Honey, March 1976

This week we’re diving into a magazine that neither of us had heard of (though our mums had!) — Honey.

You can join the discussion HERE. And if you haven’t listened to the episode yet, you can do that HERE.

Lucy Douglas 00:00

Do you work out in the bath? Are you sufficiently selfish to hold down a job and a boyfriend? Do you know how to play Libido properly? If you answered yes, or no, to any of the above, you've come to the right place.

[Theme music]

Lucy Douglas 00:21

Hello, and welcome to Mag Hags, the podcast that sincerely wants to be selfish. I'm Lucy Douglas. 

Franki Cookney 00.29

And I'm Franki Cookney. Together we're diving into the glossy archives of women's magazines to find out what's still hot, and what's definitely not. 

Lucy Douglas 00.40

Hello, Franki, how are you? 

Franki Cookney 00.42

Hi Lucy, I am okay. Working hard, playing hard, you know, parenting hard.

Lucy Douglas 00.50 

Are you, having it all? 

Franki Cookney 00.52

I'm, I'm really trying, but you know what, I've been thinking about that. So in our very first episode, you told me about the origin of the phrase having it all. 

Lucy Douglas 01.02 

I did, yeah. I think having it all is a phrase that was kicking around from like the late 70s onwards but it was popularised by Helen Gurley Brown who was the editor of Cosmopolitan in the US at the time and she published a book in 1982 that was called Having It All.

Franki Cookney 01.21

The subtitle of which was Love, Success, Sex, Money. 

Lucy Douglas 01.26

Exactly. 

Franki Cookney 01.28

And, that got me thinking, because I, as someone who was born after 1982 and grew up in the 90s and the early 2000s, I had always thought that having it all meant having kids in a career, but there is nothing in that subtitle about parenthood, and there's very little mention of children in the book at all.

Lucy Douglas 01.46

No, yeah, and, um, Helen Gurley Brown didn't have kids herself. 

Franki Cookney 01.50

Right. Um. And so, at risk of having a feminist epiphany right here on the podcast, I feel like the meaning of having it all has been twisted in the intervening years. Like, I see people, particularly millennial mothers, joking about the impossibility of it. I see, you know, I see outrage about the pressure and expectations it has supposedly created. It was never supposed to mean that. Having children was never part of the picture of having it all. At least not for Gurley Brown. 

Lucy Douglas 02.20

Yeah, yeah. You've been barking up the wrong tree, mate. 

Franki Cookney 02.23 

All this time, Lucy! 

Lucy Douglas 02.26

Yeah. I mean, also, like, I think the whole idea of trying to have it all has fallen out of fashion, or like It's certainly not on trend anymore. I think most of us are aware now that there's only so many hours in the day, and the idea of trying to have a kick ass career and a, like a really high flying career and a really fulfilling and busy family life are relatively incompatible in terms of time. But in term, I guess in terms of like discourse, we've done a real 180, isn't it? Like it's not cool to be girl bossing anymore. Like we're all quiet quitting now and fighting back against hustle culture and toxic productivity. 

Franki Cookney 03.08

Yeah, so true. Okay. So with that in mind, if you were going to write a book called having it all now, what would your subtitle be, do you reckon? What's our all in 2024?

Lucy Douglas 03.19

Okay, um, what's my all in 2024? Something like a living wage, anxiety, men to keep emotionally at arm's length, but reliably have sex with, and decent pubs. 

Franki Cookney 03.36

Amazing. An impossible dream, Lucy. An impossible dream. I think I'm gonna go for Authenticity, community, influence and brand deals.

Lucy Douglas 03.48 

Friendship, purpose, pleasure, plants.

Franki Cookney 03.52

Oh, I love that one. Yeah, I'll take that. I'll take that. 

Lucy Douglas 03.56

And actually that's quite a good wholesome note on which to move into talking about this week's magazine because this week we are going back to, I wouldn't say necessarily a more innocent time, like it was super, it was a super important time in feminism, definitely, but it was pre- Thatcher. And I think while we'll definitely like see the women in this magazine working very hard. It's definitely not as brash in tone as some of the mags that came like later in the 80s. Like it's, it's quite a bit more gentle. 

Franki Cookney 04.29

Okay. So not girl bossing. 

Lucy Douglas 04.31

It’s not girl bossing, no. I'd say it's like, girl, go get them.

Franki Cookney 04.36

Oh, okay. I'm really excited. 

Lucy Douglas 04.39

Are you ready to get into it? 

Franki Cookney 04.40 

I am. 

[Music break]

Lucy Douglas 04.43

This week, we are going back to March 1976. And we are reading a magazine. That you might not have heard of before. It's called Honey. So, Honey magazine ran from 1960 to 1986. When it was merged with 19 magazine, I believe. And at its height, it had a circulation of 250,000, apparently. Which, to put that in context today, it would make it like the third most popular women's mag today, I believe. According to the latest ABC figures. 

Franki Cookney 05.16

That's incredible because I had not heard of this magazine.

Lucy Douglas 05.20 

Yeah, it was huge. But just before we dive in, I wanted to talk a little bit about the context of March 1976 in the UK. One of my colleagues recommended to me a mini series of ‘The Rest is History’ podcast. Which I hadn't actually listened to before and I'm sort of since realizing that it's kind of like recommending Desert Island Discs to someone. So I thought it would be useful listening to kind of better understand where the UK is socially when this magazine is published.

Franki Cookney 05.48

Yeah, okay.

Lucy Douglas 05.49

So it turns out the UK is in a very bad place in 1974. It's pretty much on its arse economically, it is experiencing its first post war recession. Northern Ireland was under a state of emergency and that was the year that there were various kind of bombings in England that the IRA claimed responsibility for. There were two general elections held in 1974, so a lot of political turmoil. 

Franki Cookney 06.15

Oh boy. 

Lucy Douglas 06.16

Uh, yeah. Sound familiar at all? Like rampant inflation, cost of living crisis. Anyway, Howard Wilson became Prime Minister for the second time, he was previously PM in the 60s, but he doesn't stay Prime Minister for very long. He announces his resignation in March 1976. 

Franki Cookney 06.35

Oh, just when our magazine comes out. 

