modesty rocks

Lily Allen F*** Word Video Too Risque for daytime viewing on MTV

2007-03-14T19:52:00.000Z

Found at Sparkle's

MTV are worried about the use of the F word in Lily Allen's smile video and are only showing it in late night slots.

"The popular music channel has relocated the promo clip for Allen’s number one hit ‘Smile’ to late-night airing only because it features the word “f**k”.
Allen fumed: “They (MTV) said, ‘We don’t want kids to grow up too quickly,’ but then you have Paris Hilton and the Pussycat Dolls taking their clothes off and gyrating up against womanising men, and that’s acceptable. "

Breasts on MySpace

2007-03-06T20:10:00.000Z

Erika has highlighted the sorry state of affairs over at MySpace where breasts are acceptable but only if suitably sexualised. Breastfeeding a baby is however completely unacceptable.

The following avatar was deemed unacceptable and removed.

Yet the following is perfectly acceptable.

Hathor's site at myspace seems to have gone but I took a copy of this earlier.

Sign The Petition

The Birqini

2007-02-07T20:28:00.000Z

The Birqini has been designed by an australian muslim woman - Aheda Zanett.

Burqini on the beach - Interview with Aheda.

Responsible Animal Rights Organisations

2007-02-07T19:49:00.000Z

Responsible Animals Rights Organisations

In Defense of Animals

Friends of Animals

PETA - why not to support them

Why is rape so easy to get away with?

2007-02-01T21:15:00.000Z

Another article about how rape victims have only a tiny chance of seeing their attacker convicted.

Not only are women who report rape routinely viewed as liars; it would seem that once a woman becomes sexually active she is no longer allowed to say "no" on subsequent occasions.

"If there is too much in the defence's favour, such as she was carrying condoms, it is unlikely to result in a conviction."

In 1998, a headline appeared in the local Grimsby weekly: "Man faces rape charge". He had dragged a 15-year-old girl down an alley and assaulted her. The CPS decided not to pursue the case. That man was Ian Huntley. At the time, he was not seen as a danger to the public, and neither are the majority of other "opportunist" rapists who get away with it.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/crime/article/0,,2003229,00.html

Institutional Sexism - Rapists Immune from Prosecution

2007-01-30T20:13:00.000Z

Excellent article in The Independent which examines the legal systems attitudes to rape as a crime. The article highlights the current situation where the legal system consistly believes the best of men and the worst of women. The message to men is that unless they have a previous conviction they may rape with impunity and immunity.

************************

There is a crisis in the criminal justice system: despite years of heroic efforts by the survivors of sexual violence to help us understand that rape is not an excess of desire, nor the incontinent rush of incompetent men, that it is a crime of domination, the system believes the best of men and the worst of women.

Despite the rapport between survivors, feminist self-help networks and scholars and some senior police officers - not least Sir Ian Blair, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, himself an expert in rape prosecution - rank-and-file policing delivers no better outcomes. Despite the enlightened Sexual Offences Act 2003 , judges and juries, it seems, would rather not convict men.

The message to men is that unless they have a previous conviction they may rape with impunity and immunity. Most of their victims - thousands of them - know who their attackers are. Sometimes the police track them down; sometimes they don't bother.

There is exemplary policing, but typically the police give up too early. Judges and juries acquit too easily. Politicians, with few noble exceptions, keep schtum. Women feel muddled, abandoned and ashamed. Men feel got-at, angry and ashamed.

Hardly anyone with any power to do anything about it helps men to think about the reform of their relationships with women. The most moralising government and interventionist Home Office in living memory doesn't get it yet: that the sexual disrespect of women is domination worth condemning.

This is a crisis - it is a crisis of knowing. Popular prejudices about love and passion, of sex and sobriety, still result in women being blamed if they do not fight to the death, or extend goodwill to men rather than regarding them with permanent, paranoid vigilance.

The body of the woman still has to be the battleground mapping the evidence of conflict: she has to show the scars of dangerous, perhaps self-destructive, resistance to overwhelming force. Otherwise the conflict is translated as compliance.

If drink is involved - as it often is, Britons being the biggest drinkers in Europe - then the woman is maligned as irresponsible and the man forgiven as merely reasonable.

Professor Liz Kelly's research among survivors, the Met's own research into 677 rape-case files, the accumulated wisdom of the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo), Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary and the Crown Prosecution Service are all converging. They are telling a complicated story about rape: it unsettles the "common sense" about where rape happens and to whom and why. It is not the man in a balaclava by a dark canal; it's a man the woman knows.

"It's more mundane - rape is about the complexities of everyday life," says Kelly. Rape sometimes strikes like lightning, but usually it is only ordinary, inside - not outside - a relationship. Dave Gee, an adviser with Acpo, draws attention to the distinction between "stranger rape and relationship rape" - it is this disparity that confounds the system. It also confuses the society, which doesn't seem to believe that "real rape" happens in "real life".

Police ideologies were challenged and changed by the rape crisis centres organised by the women's movement in most cities in Britain during the Seventies and Eighties because the police knew they knew more about rape than they did. The nation was transfixed by Roger Graef's mesmerising fly-on-the-wall documentary showing Thames Valley police harassing a victim in 1982.

Women do not get justice from judges or juries - yet juries are only us. "The country we live in is the jury," says South Essex Rape Crisis Centre. There have been huge efforts to "keep women in the system, to support a woman from report to court, but the system doesn't work".

The organisation adds: "We know the impact rape has on their friends and their families and their colleagues - and on men. Everybody, women and men, is being controlled by the impact of a small percentage of perpetrators. We're used to talking about women fearing to go out at night, but we don't talk so much about the impact on men and their uncertainties about how they should behave. All of our behaviours are led by the effects of perpetrators over the everyday lives of women - and men."

Professor Kelly warns that the crisis in the courts - those decisive public tribunals - is encouraging despair: "There is a lot of evidence that something fundamental needs to happen, that the criminal justice system needs to totally rethink the construction of cases in the courts. But it isn't happening. I am very worried that the adversarial legal system and institutional sexism can't deliver justice to women. I don't want to think it, but that's what it feels like." She believes that "the police will need to run the whole process differently".

Dave Gee warns that rape is still the only crime in which "too often society judges the victim before it investigates the offence".

It is not as if the Home Office does not know - Professor Kelly's research was published by the Home Office; ministers and Parliament were closely involved in the mighty overhaul of the law on sexual offences which yielded the inspired changes on consent and capacity.

But there is bad faith between the victims and the system, which squanders the best evidence available to help judges and juries deliver justice - that of the women themselves. Our culture cannot empathise with victims because it sympathises with defendants and their version of events. A woman's abuse is a perpetrator's pleasure, no means yes, and submission is consent.

But even this self-deception requires the effort of interpretation. And if we demand it of the perpetrators we must demand it of ourselves. We all need help to raise our collective consciousness. We can do it: we have changed our minds about smoking and fox-hunting and beating children; we have made drinking and driving lose its legitimacy. Now is the time for a cultural revolution against sexual abuse and rape.

article

Victim Rights Ignored by Judge

2007-01-28T23:50:00.000Z

From SparkleMatrix

Shocking case where the judge does not want to ruin a promising football career so the self-confessed guilty defendant walks free.

Callum McKinlay, 16, last week admitted filming a friend having sex with a young girl and then distributing the pictures to schoolfriends. McKinlay, who has played for the Scotland Under-16 squad, was told by a sheriff he would not be punished for fear of harming his football career.

According to The Scotsman both police who investigated the case, and the mother of the girl, claim the incident has been massively underplayed and are enraged that both the young men involved escaped the most serious criminal charges.

Quote from a source at Tayside Police:

"The Crown has not moved on as we have in recent years when dealing with sexual crime, and the interests of victims never seem to be the main concern for prosecutors."

