Why can't we just ban page three?

[Dragontamer]

Brilliant points raised by Clare Short in The Independent. To summarise:
You would think that the relentless sexism in the media would come up against 'media ethics'. However, Lord Leveson says that this topic goes beyond his remit. It is not ok to have lewd pictures of women on the office wall or before the watershed, why then are these images allowed in a widely circulated, national newspaper?

Having just had a daughter, I am anxious about what messages she will receive from this type of constant negative bombardment about women's bodies.

When Short has attempted to challenge this she has been bombarded by the snide remarks about her own body and criticised as being 'jealous'.

So, could this be a new campaign for mumsnet? Let me know your thoughts...

I want the choice and freedom NOT to be casually objectified, ta. I want the choice and freedom NOT to have soft porn imagery displayed where I or children can't avoid seeing it. I don't care whether you have a problem with it or not. I do, as it's harmful. What about MY rights?

I've made this point before on a similar thread, but I'll repeat.

It's funny how a lot of Page 3 defenders are so quick to pull out the You're Just Jealous card. I snigger a bit at that non argument as it's so obtuse, the objections are so much more nuanced than that. HOWEVER even if it was...so what? Why can't women's sexual jealousy impinge on teh world in some little small way? After all we know how much credence and respect is given to men's sexual jealousy. There are compelling arguments that even marriage was founded in response to men's jealousy, and marriage has shaped society in a huge way. So, in the name of equality, or the road towards it, let's start responding to and yes, pandering to, women's jealousy in the same way. It's only fair.

"Why is it so important to stop men desiring women?"

???
Do you think if men aren't allowed to openly ogle page 3 "lovelies" on the tube while openly gazing at the breasts of women and girls near them, that it will stop men desiring women?
How does that work then. I think it sounds like bollocks, personally. I think heterosexual men will desire women come what may, and homosexual men will desire men come what may, and lesbians will desire women and so on.

Is it OK for men to look at hot young mainly naked lads cupping their erections under their pants while sitting with schoolboys on the tube, and eyeing the groins of said schoolboys? Yes, or no?

is the fact that this doesn't happen, a sign that gay men have stopped desiring men? Hmmm?

1. By that argument you presumably have no issue with people looking at hardcore porn on their ipads/mobiles on the tube, nor to people looking at hardcore images of men and/or women on the bus/tube etc.

It's up to them. I don't care. Bigger things to worry about.

2. People are forced to look at it every day who do not buy it. Often when in school uniform and on public transport with very obvious comparisons going on.

No they're not "forced" to look at it.

3. So what.

Protesting to get something banned just gives it lots of attention and that almost always means more sales. Meaning your little protesting could be having the opposite effect of what you want.

4. This is the new argument isn't it. Oh you will make people unemployed, that's horrible, you Horrible Feminists. Not going to wash really. I'm not going to stand up to keep any job that hinges on the object (man, woman, child, animal, whatever) that is there simply for the reason of giving men an erection.

You don't care about making a lot of women unemployed? They are women the exact same as you except they have a different job? Isn't feminism supposed to be about supporting other women? Or does it only apply to women who have a career you approve of?

And you claming you dislike the idea of men getting erections does not help your argument any. Noone cares.

5. Images of women which are taken to sexually arouse men are different to women's bodies just being what they are. People generally understand the difference. Except of course for people who feel that the right of men to look at tits on the tube to make their cock twitch is an essential right.

It may not be a "right" but it's a choice. It's a choice for women to make money posing topless for The Sun and it's a choice for people to decide whether to buy The Sun or not.

Maybe you should be grateful you live in a country where we are free to make such choices.

1. By that argument you presumably have no issue with people looking at hardcore porn on their ipads/mobiles on the tube, nor to people looking at hardcore images of men and/or women on the bus/tube etc.

It's up to them. I don't care. Bigger things to worry about.

1. Images of women which are taken to sexually arouse men are different to women's bodies just being what they are. People generally understand the difference. Except of course for people who feel that the right of men to look at tits on the tube to make their cock twitch is an essential right.

It may not be a "right" but it's a choice. It's a choice for women to make money posing topless for The Sun and it's a choice for people to decide whether to buy The Sun or not.

So your point is that you think men should be allowed to watch hard core porn films on ipads etc while sitting next to young children / girls / teens on the tube.

Well that is your right, I guess, to want that. I think that your ideas are a bit weird and disturbing TBH.

How did the topic go from breasts in a newspaper to hardcore video on ipads sitting next to a child anyway? How often does the latter actually happen anyway? Never?

I said

"By that argument you presumably have no issue with people looking at hardcore porn on their ipads/mobiles on the tube, nor to people looking at hardcore images of men and/or women on the bus/tube etc."

You said

"It's up to them. I don't care. Bigger things to worry about."

This encapsulates your views on this I think. A selfish attitude of me me me and it doesn't matter how your actions affect anyone else.

Who wants to stop men desiring women? daft extrapolation.

but I would like porn consumption to be, ideally, non existant, but failing that to be private, away from the general public. Sexuality should be something that's shared with consenting adults. Even mild expressions of a certain sexuality, such as ogling pg 3 girls shouldn't be forced upon the unwilling. In the real world, a teen girl on the bus for example can't do much about it. And the normalisation effect means that she internalises the idea that she is the one at fault for feeling disturbed and uncomfortable.

