Glossy Talk: This week in That's Life

Glossy Talk: This week in That's Life (Back to Basics, crowd-sourcing & Go Back to Where You Came From)

My interest was piqued in this week's That's Life magazine – Australia's top-selling "reality weekly" – after hearing about two of the stories that appear on its 'The Buzz' page: one on middle-aged men suffering from 'hotness delusion syndrome' (a drought of single men in their 40s means they are being fiercely pursued, hence the inflated egos) and 'Gen Y More Fun', which provides survey evidence suggesting Gen-Ys are more fun to work with than Baby Boomers. Readers are paid the princely sum of $50 for 'The Buzz' page submissions – no big secret, the reality weeklies are the queens of crowd-sourcing content for cash rewards.

The opening tear-jerker piece this week is penned by Keeley Henderson, who sacrificed love to attend to her daughter and learnt that honesty is always the best policy along the way to happiness; Smita Mistry tells of saving a girl from a car wreck and the friendship that blossomed; Sara Eltham writes 'Texting Made Me Skinny'; personal shopper and style adviser Sandra Stewart tells Katherine Davison, "I didn't want being a teen mum to define me"; and charity worker Raye Colbey confesses to being furious over the government's $10 million Inverbrackie Detention Centre for asylum seekers before taking part in the SBS documentary Go Back to Where You Came From. She writes:

"I met Halmina, a pretty 16-year-old girl who wanted to go to school so one day she might become a doctor. Then there was Dao, a thin middle-aged man who admitted he had no dreams left. He simply hoped he's still be alive every morning. At night, I sobbed silent tears for the lives these people were enduring. They simply wanted to be given a chance... Because of what I've experienced, my views have changed dramatically. And that's something I'm proud of."

With its 'Back to Basics' recipes, toddler tantrum tips, inexpensive fashion and warm and friendly tone, this is the ideal mag for passing onto a friend who's under the weather or leaving in the doctor's surgery. 

Girl With a Satchel