i take offense to that second one.

didn't we already discuss this?

Whoa! The WWI poster is awesome!

@ineffable.me: Kind of, last week.

I bet if we had more "Join The Army" posters with topless women, we'd see a huge jump in enlistment. You listening, Uncle Sam?

And finally, I think LeBron looks muy caliente on the cover of the magazine!

I felt uncomfortable with the cover, but couldn't figure out why until someone came out with the king kong comparison. But in all honesty, the pose could have been worse, she could be slung over his shoulders like that discus(?) thrower. Who by the way was HOT and I generally disapprove of men who could break me in half with their bare hands.

Instead of interpreting the Vogue cover as an unconsciously racist text, I prefer to think that Leibovitz is consciously playing with our racist iconography and subverting the King Kong imagery to both satirize and reflect our racist past.

Can we not give credit to Leibovitz for creating art-as-mirror?

It's like no one even bothers to do anything other than come here and rip off Jezebel and some of her commentwhores.

We're on to you, motherfuckers!

We ain't dicking around, either!

This isn't the point, but I love how the WWI poster girl's boobs look like she's got implants.

@gabelle: rhetorical question, but thanks.

I think I agree with golddigger.

Having little interest in this photo shoot, I haven't looked at the pictures, but do they also pair FEMALE athletes with MALE models? Because I realized that this is what's really pissing me off.

everything is offensive to someone.

more importantly... where is the new lolvogue??

I like to analyze as much as the next person, but.....whatever. I finally got this issue and felt kind of annoyed at the way the post about sports players and models was framed last week. There was so much left out from the remainder of the magazine.

The cover....I don't see it, really. I was more offended by the horrible Photoshop work. I assumed they used Gisele because she's always been marketed as kind of athletic and active.

@tailfeather: no, the female athletes were shown in action, on their own. if you look through my posting history you can find the images. i linked to them in a couple of posts that were about this issue.

@golddigger: Yeah, no chance this was not purposeful. there is no way that Lebowitz did not evoke this image intentionally, and so only remains the question of intent and effect.

Did no one in the media consider that the photographer did one of those ANTM "No, I need some emotion -- SCREAM FOR ME!" things and that's why we got that cover?

Other huge differences:

1. Giselle does not look afraid. She looks at worst amused and at best like she's having a fantastic time. Not very Fay Wray of her.

2. Giselle is not a white woman. She's Brazillian. That would make her Latin.

@stoprobbers: She is culturally Brazillian but ethnically German = white person.

@SarahBoBara: I find that remark offensive.

@stoprobbers: Good call on Giselle being Latina. I agree with everyone who said that Lebron looks like an athlete rather than a screaming, angry man, and Giselle looks like she's having a fab time hanging onto the lucious Lebron.

@stoprobbers: "Latin" is an ethnicity, not a race. I am a white woman of Latin ethnicity.

@battleaxonista: oh let's not go there.

@stoprobbers: No, because the photographer is Annie Leibovitz and her photographs don't just happen. They are carefully choreographed works of art.

Has Lebron commented on this "scandal" yet? I'd love to hear his take on it, as I don't take him for someone who would try to defend Annie and Anna if he truly thought they were being offensive.

@ineffable.me:
It was discussed, which is why we are re-discussing it, cause whilst some of you were playing the, 'this isn't offensive card', well, it seems it wasn't just us who disagreed with you.

Which is why she is posting this.

I guess you don't like follow ups huh?

Dodai you had a point!

@ineffable.me:
You asked for it with that comment...

@ineffable.me: Okay, I scrolled through about 400 comments but I found them (and a newfound respect for your prolificness)! I don't care much for Annie Liebowitz, but the gymnast photo was lovely.

I think people are reading a bit much into this. I think it's a great photograph showing his intensity for the game and her basically being a model. It is reminiscent of the King Kong posters but I think it's a coincidence.

@rantmagazine:boo hoo: what the hell crawled up your ass?

@tailfeather: My favorite was the archer. Such control in her body!

@golddigger: Actually to be more accurate, "Latin" is a culture, a way of being, rather than an ethnicity while "French" is a culture AND an ethnicity (in addition to being a language).

oh man we had a LENGTHY discussion about this before..

the way i see it, they're damned if they do, and damned if they dont. if they'd put a white athlete on the cover, everybody would be like, why'd they put a white guy there when there are so many fantastic black athletes? and since they put a strong, masculine black man, people are like oh it's vogue so it MUST be offensive.

come on, give it up. lebron is hot. gisele is hot. it's vogue. lets move on.

@PetiteGal: OK. I'm Cuban/Latina and also happen to be white. I was just clarifying that "Latin/Hispanic" isn't really a race, as you can be Latin(a) and have lots of different skin tones.