Lucy Douglas 06.37

Yeah, and I think as we're about to see, it's quite an interesting backdrop on which to be publishing what is like, quite a cheery, upbeat little mag. 

Franki Cookney 06.46

Mmm, okay. And that is interesting as well, because when I think of the mid and late 70s, I think of punk, right? And my first thought was, what was Patti Smith doing in 1976? Because I knew that her debut album came out at the end of 1975. And like the Sex Pistols formed in 1975, The Clash, The Jam, The Buzzcocks, all these bands were getting together around this time. So that whole scene was really kicking off. But, I'm going to hazard a guess that the March 1976 issue of Honey Magazine is not very punk? 

Lucy Douglas 07.21

Absolutely not very punk, Franki. Very much not punk, I would say. But, let's dive in. Okay, so, Franki, you're, I'm gonna say like 21. You might have just watched the Winter Olympics on tv, you might have just been to see the new Pink Panther film at the cinema with Peter Sellers and Christopher Plummer. If you're anything like our cover girl: you're young, fun and fresh faced and rocking a baby blue cotton like utility jumpsuit. You have got some very skinny eyebrows, got a lot of heavy black like inner liner. We've got a lot of kohl on the inner line. 

Franki Cookney 08.03

Oh yes, love that. 

Lucy Douglas 08.04 

And very peachy cheeks. 

Franki Cookney 08.06

People do say that about me.

Lucy Douglas 08.09

They do. Our cover lines are ‘Is selfishness a sin or a necessity?’ ‘The Who, still a smashing rock band?’

Franki Cookney 08.18

Wait, is there a question mark at the end of that? 

Lucy Douglas 08.20

No, I'm doing The Who dirty there. ‘The Who, still a Still a smashing rock band’. Is something about the word still? Like they're still here guys. Don't forget about The Who.

We've got a 1, 2, 3 of makeup. 

Franki Cookney 08.35

Oh, yes. 

Lucy Douglas 08.36 

People who contact the dead. Our freebie, our freebie for this issue was, um, a double sided record with four great new Philly soul tracks. Definitely not very punk, but, um, but a nice little freebie, I think. 

Franki Cookney 08.51

Yeah. 

Lucy Douglas 08.52

Starting now, our new serial by prize winning novelist Beryl Bainbridge. And yeah, so later in the mag, there's like an extract from a novel, which is quite cute, I think. 

Franki Cookney 09.03 

Yeah, I'm into that. I've heard of Beryl Bainbridge as well, like she's kind of a big deal, isn't she? Oh, she won a Whitbread Award in 1977 and in 1996, nominated five times for the Booker Prize. Anyway, yeah, please, please continue.

Lucy Douglas 09.17

Our final cover line, How are your weekends? Homely, sexy, useful, stylish, or rotten? 

Franki Cookney 09.20

Oh, um. I'm gonna say all of the above. 

Lucy Douglas 09.31

Okay, I think mine are, uh, useful with sexy rising. My overall vibe of this magazine, kind of reading through it, and this seems like especially more stark now that I know that life is kind of tough in the UK at this point. But this is just like a really like optimistic magazine, I think. A lot of the features and a lot of the adverts as well just seem very geared up towards like, you are a young woman going out into the world and you can do stuff. You have opportunity and you can live a cool life. So overall, I feel like this magazine feels a bit less like it's sort of reporting on the issues of the day, than our Cosmo was that we looked at last week. And it feels a lot more like it's kind of reflecting on how young women live now. 

Franki Cookney 10.27

Okay. 

Lucy Douglas 10.28

Which, I don't know how exciting I would have necessarily found that as a reader in 1976. However, for our purposes, it feels like a very rich time capsule. And actually, at this point, it would be a good moment to flag, if you want to read any of the features that we talk about or look at any of the adverts that we talk about on the magazine, you can sign up to our newsletter, maghags.substack.com. So that's mag, M A G H A G S dot substack dot com. 

Franki Cookney 11.03

Yes, I love this idea. I think it's going to be a really good way for people to actually engage with the features and the adverts and look at all the design elements and then they'll really understand what we're talking about and be able to send us their thoughts.

[Music break]

Lucy Douglas 11.17

The first feature that I wanted to talk about today is a particularly strong example I think of how women are living at the time. And it's the one, it's our story from the cover. How are your weekends? Homely, sexy, useful, stylish or rotten? So this feature is simply called weekending and it's basically you can do all sorts of things at the weekend.

So we're going to ask some people what they do. And the hook for this feature, the like the why now element, um, appears to be a new advert for British Rail because yes, the railways are state owned in 1976. And that advert reads, see a friend this weekend with a picture of like a smiling young woman in a fur coat and one of those sort of, uh, thick fur hat stepping off a train with her arms open having a very fabulous time.

Franki Cookney 12.08

Yeah, I think, I feel like I could totally imagine the vibe, that kind of retro travel by train vibe, like have a fun weekend away by train. 

Lucy Douglas 12.18

Right, yeah. Um, which makes it all the more hilarious that nobody in this feature uses trains. They all either stay at home or drive, except, apart from one, the one case study who does, uh, talk about using the train, to go and stay with her parents, literally says it's the only thing about her weekend that she doesn't like. “The train services are so bad, I seem to spend the whole day trying to catch trains.”

Franki Cookney 12.46

This has gone really badly for British Rail. 

Lucy Douglas 12.48 

It's gone so badly as a PR opportunity, it's gone so badly. In fact, even, even more amusingly, say like the model on this advert is the first case study. She kind of makes a point of saying like right at the beginning that she wouldn't dream of getting the train. Like literally, I think the quote is, um, “See a friend this weekend, and that's pretty much what she does, though she wouldn't dream of going by train.” 

Franki Cookney 13.15

I feel like they needed to do a bit more work on her contract before they put her up for interview, didn't they? 

Lucy Douglas 13.22

Right? Yeah. 

Franki Cookney 13.22

I don't think I would be very interested to read that feature now, but I am very excited to hear what people were doing on the weekends in 1976.

Lucy Douglas 13.30

Well, exactly. This is what I mean. For our purposes, this is, this is an absolute goldmine. So we've got five case studies. Three of them are called Sue.

Franki Cookney 13.40

Stop it. 

