Thursday 20 February 2014

We ask that Co-operative food do not advertise in publications which objectify and belittle women; that it stop all advertisements, marketing of or links to The Sun Newspaper whilst it has Page 3, and that in line with the Co-operative's approach on "lad's Mags" tabloid newspapers which contain inappropriate adult content be moved out of reach of children or not sold in store.
We propose that the Co-operative back the No More Page 3 campaign lobbying for an end to page 3.


We believe this proposal is in fitting with the Co-operatives ethos of fighting for the good of members and customers. it's aim to be the most socially responsible business in the UK, offering "members and customers not only value, but values."


The 6 co-operative values include -


Democracy  –   "giving members a say in the way we run our businesses" we the members ask the Co-operative to no longer endorse exploitation of women, sexism and degradation in a news publication with advertising revenue generated by us the members and customers.


Equality  –  no matter how much money a member invests in their share account, they still have one vote. We are exercising our vote to ask for equal representation in the media and ask that Co-op disassociate itself with publications which promote the opposite.


Equity –  we carry out our business in a way that is fair and unbiased. Page 3 is not fair, there is no male equivalent.




Co-op's ethical responsibilities include -
Social responsibility  –  we encourage people to take responsibility for their own community, and work together to improve it. We are taking responsibility in lobbying for a greater equality in UK media and better representation for women.


Caring for others  –  we ask Co-op to care for the young people of the UK who are affected by sexualised images they see in everyday life. NMP3 is backed by the British Youth Council, Girl Guides and Girls Brigade


Co-op's Principles include -
Education, training and information  –  co-operatives educate and develop their members as well as their staff but what are the young people of the UK educated to believe when the biggest single image of a woman in the UK's best selling paper is one of her standing in her pants for men's sexual gratification and what are they to make of the Co-operatives endorsement of putting its advertisements in the same publication?


Concern for community  –  co-operatives also work to improve and develop the community, both locally and internationally. We ask that it extend this to seeing it's responsibility in associating itself with the publication which offers women up as a sexual feature as part of the daily news.








Background information and evidence -


The No More Page3 Campaign has been gathering support from individuals and organisations over the last year and a half.
Supportive organisations include -
• Girlguiding UK (over 500,000 young members)
• Mumsnet (Mumsnet is the UK's largest website for parents, with 4.3 million monthly unique visitors)
• The British Youth Council (over 220 youth organisations)
• UK Youth (working with approx. 1 million young people, and 11,000 youth clubs
• Members of the Girls’ Brigade England and Wales (just under 20,000 members)
• The NUT, NASUWT, ATL, NAHT (combining over 780,000 teachers, lecturers and Head Teachers)
• Unison (our largest union, 1.3 million members)
• The National Assembly of Wales
• The Scottish Parliament
• The Royal College of Midwives
• The Royal College of Nursing
• 28 universities and 6 Oxford University Colleges have voted to stop selling The Sun until it drops the page 3 topless images
• Rape Crisis
• Woman’s Aid
• End Violence Against Women’s Coalition
 (full list available here - http://nomorepage3.org/orgsupport/)


There has been a palpable change in public mood over the mainstreaming of soft porn in public spaces and The Co-operative have been part of this movement in being the first major supermarket retailer, once again, to step up and make the ethical choice to stop sale of Lads Mags that refused to cover up their objectifying front pages.


Growing evidence is showing us that this passive, sexualised image, and its unrestricted placement, is problematic for both female and male readers of all ages and society as a whole.
Page 3:


  • Derails equality and limits the aspirations and achievements of women and girls  
  • Legitimises objectification of women as sexual beings and distorts body image
  • Fuels a disrespectful perception and sense of entitlement towards women, underpinning sexual violence
  • Undermines responsible parenting and makes a nonsense of child protection policies
Evidence to support these claims is available here - http://nomorepage3.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Research-doc-I-Effects-of-_Page-3_-type-images-on-men-1.doc
and here http://nomorepage3.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Research-doc-II-Effect-and-Impact-of-Page-3-on-Women-1.doc