From reading the details of The Scotsman Article it is clear that both boys involved in the case were orginally charged with rape, serious sexual assault and sex with a minor by the police. Despite the fact that video evidence existed to back up these charges The Crown decided to drop proceedings.

In fact the defendent walked free on even the lesser charge of making and distributing indecent images as the Sheriff didn't want to damage a promising football career. The rights of the victim have been completely ignored in this case.

Sandra Brown, founder of the Moira Anderson Foundation, a charity that works with families affected by child sexual abuse and has supported the girl's family, said: "The balance in the justice system is clearly still not right. This girl is a vulnerable child, the sort of person the system is supposed to protect, yet she has been let down because the interests of the young men involved and their futures have been given priority."

Useful Fact for The Day

2007-01-28T18:30:00.000Z

My interesting fact for the day is that you can report newagents who flout the National Federation of Retail Newsagents Guidelines to Trading Standards.

Apparently the deal, struck between newsagents and Home Office officials, is not legally binding but trading standards will be able to reprimand offending outlets.

"Newspapers such as the Daily Sport can remain on the bottom shelf if they are folded in a way to conceal sexually explicit content."

"Spokesman Colin Finch said although it was a voluntary code extending existing restrictions on top shelf titles, trading standards officials could reprimand offenders."

Woolworth's "Family Friendly" Top Shelf Policy

2007-01-28T17:24:00.000Z

Woolworth's promote themselves as family friendly store. To quote from their website:

"one of the UK's leading retailers focused on the home, family and entertainment"

I find it quite surprising that a family focused store like Woolworths actually stock publications like Zoo and Nuts at all. But thats another story. Woolworths do put their magazines such as Zoo, Nuts etc on the Top Shelf. But laughingly this top shelf is only four and half feet high.

Four and half feet - that's the the height of an average nine year old. That doesn't meet with my expectation of Top Shelf. So although I favour moving these publications to the top shelf; I feel that Woolworth's implementation of a top shelf policy is somewhat lacking. A Top Shelf should not be at the eye level of an average nine year old.

I was also quite surprised that this family friendly store positions Zoo and Nuts within handsreach of Power Rangers magazine and a range of other children's magazines.

My Hairy Experiment

2006-12-30T15:40:00.000Z

2006 has been an unusual year for me in that for the first time in my life I made a conscious decision not to remove my body hair. Body hair is something that I have removed since it first appeared as a teenager and my granny declared that I was turning into a hairy monster.

Removing my body hair was something that I just did every few days. I liked the way my shaved legs felt smooth and sensuous. I tried various forms of hair removal but stuck with shaving as it's quick, painless and cheap. However frequently my shameful stubbly legs would be hidden away underneath trousers during the working week and then shaved sensously smooth on a friday evening to celebrate the arrival of weekend.

In many ways I felt that in the hair removal game women had been dealt an easier hand than men. Most men shave every day and cannot easily hide their face stubble from view. As a woman it is quite easy to hide your body hair from public view. So shaving everyday is not a requirement. But going to the beach or wearing summer clothes would always mean thoroughly removing any exposed body hair. I never really thought about why I removed my body hair. It was simply something that was expected. I have only ever seen one real woman with hairy legs and nearly every image that I have ever seen in the media is of smooth, hairless women. Consequently my own sense of attractiveness was intrinsically linked with being smooth and hairless.

So over the years I shaved, waxed and imaaced in an effort to be attractive and sexy. In my own head there was a clear understanding that body hair was something to be ashamed of. It was dirty, abnormal and unattractive. Even the appearance of stars such as Julia Roberts in her hairy armpit dress did not cause me to question this view. Hairy armpits and legs on a woman were simply unattractive and unfeminine. One interesting aspect is that although I experimented with the brazilian concept I found that I just did not like my nether regions being bare. It just didn't look right to me and seemed a bit too childlike. So except for my bikini triangle I removed most of my hair.

Then one day my legs developed some sort of irritation and my legs became incredibly itchy. I would scratch my legs until they bled. I had huge scratch marks all over my legs. I thought that some sunlight would help my legs to heal. So I started wearing shorts and skirts to let the summer sun soothe my legs. It struck me as being quite bizarre that I was prepared to expose my horrible scratched,scabby legs to public view but only if they were hairless. I began to think a bit more about body hair and realized that our society has major taboos about body hair.

I began to notice that a huge variety of women's leg were on display: attractive, unattractive, shapely, fat, bruised, dimpled, old and young. But they were all completely smooth and hairless. With exposure to sunlight my scabby legs gradually improved. But the seed of an idea had been planted.

This year I read a few blogs where women discussed their experiences with their body hair. Eventually it dawned on me that practically every women in the world has naturally hairy armpits and legs. This is the natural state of an adult woman. The increasing trend to hairlessness is certainly part of a fashion trend. But it goes beyond that. Hairlessness in woman is deemed to be an essential part of personal hygiene. Men can be clean with hairy legs and armpits but a woman who exposes her hairiness is considered dirty. I find this concept difficult to comprehend.

As women we are meant to pretend that our body hair doesn't exist. It is simply not feminine. This has caused me to question what feminity is all about. The world tells me that an adult woman with body hair is not considered feminine. Perhaps I aspire to being a woman rather than being feminine then. They do not seem to be the same thing.

Ultimately as a heterosexual female I want to be attractive to men. I want to find a mate. Is hair removal just part of the game we play in finding a mate? Is it simply part of the process of making ourselves appear more attractive. Just another tool like hair dye, lipstick or ear-rings? Perhaps but it doesn't seem like that to me. I can choose whether to dye my hair or wear lipstick. My family would not object to me arriving at a family wedding with undyed hair and without lipstick but hairy legs would be a bit much.

The strong emotional reactions which the visible presence of body hair on a woman would cause also surprised me. One female journalist in The Daily Mail claimed Trinni Woodall was letting the side down by appearing in public with hairy armpits. A female blogger refused to buy an album because the lead singer of the band had hairy armpits. These reactions of disgust towards the natural state of a womans body saddened me.

So I decided to conduct a little experiment on myself. I would stop removing my body hair. I wanted to see what I looked like as an adult hairy woman. It struck me as odd that I had no idea what my natural unshaven armpits and legs looked like.

Initially the growth of stubble was iritating but within a few weeks this passed. After five months the hair on my legs doesn't feel iritating at all. It feels quite smooth and much less irritating than stubble. I was surprised by how hairy my new "man legs" were. A womans hairy legs can actually be as hairy or even hairier than a mans. My hairy status has changed how I dress in that I don't wear sleeveless tops or short skirts in formal settings. I am quite wary of the negative reactions which my body hair may elicit.

My expectation is that men will find my body hair unattractive and masculine. However in reality I don't think men find my body hair anymore difficult to deal with than I do myself. Man legs on a woman is not something that we are used to. We have a lifetimes worth of conditioning to expect smooth hairless female legs.

But interestingly even with this lifetime's worth of conditioning I am growing to love my bleached blonde leg hairs. Ironically now my legs feel silky smooth all the time and not only when I have just shaved. I feel that I have been freed from my enslavement to the razor. Certainly some might say I have merely swapped my enslavement to the razor for one with bleach. Perhaps that it is true. But I like my new hairy smooth blonde legs. Sex however is much more spontaneous as I don't need to worry about stubbly legs. I am now constantly smooth. My freedom from the razor comes at a price; short skirts and sleeveless dresses in a work situation would probably cause uproar. But this is a price that is worth paying. They will be denied the beauty of my wonderful hairy legs!

