Boobs Really Really Really Are Not News

Recently, the Warwick Debating Union hosted the No More Page 3 Campaign, Helen Goodman MP, Natasha Devon, founder of Body Gossip, and Raheem Kassam, editor/founder of Trending Central, to debate the motion "This House Would Ban Page 3" (for clarity, the former two spoke in proposition, whilst the latter two spoke in opposition). I was quite disappointed that I had to leave the debate midway through, having only listened to Helen and Raheem speak, especially when, in a short twitter conversation with Natasha, it was revealed that I missed a "fiery" one. Going off the two speeches I was lucky enough to see, there is no doubt the opposition should have won the debate, in my opinion.

I was rather bemused by Helen's speech, which began with her reading out a newspaper article and included the customary mention of her constituency. Other than confirming that she was not in favour of a government ban, there was not much of note. The point about a government ban is an interesting one. For what it is worth, I can understand that the campaign, and Helen, are not in favour of actually banning Page 3 via legislation, but rather are in favour 'of asking the editor nicely' but, to be frank, that campaign must be considered a failure. Of course the petition has been largely successful in terms of signatories but ultimately, if the Sun was going to 'voluntarily' drop Page 3, David Dinsmore would have done so by now. Instead, he has come out in support of the feature and this, obviously, points towards its continued presence in the magazine. Continued pressure and campaigning might be successful in ensuring the removal of the Sun from universities or individual shops, but ultimately, this will not have much effect on the Sun's decisions regarding Page 3. The Sun will continue to sell millions of copies regardless of whether my local corner shop or the Costcutter on campus stocks it - and I cannot see this changing. Making the safe assumption that there is not great pressure from the Sun's readers for Page 3 to go, there are two reasons for Dinsmore to remove the feature:

1. Removing it will see an increase in sales. 
2. The Government either makes Page 3 illegal or imposes the same conditions of sale on the Sun as are imposed on Nuts or Zoo

One would only be the case if the readers themselves started campaigning for its removal or if outlets like Tesco starting dropping the Sun in protest and I cannot see either happening, whilst both the No More Page 3 Campaign and Helen Goodman confirmed that they did not support option two, so it seems that Page 3 is here to stay, regardless of any disapproval of it. It is interesting that No More Page 3, and others, have written numerous articles about hugely negative effects deriving from Page 3, yet do not want to ban it, especially considering what I believe to be the current state of their campaign. 

As I have already made clear, I thought Raheem won the first half of the debate, the text of his speech has been uploaded to his website Trending Central and can be found here. Raheem, and I believe Natasha's, case goes beyond arguing for or against a ban, summed up neatly by the following statement: "Well, we're telling women, "No. You can't voluntarily pose for a newspaper. No. You must cover up."" Irrespective of whether No More Page 3 and Helen Goodman are calling for a governmental ban, there is a distinct dictating to Page 3 girls what they should and should not do by campaigning against Page 3, which seems to go very much against Liberal (and Feminist) values. I wish I had heard Natasha Devon's speech - from her tweets, I think it would have been along the lines of Page 3 actually promoting healthy body image with the variety of dress sizes, no breast implants etc, something that I think complements Raheem's point. 

For what it is worth, I do not really like Page 3 but my disapproval of Page 3 and its presence of the Sun is irrelevant really. Yes I understand the fear that boys/men seeing Page 3 girls and thinking that is what girls all look like or the fear that it can lead to the objectification or sexualisation of women but removing Page 3 is addressing that potential problem in the wrong way. Firstly, as Natasha tweeted after the debate (and no doubt said in her speech), to assume that Page 3 makes men think women are objects and so on is not only false (without blowing my own trumpet, I happen to have seen Page 3 and also happen to not think women are objects, and I am sure I am not alone) but is also simply offensive to all the "decent" men out there. Secondly, and more importantly, if we grant the assumption that Page 3 girls can lead to the sexualisation of women by men, the problem is not Page 3, the problem is those men.

In fact, much more dangerous than Page 3, in my opinion, are things like Smart Insurance's advert. For anyone who has not seen the advert, and cannot be bothered to click on the link, it depicts a man as coming home from work and arranging life insurance to help his family in the event that the worst should happen. The implicit message from this advert is that it is the man who is the bread winner, it is the man who needs to ensure his family is protected should the worst happen and that his wife could not possibly survive without his earnings. The advert itself is not explicit at all, but there can be little doubt that it could be seen to be reinforcing the gender stereotype and male breadwinner view that is prevalent in our society. I think there are many more people who are prone to influence by adverts like Smart Insurance's, whose implicit message is much more subtle than the bare breasts on Page 3. I am sympathetic to the fears of the No More Page 3 campaign, and others who disapprove of Page 3, but the issues they raise - the sexualisation and objectification of women, for example, should be combatted by education and other means, in my opinion.

Ultimately, the issues highlighted by the campaign are far deeper rooted than being caused by a woman having her boobs out in a newspaper. 

Arab Spring or Islamist Winter

On Monday 7th October, the Warwick Debating Union hosted a public debate on the motion THB that the Arab Spring has caused more harm than good. Whilst I was not organising this specific debate, I was particularly excited by its motion as it was the one that most chimed with my interests. Clearly the student body agreed, with the room packed to capacity and the live stream being watched by many, when it decided to work. Just for reference, Barak Seneer and Maria Holt proposed the motion, with Noel Brehony and Meg Munn MP in opposition and the motion did not carry, in fact it failed by quite a large majority.

The obvious points, as you would expect, came up - violence against women, the question of Political Islam and Democracy, Syria, whether the West is arrogant to assume imposition of its view of morality and system of government as right/good amongst others.

The panel, in the main, actually seemed to agree with each other on some of the major points - the failures of the governments that came in to replace the dictators; that there was a long way to go; and that women's rights were a serious issue, yet were consistent to their opposing sides of the debate. Ultimately, the debate seemed to come down to optimism beating pessimism. Seneer spoke about the lack of any indication that Liberal and Democratic forces "winning" in the region, whilst Brehony spoke of the (relative) successes in Yemen. Similarly, both Holt and Munn spoke of the awful assaults, sexual harassment and violence that women in the region were victim of and their lack of political and social rights. However, Holt stressed these facts, whilst Munn also made the point that the Arab Spring had large woman involvement in protests and calling for social and Political change and also noted the example of Tunisia whose parliament's make up is 27% woman - 5% higher than our own, according to her stats.

Perhaps we do have reason to be optimistic. No one denied the awful situation in Syria, no one denied that Political vacuums had been filled, often, with Muslim Brotherhood Islamists and extremists and no one tried to make it seem like women suddenly lived in some utopia. There was an acceptance of the cold hard facts on the ground, which ultimately made for much more credible opposition side than I initially anticipated. I, however, disagree with the majority of the students watching. I share Barack Seneer's pessimism, perhaps summed up when he answered a question by stating, "I hope you're right and I am wrong, I really do," and went on to further analyse his point about looking at the Arab Spring from a 2013 perspective and not seeing the signs that it could be a success, referencing the 'lack of seeds being planted' in the first place in reply to the generic point that you need to plant seeds for anything to grow and that takes time. Maybe in 100 years time, Barak and I will both be proven wrong. Let's hope so.

As George Will once said: "The nice thing about being a pessimist is that you are constantly either being proven right or pleasantly surprised."