WASHINGTON — Drug store chain Rite Aid and grocery store chains Food Lion and Hannaford Stores will place Cosmopolitan magazine in polybags in their stores after a major push by National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCSE), formerly known as Morality in Media.
NCSE successfully argued to the chains that Cosmo’s covers are far too explicit to be in plain sight, and too many minors are being exposed to adult subject matters.
Cosmo will now be sealed and covered up at the stores until the magazines are purchased.
“Cosmopolitan magazine regularly features articles, and occasionally explicit pictures, encouraging girls to participate in group, anal, and violent torture sex, and it blatantly targets young girls by displaying teen idols on their cover," said Dawn Hawkins, executive director at NCSE, in a release.
“Recently, Cosmo even posted an article encouraging readers to visit hardcore porn sites, including one site that is particularly focused on the extremely violent torture of women.”
NCSE its campaign against Cosmo in 2013, after it identified the mag as one of the “Dirty Dozen” organizations that contribute to sexual exploration.
NCSE noted in a release that Victoria Hearst, granddaughter of William Randolph Hearst, is supporting the organization’s efforts. Hearst publishes Cosmopolitan.
Cosmopolitan is the best-selling young women's magazine in the U.S., “a bible for fun, fearless females that reaches more than 18 million readers a month,” the magazine states.