Lucy Douglas 13.42

I'll give you, like, a really quick summary of them all. So, our first case study is Greta. She is a model, and she likes to get out of the city on a, at the weekends, and she goes down to her house in Surrey with her husband.

Our second case study is Sue number one and her husband Bob, and they have a sort of quite standard sort of weekend. They like to eat food, they play games, they see friends, go to the pub, that sort of thing. Case study number three is Rosemary and I'm going to come back to Rosemary because she was the one that piqued my interest the most at the start.

Case study number four is Sue two and her partner Don and they spend their weekends on a boat and like a proper sailing yacht like not like, not like a barge. Um, and then the fifth case study is Sue number three who is only 16 and her first job in London and she goes home to her parents at the weekends.

Franki Cookney 14.41

And she's the one who hates trains. 

Lucy Douglas 14.46 

She is the one who hates trains. Yes, correct. Okay, so I want to start off by talking about Rosemary. Rosemary is one of this season's debutantes. 

Franki Cookney 14.55

Oh, is she? 

Lucy Douglas 14.57 

So I didn't really know anything about like the ‘London season’ and ‘the debutante’, you know, I didn't know anything about that whole scene.

Franki Cookney 15.05

You're not, you're not posh enough to know about the debutante scene, Lucy, I'm astounded. 

Lucy Douglas 15.09

I'm not, I'm not posh enough, but I looked into it and actually, so the main, the big like debutante ball, the one that kind of started in the Regency era, that is the kind of iconic ball when you think of the debutante.

Franki Cookney 15.24

Yes. 

Lucy Douglas 15.25

So that's called the Queen Charlotte's Ball. It was started in the 1700s. And that was when women, or girls becoming women, of a certain upper class in society were presented to the royal family. And that tradition kept going until 1958. 

Franki Cookney 15.41

Like they were literally presented to the royal family? 

Lucy Douglas 15.44

They were literally presented to the royal family until 1958.

Franki Cookney 15.47

Oh my god, like, here are some new females for you. 

Lucy Douglas 15.51

Yeah, exactly, exactly. And you had to be, so in order to be presented to the royal family, I think you had to be presented by your mother or a close female relative, but they had to have been a debutante themselves. 

Franki Cookney 16.06

Wow. 

Lucy Douglas 16.07

So that was kind of kept very like within a class system, very inherited. But in the late 19th century and early 20th century, it became more commonplace for like, like wealthy Americans who really, really wanted the status of it could buy a presentation, a like ticket into the debutante ball from some English aristocrat that was a bit cash poor. 

Franki Cookney 16.32

Oh really? 

Lucy Douglas 16.34

Yeah, so there was a lot of like diluting the…

Franki Cookney 16.38

The Americans diluted the British aristocracy!

Lucy Douglas 16.42

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Anyway, so Queen Elizabeth put a stop to it as part of her kind of drive to modernise the monarchy when she first became Queen in the 50s. The party line was that there would no longer be a member of the royal family at the Queen Charlotte Ball because it was part of a drive to modernise the monarchy. That was the official party line from Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip.

Franki Cookney 17.04

Is there a but? 

Lucy Douglas 17.06

Yeah, yeah, there is. Princess Margaret went on the record as saying, we had to put a stop to it because they started letting any old tart in London in. 

Franki Cookney 17.15

Incredible. So these balls, in 1976, these balls were still going on, is that right? But just, there was no royalty there. 

Lucy Douglas 17.22

Yeah, exactly. So they, the tradition kept going for another 18 years. They kept the Queen Charlotte ball going, but they sort of became less relevant and less popular over that time. And then 1976 was actually the last Queen Charlotte ball that was hosted. 

Franki Cookney 17.39

Wow, the end of an era.

Lucy Douglas 17.40

Yeah, it was. It was revived in the, in the noughties, I believe, but it was happening. And this, so this case study is a really interesting little sort of mirror into a very sort of specific type of upper class 20th century Englishness, I think. So basically Rosemary spends her weekends, going to a coming out party, a ball, held by one of her friends or another. Another debutante. So in order to attend, you just kind of go and stay at somebody else's house. 

Franki Cookney 18.16

Okay.

Lucy Douglas 18.17 

And it doesn't seem to be any like suggestion that you necessarily know the person whose house you're going to stay at. You just get put up in the house of some other posh person who lives nearby and presumably has a enormous pile in the country, with many a spare bedroom.

Franki Cookney 18.38

Infinite numbers of bedrooms. 

Lucy Douglas 18.40

Yeah.

Franki Cookney 18.40

Can I tell you what really struck me about this? Rosemary has this whole section where she's talking about packing wrong for the countryside. Now, she doesn't mean for the ball, does she? Presumably you wear a ball gown for the ball. I think she's talking about the daytime on Sunday.

 Lucy Douglas 18.57

Yeah. No, it's the daytime on the Sunday. She's packed a skirt and everyone's wearing jeans. 

Franki Cookney 19.03

Yes. And I was like, this is amazing, I'm obsessed with this! Also because this is the second mention in this feature of the countryside dress code, ‘cause Greta, who was the first case study you mentioned also talks about: 'Oh, well, when I'm out in the countryside, I just wear jeans and you know, it's a totally different vibe out there.' I was just really intrigued by this very upfront discussion of the fact that there is a different dress code for the countryside and the city. Because I think there is, I just don't think anybody would vocalise it in that way.

Lucy Douglas 19.46

And also I think London style now is like sooo casual compared to outside London, which is, I'm thinking like evening wear specifically, like women's evening wear outside London is still glam. 

Franki Cookney 20.00

Yeah. 

Lucy Douglas 20.00

Women's evening wear, if you live in London, is very deliberately not glam. 

Franki Cookney 20.08

Well, I mean, speak for yourself. I do actually rail against that slightly, like I, I can't get on board with trainers as evening wear. I just, I, I cannot, but I do hear what you're saying completely, but if I'm going out to the countryside for a weekend, maybe I'm going to visit friends or just having a weekend away. There are definitely things I wouldn't bother packing because I'm like, nah, that's a bit London-y. 

Lucy Douglas 20.32

Interesting. 

