Neutrogena has partnered with Self magazine and Jennifer Garner to unveil what the company calls The Roadmap to Healthy Skin, a viral campaign discussing sun safety and skin cancer awareness.
  The Roadmap appears in the May 2008 issue of Self, stressing the importance of self-examination to prevent skin cancer and promote early detection. Self encourages women to download a mole map, located at www.self.com, to track skin changes that could signal cancer.
  An e-card campaign enables women to send e-cards to friends and family to encourage them to perform self-examinations and to visit the dermatologist for an annual full body check. For every ïŹve e-cards sent, Neutrogena will make a donation to help support skin cancer research.
  Self.com also has an exclusive video about sun safety featuring Jennifer Garner, and an interactive map highlighting important facts about sun safety across the US.
Some of the most famous women in the world are lending a hand to celebrate Moms this Motherâs Day and also raise awareness about an important womenâs health issue affecting thousands of women each year.
  Oprah Winfrey, Sharon Stone, Courteney Cox Arquette, Faith Hill, Jennifer Garner and Olivia Newton-John have signed on by autographing the Pampered Chef limited-edition Pink Kitchen Gloves (the company notes that these contain natural rubber Latex) and Pink Aprons to raise funds for breast cancer education and early detection as part of the companyâs Help Whip Cancer initiative.
  From May 1 to 31, 2008, supporters nationwide can log on to www.pamperedchef.com to bid on items signed by more than a dozen famous women, many who are also Moms, including Jane Seymour, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Tori Spelling, Meredith Vieira, Melora Hardin, Nancy OâDell, Samantha Harris and the ladies of The View including Joy Behar and Elisabeth Hasselbeck. Auction proceeds will beneïŹt the American Cancer Society.
  According to the American Cancer Society, breast cancer remains the most common form of cancer among women in the United States and every woman has a chance of developing breast cancer. Thanks to early detection through regular mammograms and effective treatment, the ïŹve-year survival rate has improved to an astounding 98 per cent.
  In its ninth year, the Pampered Chef Help Whip Cancer national campaign will offer a collection of limited-edition pink products including Pink Kitchen Gloves, Mini Scoop and Measure and the Pink Kitchen Brush to raise funds in support of breast cancer education and early detection programmes. For each product purchased, the Pampered Chef will contribute US$1 to support the American Cancer Society.
Naomi Watts was the inspired choice for Thierry Mugler, over and above her beauty and her star image. Displaying a modern touch, the actress projects a personality that blends sensuality, voluptuousness and evanescence to evoke the many facets of Angel. A blond fragility, a natural tenderness, an emotional seductiveness âŠ
   Rather appropriately, it was in Los Angeles, city of the angels, and in the Hollywood Center studios, that the commercial was shot, following a scenario by Thierry Mugler and directed by director Bill Condon (Dreamgirls). A Hollywood fairy-tale surrounded by a profusion of Angel stars.
   To immortalize this mythical moment, Thierry Mugler called on photographer Ali Mahdavi to produce the advertising visuals of his Hollywood dream. A worldwide campaign, glamorous and magical, will begin in October 2008.
Itâs not that we havenât kept up with the row over the Miley Cyrus photographs taken by Annie Leibovitz for Vanity Fair, which sexualize the teenage star, but I have to draw the line somewhere when it comes to news coverage.
  There are quarters in fashion publishing which would deem these photographs appropriate and artistic, just as Leibovitz claimed, and we ourselves have featured teens in and even on the cover of Lucire, looking probably older than they really are.
  But if a subject comes to me and tells me that she is embarrassed by a series of photographs, and for a cover decision she may well be in the know, then thatâs good enough reason for me to have a meeting or a big ofïŹce poll about it.
  And thatâs just what Cyrus, star of the beloved Hannah Montana series, has said of her half-naked bedroom shot.
  In normal circumstances, this matter would be worked out privately between the Cyrus family and Vanity Fairâs publishers.
  Which makes this all rather odd: has the crisis surrounding these images been manufactured? One commenter on a Murdoch Press website seems to think so and, knowing how cover decisions are made, especially those that are potentially controversial, I am seriously tempted to agree.
