Walmart surprisingly announced Tuesday it will be taking Cosmopolitan magazine off the shelves in its checkout area.
The massive corporation decided to pull the magazine from 5,000 shelves across the country in solidarity with sexual harassment victims and the #MeToo movement.
Mary @MissEveningstar, I was shocked when I saw you on my newsstand. How on earth do you do it? I know the Cosmo publisher had a fancy for you but to feature you on the cover? Once again you blow my mind and will always be my #WCW . But tell me, did you love him or butcher him? pic.twitter.com/SEv3ucu3sN
— Dr. Miranda Forester (@TeaQueen77) March 1, 2018
The National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE), which raises awareness for sexual assault, mistreatment, and exploitation, announced Walmart’s decision in a press release today.
“This is what real change looks like in our #MeToo culture, and NCOSE is proud to work with a major corporation like Walmart to combat sexually exploitative influences in our society,” executive director Dawn Hawkins said today. “Further, Cosmo targets young girls by placing former Disney stars on its covers, despite the enclosed sexually erotic articles which describe risky sexual acts like public, intoxicated, or anal sex in detail. Customers should not be forced to be exposed to this content when they are trying to check out at the store.”
NCOSE claims Cosmo creates an unsafe environment for kids when they pass by the magazines on display near the checkout. While Walmart isn’t getting rid of Cosmo entirely, they’ve vowed to move the magazines elsewhere in the store where young eyes are less likely to see them.
This has got to be one of the stupider decisions of 2018. And there have been a lot. The mainstream left and the Hollywood elite have conducted a months-long goose chase to root out all the possible sexual offenders from coast to coast. Third wave feminists are marching for rights they already have and demanding to be paid equally and taken seriously. They’re also writing for publications like Cosmopolitan, Refinery 29, and other progressive feminist publications that feature stories about 21st century sex and gender plights. Don’t get me wrong, Cosmopolitan can get pretty raunchy, but it’s still considered a mainstream publication. But if we start to demand silence in the name of #MeToo, #TimesUp, and other catchy hashtags, the world becomes a more dangerous, more hypocritical place, not a safer one.
Taking a progressive magazine off the shelf because it might make some people uncomfortable is not woke. It’s censorship.
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