Page 3

[thefinerthingsinlife]

"Page 3: a daily reminder of our status in society and what women exist for. To be ogled, scrutinised, mocked, put down, humiliated, harassed, beaten and killed. Every day we hear of heinous (sexual) crimes and injustices against women but every day Page 3 remains a celebrated iconic image in our culture. Is this some sort of joke? No, it's just patriarchy"

I've just seen this and thought it summed it up rather well

And er Jess, I hate to tell you, but with a troll of Dave's calibre, I'm afraid it is back to basics.

It's going to be a LONG night for some of you...

oh yes, that other perspective... the one we never ever ever hear in real life, the one our culture isn't saturated in... oh, hang on...

fuckit I'm off to bed.

Absolutely Dave. You're quite right.

@The FinerThings - Francine, who set the group up, is amazing. You could befriend her on Facebook (I'm friends with her). She's a feminist powerhouse!

Nope, I can't even be bothered to be sarcastic anymore.

I don't know if this thread will get many hits. But in answer to the question earlier about whether it should be banned, I think it will never go away if there isn't some legislation around the display of it at least. It's too ingrained now as good old British culture (to morons) for it to ever go of its own accord. Even a female editor didn't dare tackle the owner on this one.

I don't look at a stripper or a topless woman as a sex object. I look at her as a woman and understand she is just working and deserves respect like anyone else.

I've just found it, TBE!

This is the second time in the short time I've been on Mumsnet that I've seen someone say 'Don't they realise that this is the feminism section?' Don't you realise that people can come across your threads in other parts of the site, find the issue interesting and want to respond or find out more. And that if your thread is being picked up in that way that it's probably being read by loads of other people who haven't responded and who wouldn't think of going to the feminism section. That's an opportunity missed.

Why don't you get off your high horses and explain to silly Dave without jargon exactly what the problem is with the objectification of women?

What are tits? oh yeah they're fat with milk glands for feeding babies. Women have them and some men have them without the milk. Practically everyone has seen a pair whilst a baby. So what's so offensive about them?

Dave, if that were all they were they wouldn't be on page three now, would they? And you surely understand that it's not the bodies that are offensive?

TheButterflyEffect,

I'm here to find out.

Rrocks - I have no problem with engaging on someone on any subject if they are genuinely interested and want to know more. However, I have wasted a lot of time - and I mean a lot of time - over the past few years trying to be well meaning and trying to engage with people who weren't there for positive reasons. I spent about an hour last night discussing pornography with some of TheFinerThings 'friends' on facebook, people who were very defensive of porn initially but who gradually came around just a tiny bit towards the end of the conversation.

However, someone who comes onto a feminism section to say that Page 3 is fine because it's just "tits"...well, I somehow think that person isn't particularly interested in engaging with the subject from a feminist perspective.

Fair play to you for trying though. I will watch with interest!

"engaging with someone..."

One of the arguments trotted out last night re: porn was that liking porn just means that someone has a different opinion. And it was a democracy so that person is entitled to that opinion. Which is fine but it doesn't make that opinion right.

Here are some links that you might find interesting and that may help with the discussion with Dave (of course, he is welcome to read them but I somehow think that he won't):

www.object.org.uk/index.php/why-object-to-lads-mags

phulme.wordpress.com/2010/02/26/linda-papadopoulos-on-the-sexualisation-of-young-people/

Unfortunately the above review doesn't seem to be available on the DH website anymore.

I need to get to bed but there's plenty more out there to read.

TheButterlyEffect and JessinAvalon,

Thanks for the posts and links, which I will read. Your greater experience of these things means that you might be right about Dave trollling. My criticism arose because I don't like to see feminism being misrepresented to the general public; it was, of course, in complete ignorance of the amount of time you generally spend explaining the issues to people. So, my apologies, ladies.

Jess, hope you are well.

I've just sent a friend request to her. Sounds like she's someone else I can learn from

Love boobs. Hate Page 3. Newspapers are for news. Put it up on the shelf or take out page 3. No one will lose jobs. People can still get thrills from mags magazines. Catch up UK. Here's my thoughts more deeply if anyone fancies!: www.youtube.com/watch?v=XomUSdsg6UY&feature=plcp.

the labour govt could have banned page 3 but were too scared to upset rupert murdoch, when in opposition, clare short wanted to bring in a bill to ban page 3 but it failed, funny how she went quiet when in govt, perhaps she was silenced by tony blair?