  Reports suggest that Cyrusâs father, singer Billy Ray Cyrus, was present through most of the shoot.
  What I do know is that the modelling agencies we would work with are protective of their talent and we agree on many aspects of the shoot prior to starting when it involves a young girlâand that means overt sexualization is out.
For once many of the press have taken a moral high ground and that is, at least, pleasing to see, even if I have questions on their consistency. The Fairfax Press noted:
Every artist wants to subvert hypocrisy and artiïŹce. And childhood, after all, is the ultimate artiïŹcial construction. It exists only because responsible adults deliberately set out to protect children from predators and situations their young brains are not yet wired to deal with.
  But in an era in which all taboos must be broken, the reigning philosophy is that every truth must be told, every emotion liberated, no matter how destructive, or unreasonable, because there is nothing worse than repression.
  Wellânews ïŹashâyes, there are worse things: child neglect, sexual abuse, childhoods cut short, depression, eating disorders, academic failure, violence against women, and all other manifestations of the premature sexualisation and objectiïŹcation of girls in our culture.
  Interestingly, the op-ed in the Fairfax Press touches on similar subjects to a blog comment that I wrote in discussion with William Shepherd, a marketing expert based in Californiaâone of those smart netizens who reminds me of the days in the 1990s when most people on the ânet were of a certain intellectual level.
  He wrote, on the topic of pornography in Brazil:
However, I ïŹnd it hard to imagine that Brazil has an issue with porn. They should have a concern with AIDS, the cheap sex and underage labor that Brazil offers to Sex Industry. âŠ
  [W]ill blocking wordpress sites stop white slavery, sexual abuse towards young children, men from going to Brazil to engage in power driven sex events that hurt the ïŹber of global culture, and humanity? âŠ
  Sex is what it has always been. Yet, the online media has tried to make porn a staple of global culture and economics.
  When I think about these words today, itâs not just the online media, as Vanity Fair and others have shown us.
  I do, after all, see the irony of citing the Murdoch Press when it popularized the page-three girl and sensationalist stories founded in sex.
  At the risk of offending fans of certain TV shows, I responded:
The sex economy, the ïŹxation on sex, are not good things for us to be so focused on, yet I donât like it being constantly propagated even through prime-time shows such as the old Friends or Desperate Housewives.
  I do not regard myself a prude but you are right: there are more pressing things to be concerned about, and Iâm far too busy to ïŹnd double-entendres in every sitcom appealing.
  While sex is as woven in to Desperate Housewives as it was into Benny Hill, and those watching it at its late hour (past the watershed?) know what to expect, it gets an awful lot of publicity in TV promos with their share of suggestive imagery at other times. OK, it wasnât the best example of a TV show (which I watched at one point), but the old Friends certainly was. I think itâs difïŹcult to disagree that we have become too obsessed with sex in our society and those early seasons of Friends depended less on characterization and more on innuendo, not often that subtle.
   At the idealistic level there is nothing wrong with this when it comes to showing behaviour between consenting adultsâitâs less objectionable than seeing the extreme violence that has now made it on to prime-time televisionâbut we now face the danger of it going further and further into promoting promiscuity among the young. Expand sexâs reach, and you arouse greater curiosity in our youngest citizens at an earlier age. Itâs like lowering the drinking age to 18, as had happened in New Zealand: now itâs not 17-year-olds sneaking in three years before they are legal, but 14-year-olds with fake IDs.
  That curiosity around sex has always been there with those who are 11 or 12, as any of you reading this will know, but the signals are telling us that as adults we need to give more guidance, and we need to take a stand against marketing that encourages sex at a time when mentally, young people are not prepared for the consequences.
  And it was interesting to read that I am not alone in my assessment; in fact mine seems ill-educated alongside that of an author who has devoted a book to the subject. Fairfax again:
[Melbourne child psychologist, Michael Carr-Gregg] said internet porn, with hardcore sites available to children at a mouseclick, âhas completely changed the sexual behaviour of young women, [particularly] the obsession with oral sex.â Young girls, he said, have been encouraged to behave âalmost as predators, as if [a boy] is some sort of game animal they want to bagâ.