We feel Co-op should remove Sun advertising until Page 3 goes because -
As a campaign we are not seeking legislation or a ban, we are lobbying the editorial team of The Sun for a voluntary removal of an image which is so harmful to so many women, and damaging to the idea of equality.
Part of that lobbying involves ethical companies recognising the damage being done to their brand by association with Page 3. We are looking to the co-op to take the lead once again on equality and equity.
At present our supporters tell us that many of them are Co-operative customers because of the organisation's ethics. They are disappointed that Co-op are choosing to associate themselves with the Sun and putting the potential profit of reaching sun readers before the potential damage caused by these sexist and degrading images in a news publication.


We propose tabloid newspapers which contain inappropriate adult content be moved out of reach of children or not sold in store because -


Whilst these images are available to children at child height it makes parents job in protecting their child from these images difficult if not impossible. The sale of the Sun and Star at child height effectively condones the promotion of soft porn where children can see it.


Workplace equality. The Equality Act 2010 states that conditions in the workplace should not be offensive to either men or women. Women now have the right to complain about demeaning images visible at work, but many still find this difficult because of the real or perceived risk of ridicule or anger. Co-operative employees and customers should not have to tolerate customers potentially picking up and opening these publications in store.

Sunday 9 February 2014

An Ode to my 30's

I entered you in silent protest, with trepidation born from a feeling of inadequacy. I was scared that I would be discovered, aware as I was that I wasn't worthy of the level of maturity that you would expect of me.


I knew I could play it OK, I felt I had spent much of my 20's playing at being a grown up but had been increasingly aware of the duplicity of it. As a teenager I had played grown up in a way which more thoroughly convinced myself but through my 20's I was, despite the throws of a stressful and responsible job and the parenting of two children, increasingly aware that I had not yet discovered who I was, what I wanted, where I was going or most importantly how to sustain any level of contentment at all.


At the turn of 30 I was married to a man I had been with since the child pretending to be oh so grown up me had met him at 16. I loved him in the way that familiarity and pattern allows you to love somebody who has been so much part of who you have become, but in my heart I knew that the biggest part of my disquiet with entering a new decade was the awareness, increasingly emerging, that I could not be the me I needed to be, could not fly, grow or be free of fear whilst I was in that relationship. I knew too that at that time I did not have the bravery to make that move. I was right. It took another 6 years.


And so we started our time together 30's with me unhappy but I felt your hand guiding me - into career changes and explorations of my sexual being, my need for expression, my abilities and strengths. I began to lay a foundation of independence that I would need to make the moves I needed. I passed my driving test, I made a network of friends who were supportive and strong. I stood up for myself at work and fought for promotions and changes.


The challenges that my parenting had given me in having children with severe allergy led me into supporting other parents in the same position and eventually into a change of direction in my nursing career. There was a reaffirmation of my academic ability and challenges faced when work colleagues became bullies but you knew exactly what you were doing - my facing of those challenges in my working life made me finally take note of the way things were at home and at 35 you had given me the strength to say the words "I wouldn't let anybody else speak to me that way so why do I put up with it from you" words born too from more lessons you had shown me about the fragility of life and the need to take our own path as I watched my mother battle cancer and lost a young friend to it for the first time. Life is too precious you said, to live so much of it unhappy and in the wrong place.


It was another year before I found the strength to end my marriage.


I may mock my less aware 20's but they had given me experience with grief and made me resilient. You, my wonderful 30's had added strength, a support network and the anger I needed to get through what I was about to do. I had to be strong and for the first time in my life I had to be quite quite cold. I felt your hand at my back pushing me through, showing me a light ahead to keep me moving forward.


I finally collapsed through the door of my new home just before Christmas into an unknown adult single life. I was scared and lonely but excited and inquisitive.


