Should we back the No More Page 3 campaign? Please let us know what you think...

[JustineMumsnet]

Hello all,

As some of you will know, there have been a few on-board debates about the No More Page 3 nomorepage3.org/ campaign, and whether or not Mumsnet should 'officially' join up as a supporter.

Previous threads here here here and here have been on balance supportive but not of a sufficient consensus for us to feel comfortable putting our full weight behind the cause.

With our most recent blog post on the issue, however, support seemed a bit more clear cut and there were lots of calls for us to back the campaign.

So we thought we'd canvass support more officially and widely. Do please use this thread to let us know whether you think we should sign up.

Obviously this is by no means a precise science, but in order to try to get a representative Mumsnet view, we will be placing a bit less weight on the views of those who have signed up to Mumsnet very recently.

Please back it. My three year old can see page 3 in our local library, that's just not right!

We could have a breastfeeding page instead: jellyjuggling.wordpress.com/2013/12/28/boobs-on-page-3/

I do think its a crappy thing and ideally would be replaced. I would be happy for mumsnet to back the campaign - it doesn't save the world at a stroke but it would be big news if it did happen, and it all feeds in to the changes we need to make in society . I do wonder what the page three girls themselves have to say about it.

Yes, please support this campaign. Page 3 is a ridiculous objectification of women's bodies that has no place in a daily newspaper.

Yes, you should support it, please.

Yes!

Many years ago I was struggling to breastfeed my fractious baby at a motorway service station. The couple at the next table gave me a dirty look and the man said loudly enough for me to hear 'ffs that's putting me off my breakfast'. I struggled on feeling mortified and upset. On my way out I noticed a copy of The Sun on their table, open at Page 3. Mortification turned to rage - how was it ok to have naked breasts openly displayed in the newspaper but not ok for me to use mine to (discreetly) feed my hungry baby? To my shame at that time as a new mum I was too exhausted and embarrassed to say anything.

By supporting the 'no more page 3' campaign I can regain my voice that I didn't dare speak out then.

Fast forward 14 years and my kids are now teens venturing out into the world independently. The thought of my daughter travelling on the bus beside men staring at a picture of a very young woman's bare breasts (published there for the purpose of pleasing men) makes me feel uncomfortable and worried.

That the largest picture of a woman in a newspaper in Britain today is of a young woman in her pants is just so wrong.

Yes I would like to see Mumsnet back the No more page 3 campaign! For me, it's not about nipples or breasts being on display but more HOW the are display. I have no issue whatsoever seeing a breast or nipple out in public feeding a baby. Let's have more of that I say! In Page 3 though breasts of women are sexualised and that's the issue. This is not just nudity, its sexualisation and that's quite a different thing altogether. The images are designed to titillate and tease. I was brought up with this newspaper in my house and it felt me feel extremely uncomfortable and embarrassed when page 3 was on view especially when my father or grandfather were 'reading' page 3, or if I sat on the bus with someone 'reading ' that page….. These images are degrading to ALL girls and women not just those in the pictures. Most other countries of the world have nothing like this and find this most peculiar - there is absolutely no place for this in 2014 in the UK!

I have backed it since the beginning and wrote a blog piece about it about 10/11 months ago. I say a resounding YES to MN backing this campaign!

Yes please back this campaign. I sat opposite a man on the train with my dd a few months back and he was reading the Sun and kept glancing at her. His choice of paper gave what may have been a friendly interest a whole different meaning.

Yes support it, it's 2014 for crying out loud newspapers should be over being gratuitously sexist by now.

And yes there are loads of other worthwhile campaigns out there but I don't see the connection between supporting this and not the other. It's possible to support more than one.

NoMore Page 3 fights one of the roots of sexism.

Yes, yes yes! Please support this campaign!

100% behind this campaign.

I attended the March in London last year, the organisers were fantastic, we had marching songs which we sang loud and proud and we received public support along the way from passers by.

I was appalled to receive some negative and openly sexist remarks from people I thought I knew when they learned of my attendance, so I definitely agree that much still needs to be done to address inequality and ignorance surrounding the basic rights of women and children every day.

Please support this campaign Mumsnet, you do so much good already.

Yes please support it. I love boobs, I even love soft porn in the appropriate place, but a newspaper isn't that.

Yes yes yes. This is definitely something that Mumsnet should be supporting.

I feel that Mumsnet should definitely support the campaign!!! I am a longstanding Mumsnetter and feel that a platform that was (originally) set up for women is totally justified and perhaps even has a role in changing damaging stereotypes of how women are viewed in society. Page three is one of the most damaging icons of the sexist way women are presented in the media and it should go.

I think it is particularly great that the campaign is not asking for a ban, but tries to achieve it by requesting that the Sun update their presentation of women by getting rid of it themselves. It does a great job at raising consciousness, and hopefully other instances of sexism in the Sun and other magazine become less acceptable as well.

Absolutely YES!!!