Yet I am aware that in our current society my hairy body makes some sort of statement. Do my hairy legs mark me out as an anti-male feminist? Certainly I expect my hairy legs and armpits will limit my pool of potential partners. My current view is that my body hair will act as a filtering device to eliminate any of the more superficial potential mates. My hope would be that anyone who can't see past the societal conditioning about female body hair is simply not worth wasting any time on. The alternative view would be that my potential mates will made up of those who are so desperate that they don't care. Naturally I am adopting the former view.

From a personal viewpoint I don't regard my hairiness as being anti-male or anti-female. It is just a personal decision. Certainly I picked an easy time of the year to try my experiment in that when needed I have been able to easily cover my body hair. But I regarded this experiment as being more about whether I could accept my own natural hairiness or would I view my body with disgust. A hot summer next year will bring new challenges and decisions about strappy tops.

Sexy Male Weather Presenters?

2006-12-29T17:59:00.000Z

Watching the weather forecast during a British winter is generally quite a depressing experience. Rain, gales, fog, cloud and yet more rain. The sun has not peeked out from behind the heavy grey skys for about two weeks. I have taken to actually watching the weather forecast in a forlorn search for some hint of future sunshine.

My hopes have sadly been dashed and I was also surprised to find that Francis Wilson is still doing the weather. Francis is certainly a fine weather presenter but he is past his prime.

By contrast the female weather presenters are all not only highly intelligent articulate women but generally of above average attractiveness. Lisa Burke graduated with a first class Masters degree in Natural Sciences from Cambridge University in 1999. She was ranked second in the university, won two university prizes and was made a scholar of New Hall. Lisa was also voted 'sexiest weather girl of all time' in October 2001. Being attractive and sexy is an integral element to being a successful female weather presenter.

What about a male equivalent of Lisa to replace Francis? A sexy, intelligent male weather presenter to brighten up the cold winters day. Do any sexy intelligent male weather forecasters exist? Will Sky finally treat it's female viewers to some male totty and poach Tomasz Schafernaker from the BBC?

I have a sneaking suspicion that Francis still be presenting Sky weather in twenty years time whilst the female presenter will be an 18 year old former Miss World Oxbridge graduate.

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2006-12-08T22:01:00.000Z

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2006-12-08T18:59:00.000Z

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2006-12-07T23:58:00.000Z

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2006-12-07T23:53:00.000Z

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2006-12-07T23:51:00.000Z

crotch
1539, original meaning “pitchfork,” from O.N.Fr. croche “shepherd’s crook,” var. of croc “hook” (see crochet); meaning “region where the body forks” is c.1592.

crotch
• noun 1 the part of the human body between the legs where they join the torso. 2 a fork in a tree, road, or river.
— ORIGIN perhaps related to Old French croche ‘shepherd’s crook’; partly also a variant of CRUTCH.

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2006-12-07T23:43:00.000Z

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Suggestive Underwear?

2006-11-25T23:18:00.000Z

Would a judge allow a lawyer to twice ask a male rape victim to hold up their underwear and read out what was written on it? Would the legal system consider writing on underwear relevant if a man was raped while out in public fully clothed?

http://stormcloud.wordpress.com/2006/11/23/raped-violated-suicide/

http://www.guardian.co.uk/women/story/0,3604,767763,00.html

Rest in Peace Lindsay.

In My Furry World

2006-11-25T15:25:00.000Z

Go wax your legs, my workmates beg
When I do a Julia Roberts wave
They ask me to shave
My wearing a short dress
Causes them such distress
They say it's my duty
To suffer for my beauty

My legs are all furry
My armpits aren't bare
But sprout furry hair
In my furry world
Life is Fantastic

I'm hairy and furry
Just like a strawberry
all hairy and furry

Friends and Neighbours
All offer advice
On waxing and shaving

You look like a man
shouts someone called Dan
Who drives a white van
and lives with his nan

My fur feels so nice
All Woman like sugar and spice
No stubble or itches
Unwanted advice on waxing and shaving
will go in the ditch

I'm hairy and furry
Just like a strawberry
all hairy and furry
In my furry world
Life is Fantastic

Baby I'm Your Venus

2006-11-25T15:19:00.000Z

Baby I'm your Venus
Baby I'm your Godess
But Baby I'm all hairless
At Gilette's Desire
My legs are on fire
Freezing on a moutain top
At Gilette's Desire
Yeah Baby They got us
Gilette's weapons were the adverts
Making every woman mad
They created an illusion
that women were all hairless
Gilette's Creation

Yeah Baby, They got us
We will struggle with our stubble
While Mr Gilette wears cashmere and sable

Venus will wax and Venus will preen
to look like a pre-teen
Smooth like a baby under jeans
Wearing killer six inch heels

Yeah Baby they got us
Hairless Venus
Just an illusion

Cute Pussies

2006-11-12T16:56:00.000Z

Playboy Galore in Debenhams

2006-11-12T16:26:00.000Z

Whilst browsing the gift section in Debenhams I found not just one but two playboy sections.

The porn lord's campaign to claim pink and fluffy continues.

Boots - High Street Adverts

2006-11-12T16:13:00.000Z

An advert on the side of a high street telephone box for the boots additions catalogue.

Quite a good reason to take my trade to Superdrug.

The Playboy Bunny

2006-11-06T23:03:00.000Z

Only Rapists Can Prevent Rape

2006-10-27T20:30:00.000Z

A lot has been said about how to prevent rape. Women should learn self-defense. Women should lock themselves in their houses after dark. Women shouldn't have long hair and women shouldn't wear short skirts. Women shouldn't leave drinks unattended. Hell, they shouldn't dare to get drunk at all. Instead of that bullshit, how about:

If a woman is drunk, don't rape her.
If a woman is walking alone at night, don't rape her.
If a woman is drugged and unconscious, don't rape her.
If a woman is wearing a short skirt, don't rape her.
If a woman is jogging in a park at 5 am, don't rape her.
If a woman looks like your ex-girlfriend you're still hung up on, don't rape her.
If a woman is asleep in her bed, don't rape her.
If a woman is asleep in your bed, don't rape her.
If a woman is doing her laundry, don't rape her.
If a woman is in a coma, don't rape her.
If a woman changes her mind in the middle of or about a particular activity, don't rape her.
If a woman has repeatedly refused a certain activity, don't rape her.
If a woman is not yet a woman, but a child, don't rape her.
If your girlfriend or wife is not in the mood, don't rape her.
If your step-daughter is watching TV, don't rape her.
If you break into a house and find a woman there, don't rape her.
If your friend thinks it's okay to rape someone, tell him it's not, and that he's not your friend.
If your "friend" tells you he raped someone, report him to the police.
If your frat-brother or another guy at the party tells you there's an unconscious woman upstairs and it's your turn, don't rape her, call the police and tell the guy he's a rapist.
Tell your sons, god-sons, nephews, grandsons, sons of friends it's not okay to rape someone.
Don't tell your women friends how to be safe and avoid rape.
Don't imply that she could have avoided it if she'd only done/not done x.
Don't imply that it's in any way her fault.
Don't let silence imply agreement when someone tells you he "got some" with the drunk girl.
Don't perpetuate a culture that tells you that you have no control over or responsibility for your actions. You can, too, help yourself.

If you agree, re-post it. It's that important.

From the f-word blog.

Cute Pussy

2006-10-06T08:29:00.000Z

A cute pussy. (Part of the reclaim the word "pussy" campaign started by SparkleMatrix's cat)

Shoes - Torture Instruments

2006-10-05T09:07:00.000Z

"Shoes," Sheila Jeffreys says, "are almost becoming torture instruments.

This struck a cord with me. Taken from a very interesting blog by Anika

My number one rule for buying shoes is if hurts my feet then I will not buy them.

