To think Karen Danczuk is right

[VivaLeBeaver]

Sorry, only a dm link

Basically she's the Rochdale councillor, married to an MP who has been in the press recently for the fact she posts selfies on Twitter displaying some cleavage.

She got a slating on Loose Women with Janet Street Porter basically saying that especially with the recent underage/sex abuse scandal in Rochdale she should be setting a better example to young girls.

Which to me sounds like total victim blaming.....that young girls shouldn't be encouraged to wear low cut tops, etc.

squoosh Why should the crate be ventilated?

I'm no fan of selfies......its all a bit too self absorbed for my liking.

However she's an adult and can weigh up the pros of publicity against the cons of perhaps not been taken seriously herself.

Blaming her for wide scale sexual abuse is piss poor though. Blaming any woman's clothing for abuse is awful. I'm sure JSP has worn some seriously short skirts in her time. If she was attacked and then told it was her fault because of how she was dressed she wouldn't like it.

I find it quite odd that someone so clearly self obsessed and interested in looks would fall for someone like her husband. They make a rather odd match...to say it kindly.

She's quoted as saying:

"This is the new type of politics. A determined make-up wearing female who takes pride in her appearance! KD #power".

She is also keen for people to know that she was voted 'best dressed' at the Labour party conference.

I'm exceptionally pleased that women like her are out there proving the point that there is no more to us than tits, lips and pretty clothes - really focussing on how she contributes to politics and women as equals by posting bikini selfies and tweeting about being topless on the beach. Hard hitting power politics.

I know nothing about her politically. I think that in itself speaks volumes for her "new type".

Agree Fairylea.

Fairylea I live in Rochdale and neither do I... She's not my councillor though.

Can't wait for this tasty trio to do some cleavage flashing selfies!

Urrghhh. I NEVER want to see that. Ever. Stuff of nightmares :)

I looked up her images - all these posey selfies showing off her boobs. I can't stand this selfie, posey, pouty stuff - it makes women look shallow and vain. So I did agree with JSP, you don't tend to see men doing this stuff and if they did they would be laughed at.

I don't agree with Jamelia or JSP at all and rape has absolutely nothing to do with the victims clothing and everything to do with the vile perpetrator, it's disgusting to suggest otherwise.

That said, I hate that once again I have to hear that it's feminist to show yourself in a state of undress, that it's empowering to get your tits out for the lads and it's helpful for it to be even more acceptable that a woman is judged on her looks and not on her thoughts or abilities. Politics is absolutely the last place where we need this culture to grow. I work in a politically related field and it's so hard to be respected as a younger woman. Being famous for vacuous, self indulgent selfies doesn't appeal to me but it seems like the only way I could get noticed in my field of work sometimes.

What I heard JSP saying was that if you want to be taken seriously in a serious field where women have struggled - then posing and acting like KD is not that great. And I don't think the whole posing sexy selfy thing is a great role modelling for young girls. And I feel the same for all the liberated female singers who rely on being hot and sexy to sell their music. I am turning into Mary Whitehouse.

I wish women wouldn't voluntarily reduce themselves to sex objects! They really let the side down.

I wouldn't take a single thing she says seriously now, having seen those ridiculous pictures.

Yanbu. What happened in Rochdale had nothing to do with women/girls not hiding their sexuality under a burka, it was about men who were raised to believe that any female not fully covered is a whore who deserves to be gang raped and forced into sex slavery.

The men who did this would equally rape all of the female victim blamers who seem to be under the illusion that they're exempt due to not having their tits out on the internet. Many of the victims were too young to have tits in the first place and were targeted because they were vulnerable and the police refused to protect them, they weren't naked dancing around the streets. Even if they were, only rapists rape.

What JSP said was tenuous (at least as she expressed it).

But even given that, KD's attempt at defending the cleavage selfie habit was pathetic. And the tweets about make-up wearing women constituting a new politics

If that is honestly the best she can do, she has no business aiming for Westminster.

LuckySaint I googled her tonight and they are a peculiar couple, aren't they?