I wish they'd get rid of page 3.

What people who support it fail to realise is that it's got massive connotations for the wider social context of objectifying women. Page 3 girls aren't there for anything other than men to look at, pure and simple.

In a country when you get gawped at or tutted at (or asked to go to a bathroom in some cases) for breastfeeding in public, having page 3 seems so much more of a contradiction.

I know this because I'm a woman. I've been repeatedly made to feel extremely uncomfortable breastfeeding in public with both my children, and I'm not flopping out my DD-cups in the middle of a busy cafe, I'm finding a quiet corner and covering as much as I can.

If we were more 'european' in our thinking, and women could walk along beaches here with their tits out without fear of being whistled at by teenage boys or ogled by men, then it might be a different story.

The furore that Kate's topless photos caused only serves to support this idea that in the UK women going topless seems like a big deal.

Until we can all walk around topless in the summer (like men do) with our stretch marks, lopsided, sagging, uneven, un-enhanced breasts for all the world to see without feeling self conscious, then page 3 needs to go.

I feel very strongly that by having page 3 it's upholding the idea that women have to look and behave in a certain way just to be attractive to a man. And that's fundamentally wrong.

I don't want my son thinking it's ok, and my daughter feeling objectified.

(Rant over )

I'm with Flamingo Bingo and wouldn't support a ban, in the same way as I wouldn't support a ban of prostitution or pornography - I think banning and censorship rarely has the positive effect those in favour of it are hoping for.

Now I would love to see the market of all 3 diminishing, and page 3 disappearing because people are aware that it's shite, but that's a very different thing to a ban imposed through legislation.

Gosh, another thread from the dead...

Page 3 is awful - not so much because it's naked boobies, but because it is yet another way of pushing a synthetic body image down people's throats. You're only attractive if you're...

young
slim
half-naked

no-one cares what you're interested in, think like, talk like...

It makes men have unrealistic ideas of what real women look like, makes women feel they have to adapt to some woman hating picture editor's ideals [Oh, just like fashion magazines]

[Oh, thats besides any specific feminist moral issues about objectification and status]

Couldn't agree with you more OneMoreChap.

I really worry for my daughter's future when I see young women wearing so little in a desperate attempt at trying to prove something.

As you say, I don't have an issue with nudity per se, it's the intent behind it that makes me feel so uncomfortable. It's sort of creepy and pervy rather than celebratory.

It's not showing breasts that's the problem or I would be with the anti-public breastfeeding camp, fuck no to their misogyny.

That's only people and especially hypocritical men who claim it's "wrong" to use the mammary gland for its primary function without ducking out of sight, not for women whose personal boundaries around their bodies include keeping it private- no one has a right to disrespect that, especially in a sexist culture where the non-consensual touching of them figures strongly in violence against women.

It's the fact that page 3 is purely there for men to gawp at breasts and a body that conforms to patriarchy's standards.

I'm convinced a lot of the women who mansplaining page 3/lads' mag/porn defenders call "prudes" would be more comfortable at a nudist beach than either the women in the sex industry, who have internalised the attitude that their bodies should only be exposed to another person's view when they are "sexy", or (by far ) the status-obsessed males who run the show.

I have no issue with page 3, and I have no prob either with women breastfeeding or women walking topless at a beach (because I'm not prudish in the slightest). We were born naked anyway.

@OneMoreChap
young
slim
half-naked

All current page 3 models are 18+ years of age (used to be 16+ but that changed). Do you think 18 is still too young to pose topless and the age should be increased again? IMO 18 is an adult age and not a child.

All the page 3 models I have seen are slim yes but a healthy slim. I don't think I've seen any anorexic or overweight models on page 3- and I don't think showing models of an unhealthy weight is a good idea. So what's the issue here?

As for half-naked if a man was shown with no top on then noone would be shocked and noone would complain. So why is it ok for a man to take his top off but a woman can't?