Refuse to Wear Dainty Shoes

2006-10-03T14:58:00.000Z

Refuse to wear dainty shoes

I love this photo which I found on Flickr

Joey Barton's Bottom

2006-10-01T09:16:00.000Z

Joey Barton, a Manchester City player, mooned during a match against Everton yesterday. The Sunday Press are choosing to either pixelate the offending bottom or else simply not use a picture. Match of The Day are the only programme daring to show the offending bottom in its full glory.

The Sunday Press are never averse to showing us female bottoms, once again male modesty is preserved. Only Match of The Day and Calciofan save the day!

Thanks to CalcioFan for the mooning shots. Here is a video of the incident without any of the pixelation which Sky are currently providing in their coverage of the incident.

The Bottom Line

2006-09-14T20:02:00.000Z

Article from The Age in aussieland which looks at the weekly magazines and how the lowest common denominator sells magazines. Sales of mens and womens weekly celebrity-focused magazines are strong. The article looks at why men and women buy these magazines.

An interesting analysis by Andrew Singleton, a doctor of philosophy specialising in gender issues at Monash University on why men buy these mags:

"For the male reader it's analogous to sexual conquest. You might not be able to pick her up in a bar and have sex with her, but if you can get her in the pages of a magazine it's like owning her sexually. These magazines are the ultimate form of objectifying women. They're just lying around in their underwear saying 'Look at me'; it's so passive. At the end of the day, Ralph and Zoo do nothing positive for women in any way. The fact that the mass-market magazines are so out-and-out sexist makes me pessimistic about the goals that feminism has kicked."

The article feels that women's magazine actually treat women more harshly than the lads mags. Definitely an interesting read.

http://www.theage.com.au/news/in-depth/the-bottom-line/2006/09/10/1157826810975.html

On The Prowl

2006-09-03T09:11:00.000Z

Playboy are launching a new range of men's clothing. The "On The Prowl" range will be available in Spring 2007. Apparently sex doesn't sell men's clothing so the range will be marketed as cool and trendy with a 70's retro feel.

"If they (young males) can't gain access to the Playboy mansion, then they'll buy a T-shirt that makes them feel like they're affiliated with the lifestyle," said Aaron Duncan, Playboy's creative director of licensing.

The licensing division of Playboy is growing fast and retail sales are expected to be worth $650 million in 2006, up 8 percent from 2005. Licensing accounted for $28 million in revenue in 2005, compared with $106.5 million for publishing and $203.4 million for entertainment. This division is growing and has margins of about 45% compared to 10% in the entertainment division. Money talks, so we can expect to see the licensing division expand over the next few years. Already there are plans for a playboy fragrance.

The increased emphasis on licensing as a revenue source is due to slumping revenue in its publishing business amid declining ad sales and higher paper costs, and second-quarter results were also hit by sales shortfalls in its domestic television business.

Oh well 2007 is looking bad already, men in playboy "On The Prowl" T-shirts will be hitting our streets. The only good thing is as stated on the RealMenAreNot blog is that it will make easier to spot the idiots.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/01/AR2006090101032.html

Secret opt-out clause for junk mail

2006-08-29T11:32:00.000Z

The Royal Mail have sacked a postman for delivering a leaflet on his round telling residents about a secretive opt-out clause which allows you to opt out of receiving anonymous advertising material. There is no mention of this facility anywhere on the royal mail website although they do tell you about the mailing preference service but this will not stop the anonymous "door to door" leaflets. Apparently the royal mail plan to increase the amount of anonymous advertising material which they deliver.

So if you want to avoid being deluged by an avalanche of junk mail I would suggest that you contact The Royal Mail and find out about this opt-out clause. Apparently you can ring them on 08457 740 740 to arrange to opt-out.

If you email optout@royalmail.com then they will send you a form to complete.

The Royal Mail are trying to use the excuse that if you opt-out of receiving junk leaflets then you won't get important government and council circulars.

Objectionable Body Hair

2006-08-28T17:17:00.000Z

Before 1915 most women did not shave their armpits. However in 1915 an advert appeared in Harpers Bazaar which would change all that. The advert featured a young woman in a sleeveless dress with shaven armpits.

The advert encouraged women to remove their "objectionable" body hair.

"Summer Dress and Modern Dancing combine to make necessary the removal of objectionable hair."

Both Wilkinson and Gilette quickly began campaigns to encourage this notion that women's body hair needed to be removed. In 1915, Gillette introduced Milady Décolletée, a razor created especially for women. Within two years sales of razors had doubled.

Now it is the norm within western society for women to shave not only their armpits but also their legs. Within the last few years there has also been a tendency towards shaving of the pubic hair.

The western world is full of images of half-naked women but none of these women have any body hair. The only women we see are completely smooth and hair free.

Anyone who dares to break this taboo will be villified by all and sunder. Julia Robert's appearance with armpit hair at a film premiere in London sparked an outcry. Any female celebrity who dares to appear unshaven is certain to be villified by the press and general public.

Within 100 years the power of advertising has created an environment where the display of any female body hair is practically taboo. The hair removal industry is big business, women in the UK spent 250 million pounds in 2005 on removing their body hair. Certainly it explains why hair removal companies will continue to relentlessly promote the image of hairless women.

This whole industry depends on women disliking their own bodies and they fill our television screens and magazines with silky smooth legs and shaven armpits. The power of advertising has turned what is in fact abnormal (removing all your body hair) into normal. Our society has been conditioned to view female body hair as abnormal and objectionable.

The hair removal industry have really played a trick on women!

WH Smiths Hypocrisy

2006-08-21T15:32:00.000Z

WH Smiths place all gay lifestyle magazines on the top shelf even when these magazines contain no bare flesh or sexual imagery. Yet WH Smith openly sell a whole range of lads magazines which feature women in very sexually provocative poses.

WH Smith respect the male body and yet treats the female body with complete and utter contempt. This is total hypocrisy on WH Smith's part.

A Real Woman's Body

2006-08-21T15:12:00.000Z

I came across a wonderful site which contains lots of real photographs of mothers. It highlights how a woman's body changes during pregnancy. It is amazing that in this world which contains millions of images of womens bodies that we never see images like this of real women.

The media is not interested in portraying what real women look like. The media just portrays a one-sided sexualised view of a woman.

You must visit this site just to see some images of real women.
http://www.shapeofamother.blogspot.com/

Women in Comedy

2006-08-15T16:41:00.000Z

Whilst channel-hopping on sunday evening I happened upon a programme about women comedians. It is becoming increasingly rare to find a TV programme on after 9pm which is not an excuse for soft-porn, so I was shocked to find a programme featuring funny but fully clothed women comedians and not jumped-up glamour models.

What has the world gone mad! I thought that the watershed meant that only DD silcone enhanced glamour models were allowed on TV.

Well the BBC have just started a new series on Sundays at 10.15 pm on BBC One. Dawn French's Girls Who Do Comedy features the wonderfully funny Dawn French interviewing women comedians. Two more episodes are still to be shown over the next two sundays. This will definitely be on my watch list.

BBC Four will also be showing some of the interviews in full.

Whoopi Goldberg - Wed 20 September 10.00pm-10.30pm
Catherine Tate - Wed 27 September 10.00pm-10.30pm
Kathy Burke - Wed 4 October 10.00pm-10.30pm
Julie Walters - Wed 11 October 10.00pm-10.30pm
Victoria Wood - Wed 18 October 10.00pm-10.30pm
Joan Rivers - Wed 25 October 10.00pm-10.30pm

A Day in The Life of a Porn King

2006-08-08T12:24:00.000Z

I have just read an article about the "Girls Gone Wild" founder Joe Francis. It is frankly quite disturbing. LA Times Journalist Claire Hoffman reports on her day spent with Joe Francis.

"He has my face pressed against the hood of a car, my arms twisted hard behind my back. He's pushing himself against me, shouting: "This is what they did to me in Panama City!"