Franki Cookney 20.34

And then I read this article and was like, this is fascinating because it sounds really archaic, but I don't, I actually don't think those dress codes are non existent. They're just a little bit more…

Lucy Douglas 20.46

They’re subtler. 

Franki Cookney 20.46

I just think different places do have different vibes. And you know me, I love a packing list. 

Lucy Douglas 20.49

Oh yeah, you do. 

Franki Cookney 20.50

So if I was going to the Cotswolds for a weekend in a big house, I would get such a kick out of spending the week before thinking about what to pack.

Lucy Douglas 20.59

Planning your cardigans. 

Franki Cookney 21.00

Yes! 

Lucy Douglas 21.02

Shall we talk about Bob in Sue number one? So just again, for another little bit of context, so Sue number three is 16, which I thought was absolutely fascinating in the context of like being a working young woman who lives in the city in the week and goes back to her parents at the weekend. By contrast, Sue number one and her husband Bob look about 40. They don't say how old they are in the feature.

Franki Cookney 21.31

But they talk about not being young. 

Lucy Douglas 21.33

I also actually don't think they are as old as 40. I think they're, I think they're maybe in their early thirties, probably in their like late twenties. I think they're probably about 28, but I just think the style, particularly the men's style. The style of Bob and that absolutely insane moustache he has just makes him look so much older. 

Franki Cookney 21.56

But his attitude as well, like I really hate what he says about, there's this line where he talks about not having to keep up with going to parties because they're no longer young, trendy, and single, and I was a bit like, Bob, don't, don't give up, man.

Lucy Douglas 22.19

Don't put yourself out to pasture, Bob. 

Franki Cookney 22.12

Yeah, exactly. I don't know, it just, it really made me angry. Um, not as angry, though, about the fact that Sue is working as a fucking nurse! And she's still having to do all of the housework and washing on her Fridays, quote, ‘before Bob gets home’. 

Lucy Douglas 22.29

This is a common theme in quite a lot of the anecdotes that we come across in this magazine.

Franki Cookney 22.34

Greta as well. She's your first case study, isn't she? And they're the ones that go out to their big country mansion on the weekends. And you said she's a model. She sounds like she's got quite a sort of jet setting career, but then she's definitely doing like all of the cooking and that sort of stuff, isn’t she?

Lucy Douglas 22.63

Yeah, I get up very early on Saturday morning, go shopping, come back and start cooking. We always have country sausages for lunch on Saturday. Saturday night we have a huge dinner and sit around the fire. Sunday we get up very late and have an enormous breakfast. I do spend a lot of the weekend cooking, she says later, and I get very exhausted.

Franki Cookney 23.12

Yeah, I'm not fucking surprised. 

Lucy Douglas 23.14

All these dinners, all these huge meals, Greta, that you're making for people. 

Franki Cookney 23.19

I read that and I was like, I can't decide whether I'm envious or horrified by Greta's weekends. Because on the one hand, they have this big country home, which they can invite friends to stay with them. 

Lucy Douglas 23.30

They do also have an exquisite Chelsea townhouse. 

Franki Cookney 23.34

Well, there you go. Exactly. What's not to envy? But then at the same time, I just, I don't know, man. I got kind of really sweaty thinking about her getting home from a work trip at 1am and making a fucking salmon mousse. Anyway, back to Bob and Sue.

Lucy Douglas 23.50

Back to Bob and Sue. Yeah. So Bob, Bob has said we don't really need to bother with keeping up with going to parties. I mean, as a concept, I find that slightly baffling because what do you mean keep up with the idea? Going to parties isn't a chore, Bob. Yeah. So we've already established that Sue is, is cooking for Bob. Bob goes to the pub for a bit on a Saturday afternoon and watch this sport. And then sometimes at weekends, they have their friends around, what their friends call John and Val for dinner, and then play a game called Libido. “After dinner, it's listening to records and board games, cards for minor stakes, a penny or a ha’penny, or Libido. Though we don't play Libido as it's supposed to be played, much to my annoyance.” I have never heard of Libido. 

Franki Cookney 24.36

Well, I had not heard of Libido, but as soon as I read about it in this magazine, I immediately Googled it. And when I Googled it, I immediately saw it for sale on eBay for 11 pounds. And so I think you know where the story is going, Lucy, don't you?

Lucy Douglas 24.51

Oh my God. Yes, I do. Please tell me more. 

Franki Cookney 24.54

I am the proud owner of a vintage 1971 set of Libido, the board game. 

Lucy Douglas 25.02

Okay. Tell me about Libido. What is it? 

Franki Cookney 25.05

I, I have played it once. It's basically strip monopoly. 

Lucy Douglas 25.09

I was gonna say, is there an element of stripping? That's heavily implied in Bob's “we don't play Libido as it's supposed to be played, much to my annoyance” quote.

Franki Cookney 25.18

Exactly. So this is, I'm reading directly from the rules of Libido right now. “The object of the game is to accumulate as much money as possible while at the same time compelling opponents to remove their clothes and also to reveal their sexual attitudes.” You know how in Monopoly you've sort of got the community chest and the chance cards and that sort of thing?

Lucy Douglas 25.39

Yeah. 

Franki Cookney 25.39

Um, similar vibes with Libido, like you go around the board and depending what symbol you land on, there's a pack of sex cards and a pack of money cards, different sort of challenges on each of them. And a lot of the questions are sort of like, whoever can't answer this question has to remove one item of clothing, that kind of thing. However, there is also a pack of clothing cards, which you can deal out and people can just symbolically give up their clothing. So you've got a choice as to whether you give up one of your clothing cards or if you play it properly you remove actual items of clothing. 

Lucy Douglas 26.14

Okay, okay. 

Franki Cookney 26.17

I have to be honest with you, Rob and I did not play the strip version, mainly because it was a bit cold and I couldn't be arsed.

Lucy Douglas 26.26 

Can you imagine getting a couple of friends around for a dinner party and playing that? 

Franki Cookney 26.31

I've, I've imagined little else. I actually posted about it on Instagram and was like, anyone want to come around for games night? And I got zero takers. 

Lucy Douglas 26.40

Rude. 

Franki Cookney 26.41

I know. Anyway, so just to give you an example of one of the cards that you might pick in Libido, give any player who has not made love to you, 500 pounds as consolation. 