  Again, he blamed parents for creating âa culture of entitlement and indulgence [in which they] are hesitant to set limits around sleep or internet use. Democracy doesnât work in families. You have to have a benign dictatorship.â
  In a new book, Prude: How The Sex-Obsessed Culture Damages Girls, Carol Platt Liebau writes that âan incremental but aggressive sexualising of [our] culture ⊠[has created] a status quo in which almost everything seems focused on whatâs going on âbelow the waistâ.â
  As long as we sit back, tut-tut when the items make the news but fall back on not caring at other times, then we have lost yet another value. Add that to a huge list in the westâand the eastâsince the end of World War II.
  If certain institutions are being so aggressive as Liebau writes, then adults need to be as aggressive. âBenign dictatorshipâ, in the words of Carr-Gregg, probably describes the families many of us hadâand we turned out all right.
  It was a sort-of democracy in my household because my parents involved me in every family-affecting major decision and I earned their trust so I never had a curfew. But that was earnedâand I was probably lucky I had a good conscience or spirit guide, or something directing me.
  Not everyone is so fortunate, and in this day and age, itâs not a bad idea to be strongly involved in our childrenâs lives because that moral compass no longer comes from those cohesive, homogeneous communities of old, nor does it come from the media, at least not regularly or consistently. We, the regular people, are the last and possibly only resort in our respective families.
UK model of the moment, Agyness Deyn, will release a single, according to British media today.
  It will be her first foray into music, in collaboration with New York-based band Five OâClock Heroes.
  Deyn contributed some vocals to the song, âWhoâ, and will appear in the video.
There are only 8,000 each for him and for her of the Diesel Fuel for Life Special Edition bottles, launched December 2007âand if you search, you may still be able to find some at âexclusive sales outletsâ. We had to mention it since we think this is the coolest looking bottle for the first part of â08.
  Meanwhile, photographer Matthew Plummer went along to the Little Brother show in Wellington, New Zealand and took some catwalk shotsâwe really loved these since they arenât your ordinary âphotographersâ pitâ stuff. Some of Matthewâs work will be in the next print edition of Lucire.
  Speaking of the next print edition, Elyse Glickman has an interview with very hip, celeb-favourite LA label Hale Bobâand it was interesting to note that there has been African inspiration there. Itâs evident in one of the collection photographs: embellished, raw and stylish. This pic probably wonât run due to space reasons, so hereâs a chance to enjoy it now.
   Finally, in terms of happenings for our team, hop over to the beauty pages: our Mari Johnson has been to the Qua Bottle Lounge in downtown Austin, Texasâread about her experiences here.
Jennifer Lopez at the 2007 Golden Globes wearing a 30 ct yellow diamond Right Hand Ring by Lorraine Schwartz (courtesy Diamond Information Center/J. Walter Thompson).
Jennifer Lopez will star in a reality TV show for TLC in the US, it was announced today.
Lopezâs show centres around how the actressâsingerâentrepreneur juggles her career with motherhood. She will also executive-produce.
The show will follow her planning the launch of a new fragrance.
Lopez and her husband Marc Anthony welcomed their twins, Max and Emme, in February.
It is not Lopezâs ïŹrst foray into reality TV: she has already appeared on American Idol and MTVâs Dance Life, which she also produced.
How reliable are these readersâ polls? The British edition of Glamour (May 2008) puts Kate Moss at number one for Britainâs best dressed woman, with Agyness Deyn not even making it into the top 50. Itâs a switch from earlier polls, which had been putting Moss lower during the last four months.
  Britney Spears was named worst dressed, with Jodie Marsh and Amy Winehouse making it on to the same list.
  Following Moss were Sienna Miller, Scarlett Johansson, Rachel Bilson, Jennifer Aniston, Alexa Chung, Reese Witherspoon, Jessica Alba, Keira Knightley and Victoria Beckham.
  Glamour attributed Mossâs success to her Topshop range and her willingness to be experimental with her clothing.
  A month ago, the UK edition of Tatler, owned by the same group as Glamour, put Deyn at number one, and Moss at number two, though the list looks very different.
   Between the two polls, Moss, Chung and Knightley appear.