If this is how this man treats a 29 year old professional journalist then how does he treat the drunken 17 year old girls who feature in his videos.

"This much is certain: He's got at least 80 pounds on me and I'm thinking he's about to break my left arm. My eyes start to stream tears."

Thankfully Claire manages to free herself and punches Joe Francis in the face.

Joe Francis has made a fortune from the "Girls Gone Wild" video series which features drunken girls flashing their breasts or french-kissing their girlfriends outside nightclubs across the USA. This business is worth 40 million dollars a year in sales. But Joe has even bigger plans and he wants to move mainstream and create a lifestyle brand which will be used to sell clothes, food, holidays etc.

If so then it is quite probable that "Girls Gone Wild" merchandise such as stationery, bedding and watches will soon be for sale in Argos and WH Smith. The "Girls Gone Wild" concept is an appealing business proposition. Drunken seventeen or eighteen year old girls can be quite willing to flash their breasts in exchange for a t-shirt or the vague possibility of being spotted and becoming famous. The business essentially has a plentiful supply of free labour. Many of those interviewed by Claire enjoy the experience:

Jillian Vangeertry, a 21-year-old student:
"Anybody enjoys the attention. T-shirts, hats—we got all the accessories," she says. I ask if she plans on going wild for the cameras later. She shrugs. "If you do it, you do it," she says confidently. "You can't complain later. It's almost like your 15 minutes of fame."

Kaitlyn Bultema:
"If you do this, you might get noticed by somebody—to be an actress or a model."

Certainly there is nothing illegal in any of this at all. However the concept of grown men hanging around nightclubs waiting for drunken seventeen year old girls who can be lured to the bedroom in the "Girls Gone Wild" bus to reveal all is distinctly sordid.

The story of eighteen year old Jannel Szyszka's encounter with Joe Francis highlights the inherent dangers when adult men deliberately seek out drunken teenagers. (WARNING: DISTURBING CONTENT)

Szyszka tells me later that as she was spinning around the strip pole that night, Francis appeared, grabbed her arm and pulled her toward him. "You are so going on the bus later," she recalls Francis saying. "I was like, 'Um, OK.' I was shocked. I was like, 'Whoa—Joe's, like, trying to talk to me, like out of all the girls in here.'" Francis invited her back to the VIP area to do shots with him, she says, and she said yes.

Szyszka says the more shots she drank, the cloudier her judgment became. She says she agreed to join Francis and his crew on the "Girls Gone Wild" bus. "I thought 'Girls Gone Wild' was like flashing, and I thought I would flash them and be done. And so when I'm walking to the bus, that's all I'm thinking is going to happen."

At first she felt comfortable, she says. Inebriated and excited, she says she was led to the back of the bus, to a small bedroom. The double bed, with its neatly folded iridescent purple sheets, takes up most of the room. A flat-screen TV faces the bed, and cabinets are filled with remote controls, lubricants, condoms, sex toys in plastic bags, baby oil, a DVD called "How to be a Player" and a clipboard full of waivers for girls to sign. A small bathroom is off to the side, with a half-sized shower with faux marble tiling, and on the floor of the shower is a crate holding cheap and fruity-flavored rum, whiskey, tequila and Kool-Aid.

Footage from that night shows a close-up of Szyszka's driver's license, proving she's not a minor. The camera then captures Szyszka lying on the bed. Her nails are chipped, her eyes coated with makeup. Following a camerman's instructions, she shows her breasts and says, "Girls Gone Wild." She seems shy but willing. She smiles. The unseen cameraman asks her to take off her shirt, her skirt, then her underwear. She sprawls on the bed, her legs open. At his suggestion, she masturbates with a dildo, saying repeatedly that it hurts but also feels good. Francis enters the room at certain points and you hear his voice, low and flirtatious, telling her, "You are so adorable." When she says she's a virgin, he responds: "Great. You won't be after my cameraman gets done with you."

When I talk to Szyszka seven days later, she says she "didn't quite realize" she was being filmed. "But I didn't care because I was drunk and who cares?" Then she adds: "It didn't feel good to me at all, but I was totally faking it because I was on 'Girls Gone Wild.'"

Eventually, Szyszka says, Francis told the cameraman to leave and pushed her back on the bed, undid his jeans and climbed on top of her. "I told him it hurt, and he kept doing it. And I keep telling him it hurts. I said, 'No' twice in the beginning, and during I started saying, 'Oh, my god, it hurts.' I kept telling him it hurt, but he kept going, and he said he was sorry but kissed me so I wouldn't keep talking.

Afterward, she says, Francis cleaned them both off with a paper towel and told her to get dressed. Then, she says, he opened the door and told the cameraman to come back, saying, "She's not a virgin anymore".

Szyszka says Francis told her that what happened had to stay between them. She says she agreed, and they walked to the front of the bus. Szyszka remembers that one of the crew returned her driver's license. Another asked if she wanted to hang out on the bus. She declined, she says, but asked for three pairs of "booty short" underwear that Francis had promised her for appearing on camera. "They gave me a weird look like that was too much," Szyszka recalls. "They were, like, 'Three of them?' and I was, like, 'Yeah, three.'"

Within days, Szyszka says, she told her father, who was angry about what she said had happened but kept quiet at her request. A month after the incident, she says, she told her sister and mother.

She's confused, she admits, about what happened. She feels guilty, she says, for getting herself into the situation in the first place. She says she never would have undressed for the cameras if she hadn't been completely drunk. And she is adamant that she said "no" to Francis. She says she's haunted by that night.

"I feel like it was planned," she says. "Sometimes I'm driving along, and I think about it and all of a sudden feel weird."

Six weeks later and Claire rings Joe Francis about the incident. He denies that he had sex with anyone that night.

"If you print that, I will [expletive] sue the [expletive] out of you. If you print that, baby, you just put the nail in your own coffin," he tells me. "You are a [expletive expletive]. You decided to blast me . . . You are a [expletive] bitch . . . I will get my last laugh on you. I will get you."

His lawyer later confirms in an email that Francis and Szyszka has consensual sex.

The full article is in The LA Times.

Not a newspaper but a porn paper

2006-08-08T08:43:00.000Z

It is incredulous that The Daily Star is for sale on newstands across the country. The Daily Star is not a newspaper. It is soft porn and needs to placed on the top shelf.

The retail industry have failed to regulate themselves and government regulation is needed. The Daily Star has been on newagents shelves in the UK since 1978. Both Labour and Tory governments have had many years to deal with this issue yet neither of them choose to do anything about this. Why is it left to Claire Curtis-Thomas one woman MP to bring her own private member bill under the ten minute rule? Realistically her Sexually Explicit Material (Regulation of Sale and Display) Bill has little chance of becoming law because of lack of parliamentary time!

The politicians have been ignoring this since 1978 and continue to let the profits of porn peddlers take precedence. Politicians have given newspapers and magazines a license to do what they want with womens bodies.

Breasts Uncovered

2006-08-07T20:13:00.000Z

Bare breasts are part of a British tradition started by The Sun's Page Three in 1969. In recent years publications such as The Daily Sport and the lads mags have joined in the fun. Now retailers across the nation have a bevy of breasts on display. Apparently bare breasts are now part of a great british tradition started by saucy postcards from Blackpool.

Yet a mother in Boston (UK) is forced to breastfeed her baby in public toilets due to public attitudes towards breast-feeding and a lack of breast-feeding facilties.

"I wouldn't mind doing it in public, but some people think it's disgusting and give you funny looks. But what are you supposed to do?"

It is a very strange world when a mother can't breastfeed her baby in public yet three and half million people buy The Sun every day. If you walk into any newsagent or supermarket you will find plenty of practically naked women in sexually provocative poses on the covers of both lads magazines and national newspapers.