"my actions"? For the record I have never viewed hardcore porn on public transport, and I have never once seen anyone else view it either (and if I did I don't see how it becomes my responsibility).

@24HourPARDyPerson porn consumption will never stop. Even if you made it illegal that would just create a huge underground market for it.

totally agree.

does any newspaper have a male page 3?

You said you have no problem with people looking at hardcore images and films on public transport.

Given that, it's not surprising that you don't have any issues with page 3.

hairymother when they do have pictures of men they
a. don't show any parts that are generally kept private
and
b. don't depict the same level of sexualisation

i do wonder sometimes how all these men people who say what's wrong with page 3 if they had to sit on the tube next to a burly man looking at highly sexualised pictures of scantily clad men, who was looking at the images and then eyeing them - their bodies and groins and bottoms. Would they be comfortable with that? The answer is absolutely not.

You can't ban sexuality and it's practices. Where would you stop and why is looking at breasts so wrong? I do it and I'm for feminism. Breasts are beautiful. What's the issue really? It's all consenting. I don't really like tradition of p3 as I'm not sure a newspaper is the right place for it, but then again when writing articles on entertainment there are often more explicit pictures.

Repressing women's bodies is really not helpful for womens rights IMO. By suppressing them, what you are saying is women's bodies cannot be appreciate without objectifying them do don't do it. There's no differce between telling women not to model naked and telling them to cover up on case someone looks at them. Backward thinking IMO. Although like I said, newspapers are necessarily the right media but the sun etc aren't really about news are they. They are about entertainment.

Are you comfortable when couples kiss in pubic or touch each others bodies? It's all expression of sexuality. Do you turn films of at love scenes?

Sorry! Freudian slip... Public not pubic :)

1. If breasts are so evil and so "harmful" to children (children have all seen their mother's breasts anyway), should we ban women from going topless at the beach too?

Do yopu actually understand at all the difference between sunbathing and posing topless to titilate men?

Sexualised images of women in the mainstream press are a bad thing for girls and women.
It's just obvious.
How on earth is it good for a girl to sit on a bus next to a man leering at a picture of a young woman with her top off? How is it good for a teenager on the tube to have a man ogling page 3 and then ogling her chest?
It's upsetting, embarassing, it puts the girls in their places, it tells them what they are for. they are nothing more than their bodies and they are there to be leered at and judged by any random man who chooses to do so.

Sex should be a private matter. It is illegal to show porn to children. it is illegal to have sex in public. Unless people want to legalise these things then i don't really understand the argument that these things are no good but page 3 is great. It's nonsensical.

Men do not need to be provided with pictures to make their cocks twitch in their daily paper on their commute. It is bizarre that this happens.

Fwiw, I wouldn't encourage my daughter to do it as there are better ways to express yourself and show your talents, however, we aren't all the same. There will always be people who want to do p3 whether because they think it will pay or get them onto something else or just because they are exhibitionists. I know some women don't fully understand the situation they are getting themselves into and so it should be more heavily regulated and perhaps the age range should be higher.

Do you think there is much difference between models and page 3? Aren't both objectified? Both are open to being abused as is any person. Should women stop capitalising on their bodies full stop? Should men stop capitalising on their bodies? Should people stop capitalising on their looks? What about their physicality like strength? Where does it stop? Our bodies have evolved to be amazing in so may ways and I don't think it makes sense to deny that.

Men and women are titillated by so many things... There's no way to prevent someone being titillated by you.

Titillated is a loaded word which really means be attracted to or fancy.

eclectic this has nothing to do with whether people want to model for page 3 or not. As long as something pays there will always be someone somewhere willing to do it, no matter what it is.

What most people on this thread are saying is that page 3 is anachronistic, sexist, offensive and should be banned.

I don't agree sq. it's not obvious or nonsensical, it's subjective. As I said, I don't think newspapers are the right place but what's the difference between someone looking at p3 on a bus next to a teenager or someone looking at the daily mail entertainment section?

Sexual appetite and practices really haven't changed that much other thanto become more underground. How underground do you want them to become?

I have never seen the daily mail entertainment section. Does it feature soft porn images of young women in their pants? If so then clearly that needs to go as well.

If you don't think newspapers are the place for soft porn then your posts seem odd as actually you agree with the OP.

Would it not be better to educate girls and boys about sexism and objectification rather than trying to remove any potential material. It's treating a symptom perhaps, not treating the cause. You will never stamp out this kind of thing, it's entwined within our nature. It's how we reproduce after all. Men and women desire eachother and like looking at eachother.

IMO, we should be explaining these complexities to young people and hello them to understand human behaviour with the ability of critical thinking.

I'd like to see lots of things banned but we don't live in a vanilla idealistic perfect world. We are human.

I don't agree or disagree with OP. I don't want to see anything banned, however I'd like for people to in time stop buying the sun for p3 or for the sun to realise maybe they don't need p3 to sell papers.

However, I think it's unlikely, a the DM mainly sells on its entertainment section which is far more troublesome from a feminist standpoint to me than p3.

We need to address the issues at the root cause not at the outcome.