Monthly Archives: January 2012

Pornified images are a problem made worse by the lack of women’s representation elsewhere in the press

Pornified images are a problem made worse by the lack of women’s representation elsewhere in the press

Following their written submissions to the inquiry, representatives from End Violence Against Women, OBJECT, Eaves, and Equality Now sat in front of Lord Justice Leveson on Tuesday to give evidence. Amongst the demands of the four groups was a call for a consistent legislative approach to hyper-sexualised images of women in the media. Such images wouldn’t be shown on television past the 9pm watershed, it was argued, and so shouldn’t be left unchallenged in non age-restricted publications on the ‘news’stand. The groups also accused some media outlets of perpetuating myths about rape, which they argued could prevent victims reporting the crime. The Daily Mail, for example, reported about six footballers being jailed after gang raping 12-year-old girls in a “midnight park orgy” and referred...

L.A. City Council votes in law requiring condom use by porn performers

L.A. City Council votes in law requiring condom use by porn performers

In a significant defeat for the adult film industry, the Los Angeles City Council has given final approval to a city ordinance requiring porn actors to wear condoms while performing. The 9-1 vote marks a significant victory for the L.A.-based AIDS Healthcare Foundation, which has been rallying for years to protect the health of porn actors by asking agencies in California to mandate condom use during film shoots. The measure now goes to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa for approval but he is said to be supportive of the ordinance. Despite this many in the industry are sceptical as to how effective the legislation will be. “It’s going to be interesting to see how in fact they do try to enforce it and who’s going to...

ACTION SUCCESS: Typo promises to remove porn themed products from shops after petition

ACTION SUCCESS: Typo promises to remove porn themed products from shops after petition

Australian retail chain Cotton On’s stationery shop Typo was criticized last week for adding a product line which include a travel mug that says “Porn is my saviour” and an iPhone cover featuring a naked woman sitting provocatively in a cross-legged pose with the word “dirty” above her. These items are part of the chains’ “Back to School” sale. A notebook featuring a topless woman pouting in front of a bullseye is also for sale, while another appears to be trying to emulate the front of a porn magazine. Anti-child exploitation group Collective Shout spokeswoman Melissa Tankard-Reist said parents should boycott Typo and online petition which was started in response to the sell of these items calling for the withdrawal of the products from sale gathered more than 500...

fetishes.

fetishes.

Porn loves variety. Log on to any porn site, free or paid, open a porn mag, walk into a porn video shop, and you’ll see it laid out before you like the infinite varieties of toothpaste in a supermarket. Amateur, Anal, Asian, Barely Legal, BBW, Ebony, European, Gangbang, POV… a complete list would fill a book. You become the immaculate consumer. Every possible definition is available to you, and the definitions become definitions that only exist insofar as they offer you choice. Every possible narcissism is possible, every combination, every motion of this immaculate world can be bent to your exact whim. The word ‘fetish’, once used about objects with magical properties, continued in the 19th century through use of objects with sexual properties...

ACTION: Support OBJECT and Turn Your Back On Page 3′s submission to the Leveson inquiry

ACTION: Support OBJECT and Turn Your Back On Page 3′s submission to the Leveson inquiry

Help address sexism in the UK media. OBJECT and Turn Your Back on Page 3 recently made a joint submission to the Leveson inquiry which provides a snapshot of ‘A Week In The Life Of’ The Sun, The Daily Star and The Sport’. It highlights the “Page 3″ phenomenon, the adverts for the porn and sex industries, and other innumerable ways in which women – and even crimes against women, such as rape and murder – are routinely trivialized and sexualised within the UK press. The submission calls on the Leveson Inquiry to address this relentless portrayal of women as sex objects as part of its remit to examine the culture and ethics of the press, and it provides recommendations to tackle the hyper-sexualisation and objectification of...

(UK) Leveson inquiry called upon to address media sexism

(UK) Leveson inquiry called upon to address media sexism

The UK’s Leveson inquiry has been called upon to tackle the sexual objectification and damaging representation of women in the media by a coalition of women’s groups. The Leveson inquiry will “not be doing its job properly” if it does not examine the portrayal of women in the media, according to End Violence Against Women (EVAW), Equality Now, Object, and Eaves. They argue in detailed submissions to the judge that reporting in tabloid and in some cases broadsheet newspapers perpetuates violence and even prevents some women reporting rape to the police. “Leveson is not just charged with looking at phone hacking but for the entire relationship between the press and the public,” said Jacqui Hunt, director of Equality Now. “Women make up 50% of...