This study of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue demonstrates how the magazine encourages individual and institutional practices that create and maintain inequality. Laurel Davis illustrates how the interactions of media production, media texts, media consumption, and social context influence meaning. Individuals' interpretations of and reactions to the magazine and influenced by their views about gender and sexuality, views that have been shaped by their social experiences.

Based on extensive interviews with Sports Illustrated producers and consumers, as well as analysis of every swimsuit issue from the first in 1964 to those of the 1990s, the book argues that Sports Illustrated uses the swimsuit issue to secure a large male audience by creating a climate of dominant masculinity. This practice produces considerable profit but on the way to the bank tramples women, gays, lesbians, people of color, and residents of the postcolonialized world.