It seems her now-husband (then someone else's, as you say) denied paternity of their two DC for quite some time

You'd think she'd be ready for a quiet life.

Maybe I need to hear the exchange again but I felt KD twisted what JSP was saying.

I'm quite relieved by the replies on this thread. .. I read some of the comments on the loose women Facebook page yesterday and it made me quite surprised - a lot of people in support of KD and saying how proud they were of her

Again I don't think it should make a jot of difference what a woman wears with regard to prosecuting sexual predators but I do think any professional person has a duty to behave in a professional way and I don't think flashing your cleavage in a series of selfies is the way to do it.

I don't even think it's a sexism issue. As others have said I wouldn't want to see a male politician in similar poses. Fair enough if they are on the beach and happen to be snapped in their swim wear but the selfies she took are obviously sexualised and that is a bit .

If I were her I'd be annoyed that my policies were less known than the size of my breasts.

And I have large breasts myself and used to wear a suit to work- you don't need to flash them if you don't want to. It is possible to dress conservatively and attractively with larger bust without being carry on ish.

I don't think JSP was victim blaming, well I don't think she meant to at all, but some of her comments could have been thought through more throughly though. I too thought KD twisted a lot of what was said.

I agreed with a lot of her points on how it is unprofessional to take a lot of selfies of your cleavage and makes it hard to take her seriously.

Jamelia is a hypocrite though and very very annoying.

U2 spot on. Totally hypocritical for Jamelia having a pop at KD (whatever you think about her). KD, a couple of hours after the show, tweeted a photo of Jamelia in a very sultry pose, low cut and almost see-through top. So it's OK for her, but not for KD????

I'm not sure with the Jamelia aspect. In some ways I agree with Jamelia. She is a pop star, totally different to someone in a position of authority when it comes to having weight in serious issues. Everyone knows pop stars are a bit of fun, it's meant to be taken with a pinch of salt. I agree there should be a line and I do think a lot of modern pop videos cross that line but I still think it's very different to a politician who is dealing with very serious issues on a daily basis.

Fairylea, I disagree, pop stars aren't just a bit of fun, although their jobs might imply that. Jamelia is far better known by adults and children than KD is. As such she will have more power and influence over popular culture. When she poses in a see through top and suspenders to promote her voice she is creating and participating in the idea that you have to look or act in a certain way to get noticed.

It is that sexualised popular culture that seeps into politics and means that women are treated as window dressing rather than serious and informed activists. For KD to then reinforce this through the booby selfies is almost heartbreaking as it feels like the circle is complete, women=the sum of their bodies.

Fairy - you don't think it is at all hypocritical for someone who regularly wears very skimpy revealing clothes in an effort to sell more records and make themselves pots of cash to slate other women who wear very skimpy revealing clothes?

Politicians are still, well, some of them, human beings. If KD is on a beach on holiday and wants to flaunt her boobs on Twitter, that's her business. If her constituents don't like it, they can vote her out. If her party don't like it, they can deselect her. I agree, there are times when it might not be appropriate - like wearing a bikini at a formal gathering in Parliament or Buck House - but quite honestly, women should be allowed to wear what they want without others slating them, especially if the slater does it themselves.

Has Jamelia posed in her pants to sell records any time in the last decade?

I wasn't aware her pop career was still going or ever got anywhere in the first place. I thought she'd knocked it all on the head after trying to be seen as a serious telly presenter.

Karen Whatsherface's selfies are an ongoing thing tho. Not old pics that people have dug out from when she was a silly, young girl.

Saucy is right.

There is a massive difference between a politician in her 30s trying to make her way to the top posting sexualised selfies and a young pop star flashing a bit of flesh. It's like saying jennifer Lopez should have to wear a business suit or that Margaret Thatcher would have been okay wearing a leotard to a cabinet meeting. Showbiz and politics are world's apart. That's the way it's always been and it's not good to blur the lines like KD is attempting to do.

There is a whole different debate about whether popstars are now veering into pornography judging by some of the recent pop videos but that is a separate debate really.

Sex is and always has been part of showbiz and pop stardom. It shouldn't be used to "sell" politics.