To tell you all what Alan Titchmarch thinks of 12-15 year old girls who dress 'inappropriately'

[RiffyWammal]

I'm so angry. On his show today in a discussion about sexual harassment and sexism he said something really vile. I will transcribe what he said exactly;

"A lot of 12, 13, 14, 15 year old girls are now walking down the street barely covered. I see crop tops on girls of 12 and skirts up here, in a way now I hate to say that thing which men say 'they are asking for it' but it strikes me that if a girl of 14 walks past a building site in a crop top and short skirt she's probably going to get whistled at and worse."

I'm disgusted as was Laura Bates from Everyday Sexism who stayed remarkably controlled as she countered this. The victim blaming, the implication that girls should jolly well cover up if they don't want to be harrassed, the attitude of 'how else do we expect men to react if they see a girl's legs and belly'? I could hardly believe my ears. The audience applauded him FFS

I think I am going to make a complaint to ITV. I just wanted to bring it to the attention of anyone else who might wish to do the same.

Christ, it's even worse when you watch him say it.

I don't agree, unfortunately. I think he's repeating views commonly held by his generation. Hell, Im in my 40s and was definitely taught to be careful of what I wore to avoid negative attention, assault, rape etc My mum was doing it protect me cause that's what she was taught.

It's all shit of course and needs to be challenged whenever encountered but it's really pervasive, ingrained shit and will take a long time to get rid of.

Equally, focusing on the clothes is completely 'missing' the point - there is a huge problem with blatant sexism in society, it is not seen as repugnant and that really is how it needs to be perceived by most people.

From what I've read on the Rotherham cases, a major problem was the institutionalised sexism, Police referring to victims as 'tarts'. These attitudes are so prevalent in society and that's what needs to be tackled. Handy hints and tips on dress code are highly irrelevant and distract from this problem.

Freudian, I take your point.

Interesting what 'Japanese' says about the appearance of a bloke making a difference

Nick Ferrari was on there? Well he makes Titchmarsh look sensitive, thoughtful and well informed

Can we watch the 'twat' and 'tit' insults please folks? They're especially inappropriate on a thread like this

Just watched the You Tube clip. Off to find a massive sick bag

I see teen boys walking around without a top on and shorts and sandals in the summer months.

I don't wolf whistle or look at them in lust because not only that I am a married women but I also have respect.

I don't think men like him realize that with their comments they are saying 'Yes, us men are all disgusting perverts who would like to bone 14 year olds. If they aren't going to take proper measures to protect themselves from that, what can they expect?'

I'm SO sick of men looking at passing girl/women they don't know and openly discussing with their mates whether they would or would not fuck them, and then helpfully passing on the conclusion. Only yesterday a group of fat balding 40 something men were walking behind me discussing whether I was fit or not. Apparently my arse is on the big side so I was not up their standards, but I should take comfort in the fact that I have nice hair... And there's nothing you can do except dive into the nearest shop to try and get away from them. say anything and you get laughed at, called a humourless cow, or punched in the face.

Apparently my arse is on the big side so I was not up their standards, but I should take comfort in the fact that I have nice hair...

Gatorade a man once came up to me in the street, rated me out of 10 (not even a hello first) then explained the result - it was my breasts that let me down. I did get angry at him but I was 18 and not very confident. I'd love to go back as I am now and tell him what I think of him and his rating.

Alan Titchmarsh, for example, is a....

I thought it before. Nice to know my hunch wasn't misplaced.

Dressing up and discovering fashion and experimenting with clothes is what teenage girls do. Its part of growing up. Like a rite of passage.

And they should be able to do that and express themselves without dinosaurs like Titchmarsh blaming them for the inappropriate behaviour and harassment of grown up males.

His Madonna/whore complex was really showing too!

I have large breasts too.

As a teen i remember being told by a builder "Blimey love you put them on page 3 to shame."

Afternoon all. Just a reminder to please keep criticisms of other people (sleb or otherwise) relevant and civil if you don't mind. We've had a few complaints about this thread and it would be a shame to have to delete it as it discusses some really important issues.

For the record, we wanted to address the post about our having deleted a thread about Kirstie Allsopp recently, and not this one. These things are always a judgement call and there are no hard and fast rules.

It's never been our intention to censor debate about controversial things that slebs have actually said or done, and - on threads such as this one about Alan Titchmarsh - it seems understandable that MNers will have fairly strong views on what's apparently been said.

What we don't allow is highly personal remarks - things that are just plain mean; the Allsopp thread contained a lot of posts criticising her appearance and weight, for example, as well as posts that could have sounded quite threatening, which is just not the sort of thing we want to host, to be honest. Added to which, the original post was pretty strong and also contained a particularly offensive disablist term, and we can't really delete an OP without deleting the entire thread, as you can imagine.

For the moment, we're going to leave this thread to stand, with a few deletions of comments that we felt were really unfair or beyond the pale. Hope that clears things up a bit.

I am pleased this thread was checked over, and no I didn't do any reporting, but i stepped away from it. It closes down debate when people take statements, extrapolate them to way-beyond the original intent (what? Do you mean that daisy?? Um no that wasn't what I said or meant!) and only accept a single view point. Democracy? I lost the will to bother expressing a pov beyond the bare minimum because it is too tedious.

It is rather ironic that people are talking about how threatening men are and yet their own ways of expressing themselves can equally be taken as threatening, spiteful and judgemental.

Yet another example of AIBU at its worst, most intolerant!

I'm not sure why anyone would report this thread?

Unless they agree with AT...

Lots of people do, usual. His whole studio audience did.

Yes he got lots of claps

Just seen a post on twitter saying "we will not change the way we dress because it is more convenient for your lack of self control. Blame Rapists - Not Victims"

The first comment says "Do you have a screen lock on your phone"

screen lock ? I don't get that

Screen locks stop your phone accidentally dialling numbers in your pocket.

I'm .

I still don't get it. < shrug >

Surely there are 2 issues here? The sexualisation of young girls and sexist behaviour by men