Lucy Douglas 26.53

Oh, amazing. 

Franki Cookney 26.54

Yeah, I would say, I mean, it's really fun and psychedelic and I'll include some pictures in the newsletter, but I would say that my overall impression of Libido is that it is somehow both overly complicated and boring.

Lucy Douglas 27.13

It's not a golden era of board games game. 

Franki Cookney 27.15

No, I think. I think it's ripe for an update, honestly. And I think I could come up with the goods. 

Lucy Douglas 27.24

There's another nice little sort of article that's like a kind of how we live now sort of piece. In the very rich journalistic territory of imagine living in not London, where we literally just meet these two different case studies who don't live in London. I don't want to talk about it in loads of depth, but I do just want to mention the second case study, these two women called Angela, they're 29 and 30 and they've left London to go and live in Somerset. They work for Friends of the Earth and they grow all their own vegetables. And there's so much what we would now see as like cliche euphemisms in there. There's a lot of, um, my mother would prefer to see me married and having children. She thinks this is just a phase. 

Franki Cookney 28.14

Just a phase. 

Lucy Douglas 28.14

Yeah, there are so many like absolute clangers in there. And my question is, do you think, do you think the staff of Honey Magazine realise that they were selling a bucolic lesbian dream, or do you think they genuinely thought that they were just talking about two women best friends who had moved into their own home together in deepest darkest Somerset. 

Franki Cookney 28.43

Oh, do you know what? I don't know. I've thought so much about this because you could not read this feature now in 2024 and not understand that these women are a couple, right? 

Lucy Douglas 28.56

Yeah. 

Franki Cookney 28.56

You couldn't miss that. You know, we spend a lot of time talking about those kinds of memes, like the just a phase or just close friends. All of that stuff is just so obvious to us now. It's really, really hard to work out whether a) the readers, and b) as you say, the editors, would have been aware or not. I've got to say yes, and I'm basing that purely on, just like, my mum, who is not a magazine editor, but she was a 19 year old woman in 1976, living in London. She read Honey, I asked her. She remembers it. I don't think she would have missed the inference here. I just don't think she would have done. 

Lucy Douglas 29.38

Okay. Okay. 

Franki Cookney 29.39

Um, that's not to say that every reader would have got it. But yeah, speaking of my mum, when I read the weekending feature, I realised it's almost 50 years ago, but there wasn't one lifestyle here that sort of felt relatable. Do you know what I mean? I found myself reading it being like, so what were the cool kids doing in 1976 on the weekend? And like specifically the cool kids who didn't have lots of money. And so I asked my mum, um, basically she gave me a whole list of pubs that she liked going to. She told me she was going to see all these bands, The Movies, The Diversions, The Jam, like there's no mention of people going out to gigs or anything like that in this feature, which is interesting. 

Lucy Douglas 30.23

Or even like the cinema or the theatre or anything. 

Franki Cookney 30.25

Exactly, like there's kind of no culture. I mentioned earlier that my first thought about 1976 was what was Patti Smith doing? Two months after this was published, Patti Smith was on the cover of Time Out wearing, like, a leather jacket with nothing underneath, talking about, like, her gender expression, and I feel like there was a lot of exciting, transgressive, creative stuff going on in that time. 

Lucy Douglas 30.48

I spoke to my mum about what she was up to in 1976 as well. She was either working very hard or getting very pissed with her medical school friends. She was very like, we were either in the pub or getting a curry. Turns out my mum absolutely not counterculture at all. 

Franki Cookney 31.06

I regret to acknowledge that I think my mum was quite cool. And she also said she was training to be a teacher, right? And I'm sure your mum was unionised as well as a medic, but she was like, oh, everyone was in the NUT, the teachers union, you know, she was involved in CND. One of the things she said, and I wrote it down in quote marks was, ‘everybody was very radical’. Which is not really reflected in the pages of Honey, is it? 

Lucy Douglas 31.30

No, not at all. 

[Jingle]

Franki Cookney 31.33

Hey Lucy, I heard you joined the Navy. 

Lucy Douglas 31.34

That's right, the Wrens! Well, you know me the last thing I wanted to do when I left school was a 9 to 5 job where I just did the same thing every day.

Franki Cookney 31.44

Isn't it horribly strict? 

Lucy Douglas 31.45

Not at all! When I first joined, I thought it would be people shouting at you and telling you what to do, but it's not like that at all. I live in a big house in Kensington and share with three other girls. We can go out whenever we like in the evening and nobody stops us or asks where we're going.

Franki Cookney 32.02

Oh, that does sound rather jolly, but what do you actually do?

Lucy Douglas 32.06

Well, they offered me three different jobs and I chose radio operator. Basically, my job's typing messages onto tapes and sending them to Naval ships and bases around the world. It might be a top secret message, or it could be something routine. All the messages go through a computer, so there's a lot to learn, and you have to know all the right codes. 

Franki Cookney 32.28

Oh, how terribly exciting! But aren't you worried they'll ship you off somewhere miles away? 

Lucy Douglas 32.33

On the contrary, I actually want to go overseas. For me, that's part of the appeal. I'll probably be sent to Gibraltar next year, but if I'm really lucky, I might get to go to Oslo and work with NATO.

Franki Cookney 32.45

Goodness, how grand! Can anybody join?

Lucy Douglas 32.48

If they're between the ages of 16 and three quarters, and 28, yes! So, if you like the sound of life in the Wrens, get in touch! 

[Jingle]

Lucy Douglas 32.54

Oh, how time flies! Can you believe it's 1976 already? 

Franki Cookney 33.03

I know, and I still don't know what the face of the 70s is. 

Lucy Douglas 33.07

Tell me about it. I've seen you down on the high street in your winged eyeliner and pearlescent lippy.

Franki Cookney 33.13

Oh no, how do I stop looking so 60s? 

Lucy Douglas 33.17

Well, it looks like the face of the 70s has finally come through, and according to Mary Quant, it was well worth waiting for. 

Franki Cookney 33.24

I don't know what any of that means, but please, for the love of god, tell me, how should I be doing my makeup in 1976? 

