Accessed 27th August 2013
http://www.economist.com/news/britain/21583661-what-row-about-tabloid-nudity-says-about-sex-and-society-tits-out
Bagehot
Tits, out
What a row about tabloid nudity says about sex and society
Aug 17th 2013 |From the print edition
AN ENGLISHMAN likes a routine: Marmite
on his toast, warm beer in his glass, bad teeth in his mouth and, for a couple
of million readers of the Sun, a squint at
Kelly from Daventry’s boobs on Page 3. Such is the claim made by Britain Britain
People have always complained that Page
3 demeans and objectifies women. But the impetus for a rethink now is new. A
year ago Lucy-Anne Holmes, an actor and writer, began an online campaign, No
More Page 3, and a petition that has since attracted 114,000 signatures. Her
success is salutary. Death threats made recently against female MPs and
journalists highlighted the use that deranged misogynists make of Twitter and
Facebook; Ms Holmes’s efforts demonstrate how valuable the internet has been
for feminists, too. Suddenly women and girls no longer feel like the only
person in the office or classroom who cares.
Previous opponents of Page 3 have been
dismissed as puritanical killjoys. With the especial venom the tabloids reserve
for those who threaten their own interests, the Sunlabelled Clare Short, a former Labour minister who
advocated a ban, “fat”, “ugly” and “jealous”. Wisely, today’s campaign is not
calling for legislation, nor even for the Sun’s banishment to
the top shelf or a minimum age for buyers (the print equivalents of a
television watershed). It is politely requesting that Page 3 be discontinued.
The Irish version of the Sunrecently did
just that. The word is that a revamp may be coming in the British paper, too.
But meanwhile fans of Page 3 are
marshalling their arguments, as familiar as the new activism is nimble. One is
that critics’ real concern is not sex but class: that the underlying anxiety is
not for the women on the page but the (largely) working-class men who ogle
them. The snooty prosecutor at the obscenity trial of “Lady Chatterley’s
Lover”—who asked if the jury would want their servants to read the
book—sometimes gets a look in. This defence is itself a form of snobbery—as if Sun readers
would not cope without a daily dose of nipples, or are irredeemably sexist.
Then there is the lazy appeal to the
sovereignty of the market. That is the line taken by David Cameron and other
senior politicians (though 138 other MPs support Ms Holmes). This is a matter
for consumers, they say, sometimes proceeding to reject the idea of a ban, even
though no one is proposing one. Like most papers, the Sun’s circulation has declined; it has been tarnished
by a scandal over phone-hacking and the bribery of public officials, in which
dozens of journalists have been arrested. Evidently, however, bigwigs still
prefer not to alienate it, or Mr Murdoch. The prime minister’s blasé approach
sits uncomfortably with his alarm at the spread of salacious images online.
That is something that definitely has
changed. These days, raunch is everywhere—not only on the internet and
television, but on advertising hoardings and the sides of buses. Another online
campaign is aimed at sanitising the covers of sub-pornographic “lads’ mags”. In
this context, Page 3 can scarcely be titillating for anyone over the age of 13.
Like the saucy “Carry On” films of the 1960s-70s, or Benny Hill’s puerile
comedy sketches, it is more cartoonish than erotic. Britons seem to have an
enduring taste for coy, almost evasive smut.
Which is not to say that it is
harmless. As with much nastier material, only more so, linking Page 3 to
violence is highly speculative. But, given its brand and (despite the falling
circulation) its ubiquity, it is silly to deny that the Sun plays
a role in shaping views on women. In particular, the attitudes of boys to girls
and girls to their own bodies: Page 3 supplies invidious comparators and
narrow, retrograde stereotypes.
The paper itself seems to understand
that tits are not for kids, and drops them in its family-friendly weekend
editions. But children pick up the Sun at bus stops or kitchen tables during
the week. In a way, the new, hypersexual environment strengthens the case
against Page 3. In the emerging, rough-and-ready rules of the pornofied world,
adults can look at what they choose, but children should be shielded where
possible.
Turn the
page
Besides the issue of whether Page 3
should be scrapped (it should, but voluntarily), there is the question why, in
this age of wall-to-wall filth, readers might remain attached to it. Here the
fallback plea of the Sun’s editors—that
the boobs have become a tradition—may be helpful. Page 3 has been going about
as long as the Super Bowl in America
Tough. Traditions can die, and many are
unlamented when they do. The time-honoured tradition of displaying girlie
calendars in motor garages and other workplaces is now defunct. Even Page 3
itself is not immutable. It ditched surgically enhanced breasts and swore off
girls younger than 18; ironic jokes at the models’ expense have gone the way of
all flesh. Too prim to arouse yet too lewd for a modern newspaper, the flesh
itself is a throwback to a cruder, simpler past.
Encouragingly, in February Mr Murdoch
hinted in a tweet that the topless shots might be replaced by pictures of
“glamorous fashionistas”. On occasion he has seemed ruthlessly aware that
institutions have a half-life. The phone-hacking furore began in 2011 when theNews of the World,
the Sun’s much older
Sunday complement, was accused of raiding the messages of a murdered
schoolgirl. Mr Murdoch closed the paper in a heartbeat.