Yet the british public cannot accept a mother breast feeding her baby. The message is clear in our society uncovered breasts are certainly acceptable for public consumption but only if they titillate.

http://www.bostontoday.co.uk/ViewArticle2.aspx?SectionID=756&ArticleID=1677938

Trinny "lets the side down"

2006-08-02T16:40:00.000Z

I'm completely gobmacked by an article I have just come across in The Daily Mail. The female writer lambasts Trinny Woodall for appearing "Au Naturel"- this is code for hairy armpits.

Apparently this is the most heinous of sartorial crimes. The writer subjects Trinny to a tirade of abuse and accuses her of being lazy and slut-like. Trinny looked pretty stylish to me . Women have hairy armpits. It is a fact that grown women have body hair though if you look at the multitude of media images of women which surround us on a daily basis you would not realise this. It is refreshing that someone like Trinny can show the world that women do indeed have body hair.

However it does seem that even this writer does recognise that there is something deeply wrong with our society's expectation that women have no body hair.

"Now we even have the Hollywood wax, where no hair at all is left behind, a trend that follows the fashion diktat that women should all look 12 years old."

Adult women have body hair. It's not sluttish, disgusting or immoral. It is The Daily Femail section writers who have "let the side down".

Newsagents Family Friendly Policy

2006-08-02T16:15:00.000Z

Nayam Patel, a Winchmore Hill newsagent, is backing a campaign to move lads mags to the top shelf. The MP for Enfield Southgate David Burrowes is supporting the campaign and giving family friendly certificates to newsagents who follow a family friendly magazine display policy.

full story in this is hertfordshire

Lib Dem MP challenges WH Smiths

2006-08-02T15:10:00.000Z

Lib Dem MP Don Foster has challenged lads mags retailers to clean up their acts. He claims that leading British Retailer WH Smith cannot even adhere to its own code on displaying lads magazines.

My own feeling is that when even a leading newsagent such as WH Smith consistently chooses to ignore both it own standards and the National Federation of Retail Newsagent guidelines it is time for national legally enforceable standards. Self regulation is not working.

http://www.libdems.org.uk/news/lads-mags-are-still-too-exposed-foster.html

MP supports moving Lads Mags to the Top Shelf

2006-07-18T14:17:00.000Z

North Swindon MP Michael Wills has written to every newsagent in his constituency after concerns from residents that front covers of the magazines are pushing the boundaries of what is acceptable.

One shopowner said he would not be moving the magazines as he had received no complaints. However a local sex shop owner supported the bill and said it was ludicrous there were no controls on where magazines could be displayed.

http://www.thisiswiltshire.co.uk/news/headlines/display.var.838317.0.move_the_lads_mags.php

Lobby for Breastfeeding Support

2006-07-18T08:51:00.000Z

Campaigners for a law to protect a woman's right to breastfeed in public and increased support for breast-feeding lobbied Westminster today. The campaign is backed by actress Emma Thompson:

"So many women are given conflicting information. It is time to get the message across - not only is breastfeeding the perfect beginning for mother and child, but it should be allowed whenever and wherever a mother happens to be."

There are many health benefits for both mother and baby. But only two thirds of women in britain even attempt to breastfeed compared to 98% in sweden. Clare Byam-Cook, a breastfeeding counsellor and author of What to Expect When You are Breastfeeding, said: "The problem is getting worse. The reality is midwives are all too often not teaching women the correct way to breastfeed." A recent Mori poll of 500 new mothers showed that nine out of 10 mothers had difficulties breastfeeding, and a third said the advice they received was not relevant.

Experts have estimated that at least 250 babies are being admitted to hospital each week due to dehydration. This increase in dehydration is due to new mothers being advised not to bottle feed, however there is little advise being given on how to breast-feed. The World Health Organisation recommends that mothers breastfeed their children until they are two.

Yet there is a taboo about breast-feeding in public. Breastfeeding mothers are regularly asked to move from restaurants, cafes, shops and high streets. Even The National Gallery which has plenty of bare breasts on its walls asked a mother to stop breast-feeding. This would certainly explain why half of breastfeeding mothers surveyed by the National Childbirth Trust(NCT) felt embarassed breast-feeding in public. "Normalising breastfeeding and making it acceptable to breastfeed in public is crucial to increasing breastfeeding rates," said Government Minister for Public Health, Melanie Johnson.

It really is a peculiar society which will not allow a woman to breastfeed in public but has lads mags and the daily sport for sale in shops across the country. It is perfectly acceptable to use silicone enhanced breasts to sell anything, anytime or anyplace but nursing mothers must be discreet for fear of upsetting anyone who might be quietly reading their sun or daily sport near them.

***********************************

Oregon Mum Breast Feeding Causes Complaints

What Women Want

2006-07-17T16:12:00.000Z

Well, according to research conducted by Hollywood movie producers, women want their movie stars to have a minimum C cup bra size.

As a result US movie posters for Pirates of the Caribbean Keira Knightley's breasts were digitally enhanced.

“I don’t have any breasts, so I can’t show cleavage. But you’re not actually allowed to be on a magazine cover in the US without at least a C cup because it turns people off. Apparently they have done market research and found that women want to see no less than a C cup on other women. Isn’t that crazy?”

Suddenly the whole media industry makes sense to me. It is actually women who want to look at large breasted women and the male advertisers are merely meeting this need.

This really is the ultimate male fantasy.

Hackney Anti-Porn Crusader Honoured

2006-07-11T18:32:00.000Z

A STOKE Newington-based anti-porn crusader newsagent has been voted the best in the capital.

Hamdy's News, in Stoke Newington High Street, was awarded the gold medal for being the Best Neighbourhood Newsagent at a central London awards ceremony on Friday.

"Thank you to my staff and for all the good service we have been given by the community, and for everyone who voted," said Hamdy Shahein, owner of the 26-year-old business, speaking at the Living London Awards 2006.

Mr Shahein, 54, has been locked in a battle with wholesaler, W. H. Smith News, for the past 17 years in a bid to stop the company from sending him adult material in pre-packaged deliveries.

The father-of-three refuses to stock pornography in his shop and his bid to get lads mags and racy tabloids on to top shelves in other newsagents has been championed in the House of Commons by Diane Abbott, MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington, and Claire Curtis-Thomas, MP for Crosby in north Merseyside.

Mr Shahein was also made an ambassador for peace by the Interreligious and International Federation for World Peace, a United Nations-backed, worldwide, multi-faith organisation, at an event last month in Wembley, north-west London.

*********************

It will be interesting to see if this story get any coverage apart from in the Hackney Gazette.

Girlcotts

2006-07-11T18:01:00.000Z

When spending your hard-earned money remember that this money funds the advertising campaigns of that company. If you object to a companies advertising or policies then don't buy their products. Here are my own personal girlcotts:

Lions Eggs - Rather sexist advert in The News of The World.

Renault - Jiggling female bottoms on prime time tv.

WH Smith - Refuses to comply with National Federation of Retail Newsagents (NFRN) guidelines on display of lads mags.

Volvic - Glamorises pole dancing in their pole dancing advert and contributes to a general pornification of culture. My money will not be funding this sort of leching.

Dove - Young woman in their underwear is not really a novel way to advertise.

And of course I must mention the original girlcotter.

Angry Girl Girlcotts - The original girlcotter.

Wimbledon Equal Pay

2006-07-11T15:37:00.000Z

Here are some excerpts from an interview with Tom Phillips, the chairman of the All England Club by Christopher Clarey from International Herald Tribune.