Lucy Douglas 33.31

Well, undress your eyes, and dress up your lips and nails. But of course, it's not as simple as just leaving off your mascara and slapping on an extra coat of nail varnish. 

Franki Cookney 33.42

It's not? 

Lucy Douglas 33.43

No. But don't worry, Mary Quant has your back. She's introduced three new colours to her Peep Eyes Duo Powder Shadow, called Pebble Dash, Grey Skies, and Watery Greens. 

Franki Cookney 33.55

Watery greens. Okay. And, um, does Mary Quant have any new lip and nail products for me? 

Lucy Douglas 34.03

She does. They're not bright, but they're certainly not dull. All I can say is they're very unpearly and positive. 

Franki Cookney 34.10

Well, thank goodness for that. But hang on, what do you mean, all you can say? I thought you were trying to sell me this stuff.

Lucy Douglas 34.17

They have a little difference that's going to make all the difference. 

Franki Cookney 34.22

What? 

Lucy Douglas 34.23

Get the fashion look from Mary Quant. 

[Jingle]

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Lucy Douglas 34.28

Some more completely inexplicable advert copy. 

Franki Cookney 34.31

Absolutely fantastic. Probably a good time to mention again, as we said before, if you want to see these ads in all their glory, do make sure you sign up to the newsletter at maghags.substack.com. 

Lucy Douglas 34.41

I think we should also include some others that haven't made it into the ad break, but are equally compelling. There's another lovely little classified ad for a series of brochures if you are marrying a Catholic man. 

Franki Cookney 34.57

How to guide for marrying into Catholicism. 

Lucy Douglas 34.59

Yeah, I'm absolutely obsessed with it.

[Music break]

Lucy Douglas 35.02

Do you sincerely want to be selfish?

Franki Cookney 35.05

Hmm. 

Lucy Douglas 35.05

Actually, I just want to read the intro, actually, because it, a) sets up the feature really nicely, and b) I think it absolutely slaps. So: “Selfish is sensible. Undoubtedly, indisputably sensible. Everybody told me so. The psychiatrist, the sinner, the saint, and my mother. Which was mean of her really, because like everybody else's mother, she spent my childhood telling me to be unselfish. And then suddenly, when I was nearly grown, she announced that if I didn't look after myself, nobody else would. And quite right she was.” That's an absolutely banging intro. 

Franki Cookney 35.41

Yeah, it’s great. 

Lucy Douglas 35.42

I think it's brilliant. 

Franki Cookney 35.43

Who is the author? 

Lucy Douglas 35.44

Penny Vincenzi, who is, she's on the staff at the magazine. I think she's the beauty editor of Honey, but she goes on to have, well, she has like quite a successful magazine career, Cosmo. I think she works at Vogue for a while. I think she may have even worked at some of the Sunday papers. And then she became an author in a sort of Jilly Cooper vein, and she sold, she published 17 novels and sold 7 million copies of her books worldwide. 

Franki Cookney 36.10

Incredible. 

Lucy Douglas 36.10

Died in 2018. Isn't that cool? 

Franki Cookney 36.12

Yeah. Yeah. Really cool. 

Lucy Douglas 36.14

As the intro kind of suggests, the sort of crux of this feature is we've always been told that being selfish is bad, but actually we kind of need to look after ourselves and, you know, be able to support ourselves. Then she goes on to, she speaks to somebody who is very, very unselfish and speaks to somebody who is very, very selfish. And then we kind of meet in the middle. So, Franki, did anything in particular stand out to you about this feature? 

Franki Cookney 36.40

The fact that we're literally still talking about this. Features are being written about this daily. Like, how selfish is too selfish? And maybe being selfish is good, actually? I also agree with you. I think the writing of this feature is fantastic. 

Lucy Douglas 36.56

Yeah. 

Franki Cookney 36.56

There's a great line. that I really loved, you can just really hear the tone of it. She's talking about how, obviously the idea of being unselfish is all well and good, kind of thing, but like, what are you supposed to do when you actually get out into the real world and people aren't giving way all the time? So she says, “If nobody's grabbing, that's lovely, but they mostly are. So what are you meant to do about it?” It's just like, Oh yeah, I feel that. 

Lucy Douglas 37.24

Yeah, I feel like now we'd call it boundaries. It's around this kind of pop psychology, like pseudo therapeutic speak that happens a lot on TikTok and that, you know, everybody's had therapy, so everybody's learned to talk, therapy speak. We are still talking about this, we're just talking about it in a more sophisticated way than they were talking about it in 1976. 

Franki Cookney 37.47

I mean yes and no. I know what you mean because it's quite blunt and I'm sure you'll share some examples in a minute, but at the same time the discourse now is very sort of like ‘actually it's totally okay to put your needs first’ and that doesn't actually feel like it's a more intelligent angle than this article, which actually really does sort of explore what it is that drives people to be unselfish, or what it is that drives people to be selfish, rather than just being like, it's totally okay to do you, babe. It really reminds me, if you remember that meme of a therapist saying, here's the text that you can send your friend if you can't deal with them right now. And it was like, Hey, uh, I'm so glad you reached out. I'm actually at capacity and I don't think I could hold appropriate space for you right now. Or, you know, whatever it was. I feel like that's where we are. It's trying to come up with some magic code that gets us off the hook for giving a fuck about each other. And at least this is sort of, curious, you know, about human nature and different ways of behaving. 

Lucy Douglas 38.54

Yeah. Yeah. That's such a good point. So we've got this unnamed psychiatrist who features heavily in the intro, who I really quite enjoy. He says, “People have certain needs and drives. We have a need for food, warmth, sex, and security. In satisfying those drives, we may be considered, by some other people, selfish. But if someone tries to submerge the basic aspects of his or her personality, something is going to have to give way. To deny yourself entirely, or to try to, is to put a strain on your relationship.”

Franki Cookney 39.25

So that's something that I feel like is definitely a difference, right? Because when they're talking about not being selfish, they're really talking about an extreme of unselfishness that I don't think many people would recognize today. The case study that they use, I think her name's Diana, but she's just absolutely putting herself out there. And I think that when it's saying to deny yourself entirely or try to is to put a strain on your personality. I feel like in 2024, a lot of people are sort of using that to basically get off the hook of doing anything at all. Like a lot of the people who are putting themselves first are not like, the flip side of that isn't denying themselves entirely. It's just not getting what they want. on that particular day. You know what I mean? So I think our understanding of what selfish means and what unselfish means has changed quite a lot. But maybe you can help illustrate that by telling us a bit about Diana. 

