CosmoGirl! Gives Girls What They Want and Need

Be warned?if you're looking to score a dirty flip through a teen glossy (maybe find another picture of Britney's ta-ta's, Justin with his shirt off or the latest pronouncement on body glitter), don't reach for Hearst's answer to the new youth market, because CosmoGirl! is not your mother's Cosmo. You will, however, find info on how to prevent the spread of STDs, deal with prejudice against bisexuals in the gay community, survive your best friend shooting up the local high school and, yes, spice up that drab denim. Yet as CosmoGirl! celebrates a successful two-year run this December with a special anniversary issue and a circulation of one million (ironically, the heretofore overlooked teen magazine and Spanish television markets appear to be among the only media outlets still turning a profit), 29-year-old Editor-in-Chief Atoosa Rubenstein insists she owes it all to Helen Gurley Brown.

"In coming up with the CosmoGirl! concept, the first place I looked was Cosmopolitan," Rubenstein explains. "Helen's Cosmo was the voice of a big revolution: the sexual revolution. It was all about giving women power in that aspect of their lives. When I first started having conversations with Hearst in 1998, I felt strongly that we were on the verge of another revolution. This next generation of girls is much savvier and more confident than any in history, and all signs indicate they will actually be the generation that finally pushes past the guys. But these girls didn't have a magazine which spoke to that. Sassy, where I interned throughout college, was a big part of the revolution, but it was so alternative and ahead of its time. I envisioned CosmoGirl! as being every girl's bible."

To be sure?and especially for those on the long-in-the-tooth end of CosmoGirl!'s demographic (which stretches up to age 26)?features on Reese Witherspoon, Gwen Stefani and Freddie Prinze Jr. don't quite get the punk rock points Sassy's coverage of, and more often articles by, edgier stars like Courtney Love, Joey Ramone and RuPaul earned (although the Ashton Kutcher stickers a few months back helped). The more obvious compromise the editors make, and critics often point to, is that while CosmoGirl! ranks among other teen titles as the most outwardly feminist, Janelle Brown clarifies for Salon that "in the fuzzy colloquial lingo of the teen mags," this translates into "girl power." (See the launch issue of Ellegirl now on stands, which prefaces the f-word with "dare we say it?").

But where CosmoGirl! loses ground in its arts coverage and lack of nods to 70s feminism, it gains back doubly everywhere else. For example, CosmoGirl! does an impressive job of walking the line between giving girls what they want and what they need. One page may feature a movie review section with a key including signs for "hot guy alert" and "chick flick" next to a sidebar on herpes and oral sex. And yet the "Not That Innocent" pics of Christina, Britney and Lil' Kim going from fully clothed girls next door at the start of their careers to fully nude at their height (just a few pages away from an ad for Britney's Vegas show on HBO, no less) don't come off as condescendingly didactic. Rubenstein claims that's because she's conscious of the delicate balance between sections like "Ouch!"?personal stories from readers revealing anything from getting caught picking your underwear out of your butt to not having any on at all?and essays like December's "Let's Talk." CosmoGirl! proves its worth in this refreshing editorial encouraging girls to rally themselves and their communities, even giving an address where readers can write to families of those lost in the WTC attack (typical of the strong undercurrent of activism throughout the mag.)

"Random acts of terror will never make sense..." the magazine declares. "On September 11, our country suffered a great loss. But are we beaten down? No way. Because you would never let that happen." CosmoGirl! does not play politics, however, as witnessed again by the anniversary edition. One of the more serious "Inner Girl" contributions?most of which are written by readers?is titled "The Way of the Gun," and allows a 17-year-old from San Antonio to make her case against gun control, while farther on we find a first-person by a high school student with cerebral palsy who sued her school bully, and won (civil suits?every conservative's worst nightmare!).

So while the presentation of fashion, beauty and even home decorating?every month one "cosmo girl" gets an inspirational and extremely inexpensive room makeover that might include a ceiling lamp made out of dixie cups?is beyond compare, it's the gritty stuff, like the first-person by a reader in small-town USA whose father shot her mother and then himself, that makes CosmoGirl! really remarkable. According to Rubenstein, more serious topics appropriate for these "more serious times" will increase in upcoming issues, with features on how to cope when a parent is laid off and developing leadership skills. Rubenstein stresses that the reader "will find that this magazine that was fun when times were good will be a source of strength and information?and of course still fun?when times are tougher."