Ugg. This is NOT a provocative cover. It's a man, who happens to be large (because most sports players are) and a women who happens to be small (because most models are). It has nothing to do with king kong. "When you have a cover that... brings those stereotypes to the front, black man wanting white woman, it's not innocent." This quote can not be for real. No wonder racism still exists, as it appears some people can not just see people for PEOPLE. Because he is black and she is white it MUST have some racist undertone. PLEASE. This shouldn't even be a story.

Anna Wintour doesn't care about fat people.

Their point might be taken more seriously if Gisele was screaming or scared like Fay Wray or the woman in the WWI poster. Instead she looks excited and happy. That is the one fact that people seem to be overlooking here. He's an athlete not a model. He was chosen because he's a tough athlete. Making him look "pretty" wouldn't have been right for an issue on shape and athletes.

@Neon.Wonder: Yep. Giselle isn't even THAT small all over--she's tall as shit. How many women out there aren't going to look small next to Lebron James, seriously?

And that WWI imagery is really propagandizing Germans (note the Prussian helmet on King Kong and "KULTUR" on his club, and I believe the woman is supposed to be Lady Liberty in distress) more than African-Americans. I mean, the latter subtext might be there, but it's really more of a German dig.

Lots of different types of 'latin' or 'hispanic' peoples. Giselle wouldn't be 'hispanic' and neither is someone from Spain. Because we like to be confusing in our definition of random cultural organizational words. Latin implies anyone who speaks a latin-based or Romance language, thus including Italy, France Spain, Portugal, and everything in the new world. It also implies Latin American- i.e. coming from a Latin-based language driven country in the Americas. Hispanic, I think, means from a Spanish speaking country that isn't Spain. Latin America in general is a giant melting pot of indigenous americans, european settlers/colonists and african slaves and freedmen, oh and more recently immigrants from east asia and everywhere else the worldwide. Brazil, in particular, is a cauldron of churning racial identities. A couple years ago the BBC did a story on how Brazilian celebrities underwent DNA testing to study their ethnicity/race, and well, skin tone did not mean what one assumes it meant.

My two cents don't give a shit about racial identity. It's good to know history, because for one, past is never even past, and it's good to acknowledge that we all have histories full of racial animosity and we might as well just be proud of the fact that we're all mutts of some sort.

As for the photog, Hell, Annie's getting us thinking and talking about difficult issues, and with the cover of Vogue no less! How is this not a good thing?

@vivresavie17: Yes, it's most definitely a German dig. It's standard propaganda: the enemy is inhuman, so they're brutish primates of some sort, and of course they want the woman who stands for all of our good clean ideals.

They talked about this on the "Sports Reporters" on ESPN Sunday morning. When was the last time Vogue was mentioned on ESPN? With Mike Lupica involved for that matter?

@golddigger: I prefer your take on this. Well-put.

Hey Dodai, don't forget the one where Annie painted Chris Rock in white face and dressed him up as a vaudville performer. So anyone trying to perpetuate this myth that it never occured to Leibovitz that the James/Bundchen cover would evoke negative stereotypes is in denial.

what about the image of the disc thrower and raquel zimmerman that you guys showed in the last pose? i see the king kong imagery as just blatant in that shot, as a big man grimacing while carting off a helpless woman. this one, at least giselle looks like she is in on the plan, running next to him, but i really was offended by the fact that raquel was essentially just turned into a dumbell. just playing a little devil's advocate here.

It just grosses me out that people saw such a racist image in this photograph! While it's not my favorite, I certainly saw nothing racist about it; in fact, I was glad to see a black person on vogue's cover. I'm just bummed that Gisele had to be on it, too...
After I told my friends about this controversy the other night, one scrambled to look it up andwas sorely dissapointed that it wasn't as provacative as he expected (even though I told him my feelings on it).

I've known Samir Husni since I was a little girl, and he's an amazing genius! Represent!

@ineffable.me:
Heh, nothing much. :)

Fair play.

When I saw that WWI poster I was all, HEY! cause The Wrongmen, this amazing band, used that face for the cover of their 7 inch. Vis: [www.amrshop.com]
I thought that was pretty neat.
Continue.

@Skinny Bone Jones: That's what I'm saying. Fashionably late doesn't even begin to cover it.

It's just too bad he had to be screaming like that. Why couldn't he just smile as well?

I do not think this mag cover is cool what so ever. This is 2008, when is America going to some discrimination. I hate the cover.

@cookieguggleman "Anna Wintour doesn't care about fat people." You rock.

Perhaps Annie did reference the second vintage cover ("brute"), because if you look, Gisele is wearing a very similiar dress in style and color. However, I do think her intention would be to get people to talk. As a Jewish lesbian single mother herself, I doubt Annie Leibovitz is out to discriminate against anyone-she may have been trying to start a dialog, which she certainly did.

I think they both look fit and strong and great! LeBron is doing what he does-being a fierce athlete-and Gisele is doing what she does-being a fierce model. Fierce, tranny, hot mess... lol why can't we all just get along?