Lucy Douglas 40.22

So Diana is labelled as a very unselfish person by Penny, our writer. So she is a social worker by day and then she volunteers in the evenings for the Samaritans. She knocked herself out organising a conference, not literally, I don't think, figuratively knocked herself out organising a conference for Amnesty International recently. So basically what I'm hearing is Diana has an extremely demanding job and then spends all of her free time volunteering for charity organisations.

Franki Cookney 40.58

Can I just pause quickly because I really loved the explanation of Amnesty in here. 

Lucy Douglas 41.02

Oh yeah, it's so great. Amnesty International, which is a group which helps political prisoners. 

Franki Cookney 41.08

Which is, which is true, but it's funny reading that now. The Amnesty is arguably one of the biggest human rights organisations in the UK.

Lucy Douglas 41.16

It is the biggest human rights organisation in the world. 

Franki Cookney 41.18

Also, they won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1977, the year after this magazine, and so I feel like maybe Diana was a small part of that. I feel like maybe Diana's going to feel vindicated now and everyone's like, oh, why are you wasting all this time with this political prisoners charity?

Lucy Douglas 41.38

Vindicated after Honey Magazine came to laugh at her. 

Franki Cookney 41.39

Honey Magazine were like, oh, take a break, Diana. She's like, excuse me, some of us are winning the Nobel Peace Prize over here. 

Lucy Douglas 41.45

Well, yeah, so on that, “She gave of herself unstintingly, never stopped working for or worrying about other people. She did also just happen to be divorced.” There feels like there's a little hint of judgement there. Um, basically the implication is she spent so much time worrying about other people and doing charitable things that she hasn't invested any time in herself or her relationship. And so her relationship has died. 

Franki Cookney 42.15

She sort of backs that up, but she almost agrees though, doesn't she?

Lucy Douglas 41.18

Oh, she does. Yeah. She totally agrees. She says, “I don't function very well in personal relationships. I run away. People who are very busy, who never have time to sit down and relax, are usually running away from something.” So self aware. So yeah, so we've got this kind of really like, self aware and very perceptive view from Diana of herself, using her charitable work as a crutch to avoid dealing with any real feelings. 

And then on the flip side, we've got our very selfish case study, who is Jenny. Jenny starts off being absolutely iconic in this case study. I'm really obsessed with her. She has this boyfriend called Mark. And she says she takes care of him because it gives her pleasure, but otherwise she's totally indulged, spends most of her waking moments pleasing herself.

And then we learn from her quote that he would like her to give up her art gallery that she owns and runs. It was a birthday present from her father, lol, forever. But, you know, fair play to Jenny, she doesn't want to give up her gallery just because her boyfriend wants her to. And her boyfriend wants her to because she earns more money in the art gallery than he does in his job. And she says, “Okay, so it hurts him that I'm more successful than him and make more money. Well, I can't help that, I'm afraid. He's just not a successful sort of person. I love him the way he is, but I'm not prepared to go under with him. He has to take me on my terms, or not at all.” And I, I'm sort of like, yeah, Jenny. However, however, my view on Jenny does change somewhat. 

Franki Cookney 44.02

Yeah, because so far, her so called selfishness is basically just wanting to have a job and a boyfriend, which I think, like I say, I think our definition of selfishness has changed. 

Lucy Douglas 44.13

Yeah. Anyway, later on, she says, “I'll tell you one way in which I'm appallingly selfish. I just won't listen to people's troubles. I mean, the husband of one of my best friends just left her. Well, she spent three evenings here and what seemed like three more days on the telephone, crying and asking me what she could do. In the end, I got very brisk: ‘Look Felicity, I'm sorry that nobody can help you but yourself. You must go and sort yourself out. I haven't got the time.’ Selfish you may say, but she was a silly girl. She neglected that husband of hers. She insisted on having children when he didn't want them. And then moaned about how boring it was.”

Franki Cookney 44.47

Oh my God. 

Lucy Douglas 44.50

So let's just check in on Felicity. 

Franki Cookney 44.52

I mean, literally, can we check in on Felicity?

Lucy Douglas 44.55 

Felicity has been left by her husband when she is in a sort of vulnerable year, I guess, of early parenthood. We don't know how old Felicity's child is, but I'm going to say young. I'm going to say under two. And Felicity's husband has walked out and her best friend is saying, I do not have appropriate space for you right now.

Franki Cookney 45.17

Wow, Jenny couldn't even handle three days of phone calls after this breakup. She's like, after three days, ‘enough is enough’. I'm actually reeling. I've been on such a roller coaster with Jenny. 

[Music]

Lucy Douglas 45.29

Hello, Lucy here. Just a quick one to say if you've not yet signed up for our newsletter, you definitely should. You can read the features that we talk about, see all the amazing adverts and get access to loads of other bonus bits. Plus, it's a really good way to support the show. Find us at maghags.substack.com.

[Music]

Franki Cookney 45.52

Lucy, I think I'm ready for my fashion tip of the week. 

Lucy Douglas 45.55

Honey is a little bit light on the fashion advice, I have to say, but we do have one feature that has gone big on hips. It's recommending lots of layers and then accessorising with scarves to accentuate your hips. 

Franki Cookney 46.09

I mean, I'll be honest with you. There's the, that's literal opposite of what I'm going to do. I would not be doing anything to accentuate my hips or add layers and volume to my hips. 

Lucy Douglas 46.21

Yeah. I really don't think I need to be doing anything to accentuate my hips. Like my, my hips be accentuating themselves perfectly fine. 

Franki Cookney 46.28

They are speaking for themselves loud and clear. Your hips are girl bossing. 

Lucy Douglas 46.33

My hips are girl bossing. 

Beauty tip of the week. Eyebrows are back! Oh! But that's, that's it. There's literally no elaboration on that statement in the Honey beauty editorial. Just eyebrows are back. 

