Editor of erotic mag is unrepentant

It's what readers want, says editor

A former New Plymouth woman is proud to have broken new ground with her erotic magazine for women.

Suraya Singh, who turns 31 today, attended New Plymouth Girls' High School. She first published the UK based magazine Filament, from her North London home in June but it's this month's second edition that has sparked the controversy.

The edition features a pictorial showing a man with an erection, and was almost not published after Ms Singh's printer pulled out.

The printers were worried other clients "particularly those in the women's/religious sectors" would stop using them as a result of the pictorial, she said.

However, after she was approached by another printing company, the second quarterly edition, complete with erection photos, was published last week.

Ms Singh can now claim to be the first UK women's magazine to run an erection pictorial.

"I think it is absolutely great," she said.

"With erotic images in particular, representations of the male body specifically designed for women are almost non-existent.

"We decided it's time to put a stop to that."

Before the magazine's launch, Ms Singh had done a lot of research about what women found erotic and this was what they wanted to see.

She said few people realised women's erotica largely consisted of repackaged photography originally intended for the gay market.

"We think we're the first women's erotica publication to research what the female gaze should look like, and include only images that are designed for women."

Ms Singh said Filament was only on sale in a few shops in the UK, because distributors were yet to agree to sell it, but it could be purchased from its website, www.filamentmagazine.com.

"We will try to find a way to deliver what our audience wants."

She was negotiating with distributors to take the magazine worldwide, including to New Zealand.

She believes it would be well received in Taranaki.

"My mum and dad have got their copy, and they think it is awesome."

Ms Singh said the reasons for not distributing the magazine revolved around having a man on the cover, which she and many others considered a double standard.

"Men's magazines frequently have women on their covers, so many of our readers have been outraged to discover that distributors make these kinds of decisions on their behalf by not making the product available, they're telling women what they should and should not buy," she said.

Ms Singh said she would not be toning the magazine down in the future.

- © Fairfax NZ News