Article by Cameron Spink

RALPH Magazine, the Australian monthly men’s magazine, has announced next month’s issue will be their last. This is because of a decline of purchaser’s which the magazine attributes to the “changing tastes of younger readers”.

RALPH has been in publication since August 1997 and catered for the adolescent lad specifically with significant amounts of finely clad woman through-out the magazine.

While it is encouraging to see this decline in interest it is not all good news. It is not that men have stopped indulging in their selfish desires of “adventure, sport, fashion, travel, music, boys toys, beautiful women, or life's essential how-tos” it is merely that they have other options as to where to fulfil their yearnings.

Cue Zoo Weekly.This RALPH replacement has had twice as many sales as RALPH in recent years. And RALPH appears tame in comparison to Zoo’s Magazine. While RALPH catered for all sorts of bloke activities Zoo concentrates most of its magazine space on one: women. Some of the regular features of the magazine include, but not limited to, “the week in boobs”, “talking balls” and “in bed with...”. Furthermore each month of Zoo includes discussions with bikini babes about sexual positions and lesbian fantasies.

Both of these soft pornographic magazines have the inevitable effect of desensitising the reader until the viewer starts seeking out more hard-core images. And this is the second reason RALPH Magazine has stopped being printed. Because of the power of the internet. While the magazine may have decline the RALPH website is doing just fine and has no intention of finishing.

The internet also makes available free pornography for those unwilling to fork out a monthly fee to buy magazines and this is invariably where some of RALPH’s target audience have absconded to.

So the decline of the printed RALPH does not spell good news. Other entertainment mediums have been able to disperse these magazines much further than could ever have been dreamed in 1997 and a man can now satisfy his indulgences with one click of a button rather than a quick walk to his closest newsagency.

It is because of this that I grieve rather than rejoice at the death of the RALPH Magazine. For the modern man is caught in the grip of a much greater power that threatens to consume any sense of decency that once existed. We are at war with a world that tries to impose sexual freedom upon us but provides us with only a prison. The decline of the magazine format is not a victory. It is merely moving the battlelines into the cyber world. However, this is an article for another time.