Yes please support this MNHQ. I have already signed the petition and wholeheartedly believe that P3 is wrong in today's Britain.

Yes, I think that MN should support this campaign.

The 'No' argument seems to be based on the fact that there are worse things happening to women in the world, and that it won't actually change things.

On a day when I have read in a national newspaper that Rennard's alleged sexual harassment is not really such a terrible thing, and that women should be campaigning against FGM, it is quite a disappointment to see this argument on MN.

I can care and campaign about many different issues at the same time, and this kind of sexualisation of women leads on to the other issues that face society.

We need to stop comparing issues, and trying to work out which is the most important, because everyone has their own viewpoint and every campaign is worthwhile. This is a good starting point.

I support the No More Page 3 campaign. Not to is just indefensible. The arguments against appear to be:

You are all prudes
It's the same as topless sunbathing/breastfeeding

It infringes men's civil liberties
It provides jobs for the girls
There is worse on the internet

There are many more but frankly none of them stack up. What this campaign is trying to achieve and IS achieving is to shine a light on the objectification of women by focusing on this simple symbol of very tired 1970's attitudes.

Yes there is worse on the internet but for many children, Page 3 (& similar in other "newspapers") will be their first bewildering encounter with
degrading imagery and it is being left around for them to see either at home, out at burger restaurants and yes, right at the front of newsagents shops at child height all so that certain men can have the freedom to look at young girls in their pants under cover of "reading a newspaper".

Let them do that if that is what they want to do but wouldn't it be better for all for them to buy one of the many mags situated on the top shelf at the rear of the store?

Mumsnet should have been on this long ago and I'm surprised that as a platform you have chosen to sit back and wait to gauge opinion before stating your position. No matter though as I think the campaign has achieved critical mass. Young people totally get it and are much more aware of issues such as this. They don't read newspapers either and certainly wouldn't be seen dead with The Sun/similar so the future is bright.

Yes! Please do back this ultra worthy cause (and sign the petition!) I would like to think that when my son is old enough to buy something in a shop, that he doesn't have the option of 'normalised pornography'.

YES!

Yes do please back this...definitely deserving of all the support it can get. Thanks

Another vote to please support this!

Howdy MN, most of the comments here are from women (natch) so I thought I'd risk joining just to give the opinion of a man, Grrrr. In short - I hate Page 3. I find it embarrassing, disrespectful and firmly believe that it leads to confusion about how men see, and therefore treat, women.

Just to be clear I may hate Page 3, but I don't hate women and nor do I hate boobs. In my younger years I would frequently look at Page 3, because - well, I got to see some boobs, it really didn't take much encouragement. That process of seeing a woman as a sexually-available and consumable "thing" damages the way that you relate to women.

You hear the language of boys growing up (and blokes in a male work setting) and it's invariably sexual and (mostly) denigrating towards women - where did we learn that from? I certainly didn't get it off my Mum and Grandma who raised me. Over time (and with the love of the best woman) I've realised how wrong Page 3 is and how it fundamentally altered the way I looked at women.

Frankly, I'm disgusted that I didn't see it before, which is one of the reasons I'm so in favour of the campaign. Also I'd like to think that my boys will be raised to see girls as equals - certainly not as something passive to ogle. When I think of my nieces getting input into their developing minds from Page 3 about how they should look, or about their place in the world my blood boils and I have to be restrained. If MN can support the campaign to ask David Dinsmore to take an enlightened step of simply binning an outdated feature from his paper it would be a big step towards, I believe, a more beautiful, egalitarian and feminist world.

Of course, there are objections (all beautifully dealt with over at the NMP3 FAQ) such as that far more images of women are available on the internet, but that's not the point. The fundamental point for me is that this is a naked woman in a NEWSpaper. It's such a stark reduction of what a woman is. It's such a gross and pathetic slap in the chops. Every day! How can you have Angela Merkel on Page 2 helping to lead Europe out of chaos, but just over the page is another - bigger - image which says that actually women are really just tits to be consumed by men?

The fact that Page 3 has become so normalised by 40 years of repetition (a fact reflected in some of the antipathy from commenters on the thread, I believe) is perhaps the most damaging aspect of the whole situation. Forgive the analogy but it's like dog sh*t that's been walked into the carpet and although it's gross, over time you've left it and finally you just get used to it. It takes a newcomer like the NMP3 campaign to come in and say - this whole thing stinks! - before people come to and appraise what's in front of their eyes.

/rant

Anyone reading the tweets sent to Beth Tweddle and the regular trolling of Rebecca Adlington about her appearance can be left in no doubt that a woman is judged first on her appearance and then diminished - before her achievements are celebrated.

Page 3 feeds and enables this attitude by giving a full page to sexualising women.

Mumsnet - do it! You're a little late to the party - but you'd make a big difference encouraging people to sign the petition.

I protested about this. A man came up to me with his 2 primary aged DDs - and told me page 3 should stay because the girls had fucking great tits. His DDs were mortified.

That's a great post Drwhom