ON CRITICISM OF THE CLUB'S CONTINUING POLICY OF PAYING MEN'S PLAYERS MORE PRIZE MONEY THAN THE WOMEN'S PLAYERS

Phillips: There is a lobby that is being run by the WTA, and they are going around and finding people to support them, and we say, 'Fine. Why not?' That's what they are there for in a way. We have not chosen to try and argue the case in public, because we want the tennis and the players to be the story. We don't want this slightly repetitive issue that trails endlessly. It's been running since 1968, and there are two ways of looking at it.

One is that it is an equal right and entitlement and the other is that in the sports and entertainment business, remuneration is driven by the market and not by your gender, and we happen to take that view. We don't believe that what Julia Roberts gets paid per film is significant in terms of deciding what her male costar gets paid.

The WTA doesn't pay equal prize money. The average week of a Tier One tournament on the women's tour pays 63 percent of the average week of an ATP Masters Series event.

ON WHETHER THE CLUB WILL REVISIT THE ISSUE WITH THE WOMEN'S TOUR

Phillips: We revisit it every year just in the context of prize money. We look at data from any source we can get it, including the WTA, and we look and try to be fair. We have no ax to grind. It's not a sexist issue. The last thing I would ever do is disparage the women's players. We go out of our way to respect them, to build them up. I haven't done the arithmetic this year, but last year the top 10 women's players took away more money from Wimbledon than the top 10 men's players because the women play more doubles. How unfair is that?

ON WHETHER THE BENEFITS OF STICKING TO ITS STANCE ARE OUTWEIGHED BY THE POTENTIALLY NEGATIVE EFFECTS IN TERMS OF IMAGE AND ON WHETHER THE PRIZE MONEY STANCE RUNS COUNTER TO THE PROGRESSIVENESS THE CLUB HAS SHOWN IN GENERAL

Phillips: I've read your views. You use the word progressive as if that implies that progressive is what your position is. My answer to you is that this is a market issue or a gender issue, and why do you think that, in virtually the whole of sports and entertainment, your view is not the one that pertains?

My position is that I don't actually want to talk about it. I want the story of Wimbledon to be what's happened. I want it to be Federer. I want it to be Mauresmo, the first Chinese win in the doubles, the longest match that's ever been played at Wimbledon, Agassi's farewell. And I find it counterproductive from our point of view to discuss prize money. It may be the media enjoy revisiting it year after year after year, but the fundamental issue remains the same.

Playboy Culture

2006-07-11T14:26:00.000Z

The UK is currently being swept by a "playboy" culture in which glamour models are lauded as aspirational role models. The playboy brand is fast becoming the hottest fashion accessory.

The playboy bunny is being deliberated promoted and marketed to young girls who have no idea what the playboy brand actually represents. High street favourites such as WH Smith and Argos are selling playboy branded products targeted at young girls.

The acceptance of the playboy brand into our culture as a fashion icon is simply a further signal that porn has become increasingly mainstream. In our culture it has becoming increasingly acceptable to use sexual imagery to sell everything and anything. Glamour models are the new national icons promoted by the media as the face of the modern british woman.

******************************
UPDATE

Apparently both John Lewis and Claire's Accessories have now stopped selling Playboy products.

Argos are however still selling both single and double pink playboy duvet covers. Everything is pink and sparkly and very deliberately targeted at young girls. Playboy is a sex brand. Argos are selling a sex brand which is deliberately targeted at young girls.

Workplace Dressing - Is there a line?

2006-07-11T09:11:00.000Z

Another article about the changing dress standards.

What’s provocative?
Professional women walk a fashion tightrope

So which is it? Can sex appeal be part of a woman’s professional wardrobe? Should it be? Does she have a choice, if she’s under 40 and wants to look remotely in style?

The year 1977, it seems, was a simpler time. “Wardrobe engineer” John T. Molloy, author of the best-selling “Dress for Success” books, used a presidential campaign’s worth of focus groups to come up with a uniform for the new wave of women entering the traditionally male-dominated management ranks. Stick with a dark, knee-length skirted suit, a contrasting blouse, minimal make-up and basic pumps, he advised. No sweaters: “Sweaters in the office spell secretary. … They say lower middle class and loser.” Anything but skin-colored hose was “unthinkable” in the workplace. And furthermore, Molloy advised — apparently missing the irony of a statement like this in a book urging women to neuter their femininity at the office — anything but skin-colored hose would turn men off.

Oddly, even tailored pantsuits weren’t acceptable. Even as women were supposed to be dressing to de-emphasize their womanliness, according to Molloy, they needed to wear clothing that revealed their legs for their colleagues’ pleasure and/or judgment.

Molloy set up, or at least reflected, a tightrope that women still navigate today — and as business casual has become the norm in a lot of workplaces, not to mention as fashions have grown progressively revealing, the tightrope’s gotten thinner and thinner. We’re not supposed to dress like men, but if our clothing emphasizes our femaleness too much — if we show too much leg or too much cleavage or too much curve — we may cause men’s eyes to light up, but, research has demonstrated, we won’t cause their brains to take us seriously. Not to mention the even harsher judgment women can bring down on other women they believe have crossed the invisible line.

And now what this article isn’t about. It’s not trying to pin down where that line is, or taking a moral stand on women who use provocative dress to make a sale or get a bigger tip or even just get attention. Sex, or in this case just the suggestion of it, sells because people are willing to buy it; if those people are so easily separated from their money, well, who’s to tell a woman acting of her own free will that she’s immoral for taking advantage?

But we all do, of course, and that’s why there is a line. The problem today is that it’s very difficult sometimes to know where the line is. It changes depending on industry, company culture, age, season, and current fashion.

There’s the line, for instance, that Shannon Wynne draws. Wynne owns the Flying Saucer, a chain of pubs with a location in the River Market district. The Flying Saucer is known for two things: the beer selection, which is huge, and the waitresses’ uniforms, which are not. They consist of a tight tank top or T-shirt, a (sometimes extremely) short plaid skirt or skort and knee socks. But Wynne differentiates between the Flying Saucer and Hooters because, he said, the girls he hires choose the length of their skirts and the tightness of their shirts, and none of the bar’s ads and promotions make even veiled references to female anatomy.

“We’re not a breastaurant,” he said. But Wynne has frank discussions with his waitresses about their uniforms and their bodies.

“Let them show cleavage — they can use it to make money,” he said. “Why dodge the subject? That’s exactly what it does. But by no means is it required.”

Wynne said the extra exposed skin can mean a 20 percent jump in tips for a girl who’s got the figure, but that she’s got to have the personality to go with it. “It’s not only wearing the low-cut T-shirt,” he said. “It’s how you handle people’s egos.”

Elsewhere on President Clinton Avenue, Suzon Awbrey — a former bartender herself, now co-owner of Sticky Fingerz Rock ’n’ Roll Chicken Shack and Rumba/Revolution — provides uniform T-shirts and tank tops for her restaurants’ wait staff, but lets them dress themselves from the waist down. The upside is, all body types can be comfortable; the downside is that waitresses occasionally push the limits of what Awbrey considers appropriate, even in a club environment.

“I have had to step in and draw the line a time or two,” she said. “… I don’t need to see your hiney cheek when you bend over. Legs are great, hineys not so much.”

The lines get grayer, and the penalties for crossing them greater, as the relative status of the occupation increases.

Peter Glick, a professor of psychology at Lawrence University in Wisconsin, published earlier this year a study of how people perceived women according to their dress and occupation. Participants watched videos of a woman reading from the same script, but dressed differently – either conservatively or provocatively (short skirt, lots of cleavage, heavy make-up, tousled hair, etc.). When the participants were told the woman was a receptionist, Glick said, their perceptions of her didn’t change based on what she was wearing. But when they were told she was in management, they reacted much more negatively to the provocative dress.

“They saw her as less competent,” Glick said. “They had an emotional reaction that seemed to drive that perception.”