You showed me quickly that despite the new found passions of a 30 something divorcee I could not separate love from sexual intimacy. I felt a little lost and frightened that despite my bravery I would still not be complete. I was scared again, this time that you, having given me the strength to make the move which had so torn me and others apart, having torn me from the familiarity that I needed to lose you had placed me somewhat lost in a new place and left me quite alone.


I was wrong, next you did the most amazing thing of all - You opened up my heart.


You showed me wonderful 30's what you had known all this time. You showed me the thing that had carried me through all of my teenage angst, my grief ridden childbearing and my unhappy and bullied marriage and family, my mother's illness - you showed me me!


I finally saw it and felt it for the first time in earnest  - a core strength, a love that I simply had to look for to find. All I had to do was hold it, know it and trust it and I was free to be all I could be, to be truly content, to be happy.


You had given so much and I would have been happy had you left it there yet you had not finished - in having finally embraced my true self, having opened my ears, my eyes, my sense of being at one with the universe, I was able to follow the signals that I must have spent so much of my life ignoring. In trusting the universe and trusting myself the last few years of our time together has been a whirlwind of light, of action, of love and fulfilment that I would never have dared to dream of before.


I found the love of a man who met me where I stood, who made me his centre and who loves and supports me for who I am every day that he gives me.


I explored again the fun and wonder of acting and in so doing built again the strength to perform. I found a passion and an awareness of feminism and with it friendships built on sisterhood, on shared values and on truth with women who were, like me, lighting up with the wonder of self-awareness and strength.


I cannot place a value on the things I have in my life now, they are amazing each and every one. I am linked in love and wonder with so many beautiful people, I am taking a path that meanders and twists and touches places and people where I see history being made. I am totally embraced in the arms of my partner and family and I see the links with the me that has always been and the me that moves forward into new and exciting life to come.


So the time has come to say goodbye and I am brimming with tears, but not this time in fear or sadness. This time I am looking back with awe at what we have achieved together, at what we have made. I salute you 30's as I am turn my head and I walk forward in to my 40's with wonder, with excitement and with absolute faith that I am ready for whatever comes next. What a transformation.


Hello there 40, I'm ready, what's next?

Monday 3 February 2014

Of Boys and Men

Here at No More page 3 we talk a lot about objectification, sexual objectification in particular and the societal effects of this.


Sexual objectification in the media is hugely gender biased, 95% of it according to a study on changes to Rolling Stone magazine, being of women. http://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2011/12/30/gender-sexualization-and-rolling-stone/


We need only pay attention for a moment to adverts, billboards, newspapers, magazines, music videos etc etc and we see image upon image of half naked females, sometimes whole, sometimes divided into parts; sometimes human, sometimes mimicking objects. Everywhere we look women's bodies, being used to sell things and decorate things and...well....generally remind
us all that women are first and foremost decorative sexual objects for men's pleasure.


With this in mind, for some of us there is a natural snort and a tendency to say "Ha!" at any mention of objectification of men in the media and to be fair there is good reason for that.


Male objectification is by no means as prolific as objectification of women, it is rarely, if ever, as sexual and it doesn't come with the weight of hundreds of years of oppression or the knowledge of the threat of violence (sexual or otherwise) that comes from reducing women to something other than human.


Just in terms of our campaign clearly there is no male page 3 equivalent, yet No More Page 3 supporters are all too often reminded by those objecting to the cause, of features such as the diet coke man or "torso of the week".
With this in mind it is hardly surprising therefore that many of us we react with annoyance at yet another attempt to say "what about the menz".


However, if we take just a small step back, if we use the analytical view of the world has facilitated our feminist awakenings. If we step for a moment into the shoes of young men, we can begin to see that whilst there is no where near as much of it and the effects may be somewhat different, there is in fact a real problem in terms of the way men are presented in some media.


