Page 3 boobs ban sought

Press, 23 January 1988, Page 38

Page 3 boobs ban sought

By

ANDREW GUMBEL

NZPA-Reuter London Every morning, millions of people in Britain turn over the front page of their daily newspaper and stare at a picture of a topless model cheerily exposing her breasts.

The models have become known as "page three girls” from the custom of the popular daily "Sun” in placing them on the page that comes instantly to view after opening the paper. Usually accompanied by captions about "busty blonde Belinda” or “curvy Carolyn,” this feature of the popular press is about to be attacked again as part of a long campaign being waged by one of the 41 women in Britain’s 650 member House of Commons.

“There is something deeply wrong with a society that has such a lot of in said the Labour member ' . _ . •- - • -

for Ladywood, Ms Clare Short. She tried to ban the pictures by act of Parliament 18 months ago, but her bill was laughed off by leading Conservatives as “loony feminist nonsense.”

Now Ms Short is planning to reintroduce 'the bill early this year, her campaign boosted by recent rows in Britain’s popular press which she hopes will keep some of her critics quiet. The “Star,” another newspaper where the “page three girls” appear, last year struck a publishing deal- under which it promised at least 16 breasts an issue, causing leading British supermarket chains to withdraw their advertising and senior journalists to walk out.

The deal collapsed after two months and the paper was taken back by its original owner, United Newspapers.

The former woman’s editor at the “Star,” Alix Palmer, said she had left because the pictures of the topless models were no longer as innocent as she once considered them.

“These days they’re frequently to be found on their knees with their backsides in the air at one end, and the simpering expression of a bitch on heat at the other,” she said.

In a recent debate at Oxford University, Ms Short said “Page three is the soft end of pornography, but it’s where we need to start, because it’s a mass-circulated image that legitimises and leads on to all the rest.” To defend the tabloids, the Oxford students invited Cynthia Payne, aged 57, who has become a national figure after court cases over parties at her south Rondon home for male 'guests and prostitutes.

“These topless pictures of beautiful women don’t do any harm. I wish I was young enough to be one myself, and I’m sure I’m not the only one,” said Ms Payne, who was acquitted in the most recent court case over her activities.

When Ms Short first launched her Campaign, the tabloid newspapers immedaitely branded her a killjoy, and Conservative members of Parliament awarded her bill, which got as far as a first reading, the “booby prize” of the parliamentary session.

But the Birmingham MP and long-time women’s rights activist says her campaign is no laughing matter. She told the Oxford students she had received letters “that would make you cry,” from women who had had breasts removed who felt hurt and inadequate when their husbands brought the paper home.

“I’ve had lettersl/from women who’ve been

raped who talk about the fact that the men said in the course of the rape either ‘you remind me of page three’ or ‘you should be on page three’,” she said.

Ms Palmer said she had received protests at the “Star” from women readers. “Women started writing letters after Clare’s page three bill because they suddently realised that there was a woman who was prepared to stand up and fight.” Recently the weekly “News of the World,” where topless models also appear, appointed a woman as its new editor.

"People were raping long before page three,” said Wendy Henry, the first woman to take charge of a British national paper. “Women look at page three too, it’s not just men. We take great care to produce classy pictures, not tacky ones.”

Ms Short’s campaign

received a boost against the odds in August when, in a poll conducted by the “Star,” readers voted four to three for covering up the models. Ms Short said the topless photos degraded women. “It’s saying to girls and women: this is what women are, this is what women are for. If you want to be a woman, this is how you have to look. You have to be available in this way. “It’s saying to men — that’s what women are like, that’s what women are for. They’re there for you to be amused, to giggle over and lust over.”

Ms Short said she opposed any drastic across-the-board press censorship.

“We’ve got to take action on pornography, but we’ve got to be very careful what kind of action,” she said. “We can carve out the threat on page three without endangering a single political or artistic freedom of any kind.”