Franki Cookney 46.49

Okay. I need some context. Like how has that sentence come to light? 

Lucy Douglas 46.54

It's in our one two three of makeup, which is a kind of like paint by numbers idea where it kind of lists the products and tells you how to put them on, but point number five is eyebrows are back I mean, you know how eyebrows go in and out of fashion.

Franki Cookney 47.41

Yeah, to be fair. Yeah, I absolutely do. I grew up in the 90s. 

Lucy Douglas 47.16

Our final feature that we are going to talk about today is a simple one page essay called ‘How Lovely to be Beautiful’, and it's kind of like in the sort of rich women's journalism tradition of being hot is bad, actually. 

Franki Cookney 47.34

This reminded me powerfully of the 2012 Samantha Brick viral article in Mail Online. 

Lucy Douglas 47.43

Please explain to anybody who is not familiar what you're talking about. 

Franki Cookney 47.47

Okay, well, basically, in 2012, Mail Online published a feature in the Femail section by a journalist called Samantha Brick, and the title of it was ‘There are downsides to looking this pretty: Why women hate me for being beautiful’. And it was as Lucy just described this kind of time honoured tradition of discussing whether it actually might be bad to be gorgeous and actually how you really don't understand that it's really quite difficult to be beautiful and all of this sort of stuff. And I feel like that was my, That was the first time I can really remember being on Twitter and it felt like the whole of Twitter was talking about this one article.

Lucy Douglas 48.43

Which is, like, the best and the worst of Twitter all at the same time. 

Franki Cookney 48.37

Yeah. 

Lucy Douglas 48.38

So what I think that this Honey piece gets right, which, I'm sorry Samantha, but Samantha's piece did not, is that, Celia Brayfield, the writer, is not saying, ‘I am hot and it is bad, actually’. She is saying, I can see how it can be difficult for hot people. She, she is coming at this as an observer and not as a as, as the injured party, claiming pity. 

Franki Cookney 49.09

I'm instantly a bit more on side with this piece. 

Lucy Douglas 49.13

So she interviews a few different people for it and she gets some experiences from some, there's a few like Miss World type voices in there. Margie Wallace, who is Miss World in 1973, said that when she told me how she felt when she was competing for the title, “It's not like being Judy Garland and getting a great wave of love coming over the footlights. What I got from the audience was hate. I knew the only person out there who was for me was my mother. Everybody else in the audience was picking me to pieces.” And then we've got a few other examples of like models or similar people explaining their experiences of like having people coming up to them and saying, you're not that pretty actually.

Franki Cookney 49.53

Okay, thanks for that. Can you imagine? I mean, that must really suck. 

Lucy Douglas 50.01

Yeah, yeah. 

Franki Cookney 50.02

You're just going about your life and people are just being like, you're not as hot as you think you are. 

Lucy Douglas 50.06

Yeah, exactly. And we've also, for balance, we've got the voice of a hot man in here as well. 

Franki Cookney 50.12

Oh yeah, let's see what he has to say.

Lucy Douglas 50.13

He was like, “‘All my mates were desperate for girlfriends,’ recalled a handsome actor, ‘and I was just having to fight girls off. And now that we're older, it's not stopped. It's just different. They like hearing about the great time I'm supposed to have. I sort of live their sexual fantasies for them. But if I'm halfway polite to one of their wives, I practically get my face smashed in.’” So I guess, I mean, my question is like, do we still hate hot people? 

Franki Cookney 50.39

Do we still hate hot people? I think we like to think we don't, because when, for example, when this Sam Brick article came out, and then she's done sort of a couple of follow ups since then, I think that one of the things that sort of came up in the discourse around it, and one of the things that tends to come up around pieces on this subject, is the idea that we like to tell ourselves it's not true. We like to tell ourselves that we don't hate hot people. We don't resent them. And so all the things that these people are saying are just nonsense because honestly, nobody even cares that much what you look like. But then there's always somebody who has to go, you're not even that hot anyway, love, which kind of just goes to show that like, yeah, we definitely do.

Lucy Douglas 51.23

Honourable mention to a final feature. It's Penny Vincenzi again. 

Franki Cookney 51.27

Honey, beauty editor, Penny Vincenzi. We now know her. 

Lucy Douglas 51.31

And it is: ‘A brainwave for bath time’. Oh, so what this is, Franki, is an exercise feature, an exercise how to, the workouts that you can do in your bath. 

Franki Cookney 51.45

Shut up. 

Lucy Douglas 51.47

Yeah, absolutely incredible. Sit up in the bath, put your hands under your bottom, fingers turned in, push up from your hands, lifting the body out of the water and keeping your legs straight. Do this five times. Good for front of thighs and tummy. 

Franki Cookney 52.01

Oh my god, is this better or worse than all the emails I get telling me about which sex positions burn the most calories? 

Lucy Douglas 51.20

The best bit about it though is that the last example they just completely canned the brief as a whole. So it's because she's got her arms out, she's stretched her arms out wide. And it says in the caption, “Attempt this only in the swimming pool, or if your bath is of monster proportions.”

Franki Cookney 52.31

Wow. What a feature. 

[Music break] 

Lucy Douglas 52.34

What's hot and what's not in March 1976. 

Franki Cookney 52.37

What is hot? I mean, just, just weekends. Just the weekend. Really hot. 

Lucy Douglas 52.43

And what is not in March 1976? 

Franki Cookney 52.47

Playing Libido without taking your clothes off. Not hot. 

Lucy Douglas 52.51

Not hot.

Franki Cookney 52.55

Thank you for listening. We hope you enjoyed today's show. 

Lucy Douglas 52.58

If you did, please consider leaving us a glowing review and smashing that five stars button. It will help the podcast grow. 

Franki Cookney 53.04

We hope you join us again next time on Mag Hags when we'll be confronting the enemy within. Yes folks, we'll be digging into the danger of too much television. Bye! 

Lucy Douglas 53.16

Bye!

[Theme music]

Mag Hags is written and hosted by Lucy Douglas and Franki Cookney.
Editing and audio production by Franki Cookney.

Our theme music is Look Where That Got You, Mattie Maguire. Additional music: Leotard Haul, Dez Moran. Both courtesy of www.epidemicsound.com.