I went to the cinema a year ago with my partner to see the latest James bond. I found the film good in places but also profoundly disturbing in terms of the throw away way it treated the focal female character. She had no bodily integrity and her life and sexuality were stamped on an instant. Another thing however that I found annoying throughout the film was the shot upon shot of a ripple abed Daniel Craig who was never, it seemed in possession of a shirt. Whilst he looked very nice and I have never thought myself to be in any way a prude it just seemed massively gratuitous. James bond had to be hard, emotionless, constantly half naked and buff and I found it a distraction and unnecessary.


The issue is one of stereotypes - for every 10 women presented as passive and infantilised there will be a ripple torsoed man looking macho, aggressive and ready for action. For every pinned down woman looking like she is about to be a victim of sexual violence there will be 2-4 men looking ready to act upon that woman in an aggressive manor.





The passive, vulnerable, child-like, ready to be taken advantage of and certainly rarely in anyway powerful female is matched, if perhaps to a smaller degree, with images of men looking angry, aggressive, active, none-thinking and rarely sensitive or gentle. We talk a lot about the effect these stereotypical images have on both boy's and girls views of women's roles but what do the men in these pictures teach boys about what they should aspire to be and how to behave; and with all of these images what is projected is an idealised body type that is going to be difficult if not impossible for most of us to achieve.


It is for this reason that No More Page 3 is in support of a campaign started by Daniel Farr.


Daniel describes that he "started campaigning about male body image after years of being unhappy and complaining about the images of perfect bodies men like women now face."


His action was inspired by the No More Page 3 campaign and its wealth of brilliant supporters and he is a supporter himself.

"I decided to support NMP3, because I feel women should be more respected in the media and society and having pictures of topless ladies in a national newspaper doesn’t to help achieve this."


After reading about the effects of objectification of women Daniel took some time to consider how men are affected by the images they see of other men around them. He was also encouraged by Warwick University psychologist David Giles who has studies the phenomenon of “athletica nervosa”.  link- http://www.malehealth.co.uk/self-image/19375-lads-mags-are-damaging-our-body-image


Here are a few words form Daniel himself -

 I had always been chubby but it didn't bother me until adverts started showing men with perfect bodies which made me feel horrible about my body. I decided to lose weight so I began running and going to the gym every day. After several months I lost three stone, but I continued to run and do sit ups every day as I was obsessed with getting a six pack. I started getting too thin and friends and family became concerned about my weight. They managed to convince me to stop exercising excessively and now, thankfully, I have settled at a healthy and comfortable weight.

There is a male body crisis in the UK with according to Joseph Stashko in an article last year for the NewStatesman said perhaps 1-4 of the 1.6m Britons with eating disorders being male, and a 2013 survey by The Association of Teachers and Lectures found that 51% of their 693 members thought that boys had low self-esteem about their bodies:
http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/education-21864312 


Daniel has set up campaign called "Healthy not Perfect" and a petition on Change.org asking Toby Wiseman the editor of Men’s Health magazine UK to show more diverse body types in the hope this will promote a more diverse image amongst men and boys and lead society to question the impossible ideal it is increasingly setting its young men.


As a campaigner for NMP3 and a mother of a teenage son I feel this is an important campaign. Whilst we are doing all we can to redress the issue of inequality in media representation of women it is important to remember that we are doing this for our son's as much as we are for our daughters.


I want my son to learn that women are thinking, feeling people who come in all different forms or beauty, diverse shapes and sizes. That we are powerful and not passive in our relationships and that he should respect us all. But I also want him to see men portrayed for all they are, that they don't have to be impossibly muscular or large in size, they don't have to be aggressive and macho. I want him to see diverse images of manhood that reflect the great men I know and love who show sensitivity and strength of character and sometimes vulnerability.


I am campaigning hard to reduce the sexually objectifying images in our daily wallpaper but I don't for a minute want them replaced with aggressively stereotyped muscle men.


In short wouldn't it be nice if we just showed all humans being exactly that - Human.



 You can sign Daniels petiton here: www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/toby-wiseman-editor-of-men-s-health-uk-show-a-variety-of-male-body-types