’ . In that sense teen magazines were brilliant as they introduced me to the idea that you could and should enjoy your body !

I was brought up in a very straight old-fashioned household, but surprisingly my parents didn't object to me buying J17 and Mizz - perhaps they thought that if I learnt from the magazines, they wouldn't have to have awkward conversations with me. Weirdly they did object to Jackie etc due to the photo-stories being pure fantasy.

I remember the first time I bought just17, the front page read ‘dean cain is super sexy’. I had bought it for the free gift as we were using them for lucky charms at school and everyone else had them. Dad went absolutely mad and forbid me from reading it. I’d have been about 12 I reckon. I think I argued enough that I was allowed my magazine back though. I used to read just 17 and sugar And then Moved on to more, then cosmopolitan.

Do teenagers still have magazines? I assume it’s all online now? Dd is 14 and has never bought any?

Was there a magazine called fast forward when I was a child? Late 80s kind of era?

My mum never gave a shit and im glad, i learnt so much she bloody didnt teach me.

My father had not a clue what magazines I used to read and my mother assumed that I did not buy magazines as I used to read her weekly best and bella. I just to buy More magazine from a petrol station shop with my pocket money (used to get a fair bit as I would clean my Dad's offices once a week). To be honest I was young and most of the magazine went over my head.

I was allowed everything although when I was younger my mum would check to make sure they were ok. They so weren’t! I was born 1980 and I agree I got a lot of my sex and reproductive education from magazines. My mum did talk to me but it was cringy and I preferred to read more.
I remember when I was about 12 giggling outrageously at the problem pages in just 17 with my mates!

More and Just Seventeen were banned, the former due to the ‘position of the fortnight’ and the latter because my mum read a bit where a reader asked what semen tasted of. Really twee magazines like Jackie were ok!

Oh ffs, the rows I had over those magazines. I used to sneak my friend's. my mum wouldn't let me watch Grange Hill or read so much as Mizz. She had a problem with Jacqueline Wilson books and the sum total of her attempt at sex ed was "if a boy asks you to touch him down there just say no. Once you have sex it changes a relationship and you can't go back to not having it". By the time she told me what sex was, I was having it ffs. School wasn't much better. She treated me like a small child until I was in my teens and went into a depression when I hit 11 and she realised I was growing up.

My parents didn’t notice what I read tbh
I read a lot of magazines and it’s where I learned about sex, safe sex, contraception and consent etc.
I’d hate to think what I would’ve learned had I not had them.

My mum was fine but when we moved house to near my mums family they got a house tour. From that day forward my gran believed she was allowed to go into all rooms to 'see what we had done with the house'. I came home from school one day that she'd been over to find out she'd reported that i had porn by my bed. I'd been reading cosmo before bed the night before! 😂

I hate to be picky but More, Marie Claire and Cosmo were/are not 'teenage' magazines. More was aimed at 18 - 25 year olds, Cosmo and MC at slightly older.
Of course they were read by younger girls but I always get a bit annoyed when people say things like "wasn't it shocking there was a position of the fortnight feature in a mag for teenagers". I don't know why it always annoys me so much but it does .

No ban in my house. I was just thinking of J17 a few days ago. I loved the problem pages and some of the free summer books they'd have. I was a weird kid looking back!

I had Bunty until I was about 14, & then I was allowed Mizz. I didn't know anything about how you got pregnant until I was about 18, (assume I either missed or was pulled from all the sex ed classes) & had 3 periods before I figured out what was happening. I did occasionally get to read one of my friends magazines but I was totally clueless. I was sexually assaulted at 15 but lacked the language to describe it, so obviously my puritanical mother presumed the worst.

University was certainly an eye-opener!

@Sparklesocks

I read them every month. They really led me to believe toxic shock syndrome was more likely to be a threat in my life than it’s turned out to be!

Yes! Of course TSS must happen but I've never encountered it in anyone I know through my 40+ years of Real Life. Jackie et al gave the impression hundreds would be keeling over with it every time they put a tampon in.

I read J17 religiously. And wish I didn't. I think I would ban it if my kids wanted to read it. Or debrief the hell out of them after.