Karl Marx
No, that's not a typo; the magazine is called Cosmarxpolitan.
Just in time for May Day (Labour Day in Europe), a new parody Tumblr answers all your burning questions about sex, dating and beauty – plus it features a young Stalin in skimpy black briefs.
In short, it offers "fun fearless freedom from the oppression of capitalism."
Oxymorons of the world, unite!
The spoof magazine dishes some serious dirt, such as "Friedrich Engels Tells All" and "Shocking Truth: is constant, unceasing class warfare ruining your skin?"
The site offers a send-up of the magazine's cover format, while giving the sell-lines a comically Marxist twist. No word yet on who's behind the clever premise.
Since Cosmarxpolitan first appeared a week ago, a new cover has been posted each day. The monthly issues run chronologically and run from September 1849 through to today's post, dated January 1850.
Strangely, Castro is the cover boy (he would have been negative 76 years old in 1850). But who needs accuracy when readers can "get sexier legs with an arms race!"
Marx is LOLing in his grave right about now.
Tumblr has become the go-to medium for funny, zeitgeist-y mashups. Highlights from 2012 include Texts From Hilary (sarcastic captions atop photos of Hilary Clinton using her BlackBerry), Binders Full of Burgers (politics parsed via fast food) and Emceez Ansari, in which comedian Aziz Ansari gets digitally inserted onto famous rap album covers
The strength of Cosmarxpolitan is that it's both so absurd ("Look sexy while striking!") and a jab at the sensationalism of women's glossies.
Go one step further and the site's creator is obviously aware that few people would self-identify as Marxists and Cosmo readers. The values of one are almost entirely diametrically at odds with the other. Hence, the cover story quandary "Marxist-Leninist-Materialist?"
Translation: You have nothing to lose but your superficiality.
And then of course, a headline like "Revolutionary morning sex!" is more indulgently low-high brow than a dark-chocolate, bourbon and vanilla bean whoopee pie.
While Cosmarxpolitan is fun in theory, it's not about to spark any kind of publishing revolution in the real world. At least not until someone writes a magazine womanifesto.