So why did the receptionist get away with it when the manager didn’t? Sexuality is associated with traditionally feminine occupations — the stereotype of the stewardess, the receptionist, the nurse.

“We thought women wouldn’t be penalized [in those professions] because they were not combining sexiness with power,” Glick said. “But it would be different in a high-status profession.”

Another study, released last year by a professor at Tulane University, concluded that women in high-status professions do pay a concrete price for bringing sexuality in the workplace. The survey asked women with MBA degrees whether they’d ever used one of 10 “sexual behaviors” — dressing provocatively was one; others included sending flirtatious e-mails or giving back-rubs — at the office. About half said they had, and those women made less money and had gotten fewer promotions than the women who said they hadn’t.

But defining what’s provocative is a thorny business. Even knee-length skirts show a woman’s calves, and most tailored garments will follow her figure. What about heels? Lipstick? Both are part of most women’s idea of dressy attire, but both were created with no other purpose than to make women look more attractive to men.

Every woman interviewed for this article had a different standard for what she considered appropriate in the workplace. Brenda Scisson, director of public relations for Stone Ward and a veteran of both the advertising and banking industries, has a no-cleavage rule for herself, although she doesn’t apply it to some of the younger women in her office who don’t have day-to-day contact with outside clients, as she does.

Carole Smith, a former owner of New Traditions, a women’s clothing store, as well as a former banker and current president of a management and human resources consulting firm, is OK with slightly lower necklines, depending on a woman’s bust size.

“I wear some stuff that’s pretty low,” she said. “I don’t mind if you show a little rise right there, but not cleavage.”

In another industry, though, she readily admits her standards would be different.

“Let’s take pharmaceutical sales, for example,” she said. “We all know part of success is being able to get in the door and see the doctor. That means you need to be very attractive and very feminine, I think.

“But you still need to be respected for what you know about the product. I don’t think you can walk in with your boobs hanging out, but an outfit that shows your figure, maybe a shorter skirt, I think it’s great.”

Both Scisson and Smith, who are in their 50s, said younger women seem to have more difficulty knowing what’s appropriate in the workplace and what isn’t.

Part of that is what younger women see when they shop in stores geared at their age group. Finding a summer top with thicker than spaghetti straps isn’t easy; finding one with sleeves is virtually impossible. This season’s most promoted item at the Limited, a popular mall chain, is “the Sexy Summer Suit” — tight-fitting, and available with long, cropped or knee-length pants.

It can be even worse for women just a few years older, who’ve moved beyond entry-level jobs but aren’t ready for matronly styles.

“Thirty to 40 is land-mine city,” said Kerri Jackson Case, 30, a former TV news reporter and pharmaceutical sales rep who now works in public relations. “You’re in this horrible place between being old and being young, and you can’t be either. … I don’t know what you’re supposed to wear. No one does.”

As for her own ideas of what’s appropriate, “I don’t have any hard and fast rules,” she said. “I can’t tell you exactly where the line is, but I can tell you if it’s been crossed.”

(Case herself, on the day we spoke, wore a short-sleeved jacket over one of the deep-V, crossover-bodice tops that are extremely popular right now, but have the potential to bare a fair amount of cleavage. “I guess I have quite a few tops that look like this,” she said.)

Younger women also tend to watch a lot of TV, where shows feature more and more women in important positions — invariably dressed in something tight or short or low-cut.

“You watch any kind of show set in the workplace, and most of the time women are wearing something inappropriate,” said Amanda Tiner, 29, an interior designer.

“We see more and more of these images of women in the workplace,” said Glick, the psychology professor. “There’s a sexualizing of women in the workplace going on that’s problematic. There’s kind of a trap here.”

The trap, he said, is that dressing sexy, as popular culture says it’s OK to do, can actually help a young woman get hired into an entry-level job. But it can also keep her from moving up.

And it’s not just because of how men view her. Other women’s reactions can be just as damaging.

“Women judge other women,” Tiner said. “They almost look down on women they think dress inappropriately. They think, ‘She doesn’t do as good a job.’ ”

Case agreed.

“I think it depends on if you’re the kind of woman who would do that,” she said, referring to women who dress provocatively to get some benefit at work. “If you’d do it, you probably don’t mind. But if you’ve made the decision not to do that, it tends to get very catty.”

Kristen Dickens, a wardrobe consultant and personal shopper in Little Rock, helps women develop or tweak their own styles.

“For a lot of people, especially in their professional wardrobe … usually what they’re looking for is something to add sex appeal,” she said. And in recent years, she said, they’ve had more options to do so tastefully.

Companies have a hard time pinning down exactly what’s appropriate, she believes, in part because fashion changes so quickly — and along with it, people’s ideas of what’s acceptable. Ally McBeal’s circa 1998 upper-mid-thigh hemlines, for instance, look extremely dated today, at least where business suits are concerned. Around the office, knee-length is the norm. For now, anyway.

And then, of course, there’s the whole issue of the double standard. The most pressing fashion question men have to ask themselves is whether or not to wear a tie. Business casual, for men, can actually be defined in 50 words or less.

But this is a self-inflicted wound. We could trade in our freedom for a pants-and-button-down uniform — author John Molloy begged us to back in 1977 — but on a 95-degree day it seems worth the hassle to be able to ditch long pants in favor of capris or a skirt sans pantyhose.

“It has so much to do with a woman’s psyche, her comfort level,” Dickens said. “Part of her comfort level comes from sex appeal. Whatever part of your body you feel comfortable with, you will show it off or flatter it somehow.”

A cleavage of views - pornification of the workplace

2006-07-11T08:53:00.000Z

Interesting article in the Ottawa Citizen.
Shelley Page, The Ottawa Citizen Published: Sunday, July 02, 2006

I used to work for a breast starer. He'd summon me to his office for a chat but instead of meeting my gaze he'd plant his beady eyes on my chest, no matter how buttoned up I was.

I could be pitching a story idea, but he wasn't listening, too busy trying to sneak a peak through my shirt, the proverbial deer caught in my headlights.

This happened to all us female reporters. So when we went into his office, we'd hold a large binder over our breasts. Foiled, he'd eventually look at us while we talked business.

Call me old-fashioned, but I didn't much like being leered at in a workplace that had very few women where the men used to stand in a row to loudly rate the young female reporters (0 to 10) as we self-consciously slouched by; where I was partnered with an older male mentor who requested a "pretty young thing for the summer;" where one boss faithfully displayed the Playmate of the Month on the wall by his desk; and where we were more likely to be sent for coffee than on assignment.

When I started my career I was one of only two women among a general assignment pool of 22 reporters. One male colleague joked that I had the number of the Ontario Human Rights Commission etched on my desk for quick reference. Admittedly, I was frequently humourless.

I didn't want my appearance to be an issue even though my gender was, so I hacked off my hair, kept buttoned up, and tried to do the best job possible. But at least I had scored a job.

All was well, more or less, until the Britney Spears generation showed up to work a while back in various states of undress, from see-through slip dresses, to thongs sprouting out of their pubic-bone riding jeans, to plunging necklines and prosti-tops.

Two decades later, I've become the breast starer.

Jiggling, firm, round, translucent, veiny, tanned, huge, flat, fake ... I'm surrounded, at work and at play -- whether the office, an interview, being intercepted by a PR hottie or a brassy bureaucrat.

I'm not leering or sneering. I'm just perplexed.

My male friends think this is a most excellent development. But I'm not so sure.

I realize that even to wonder about a dress code makes me sound prudish and pruny. And when there are societies that find women's bodies so offensive they have to cover themselves from head-to-toe, I'm loathe to suggest that tube tops and a hint of thong aren't appropriate business attire.

Besides, who wants to be one of those women who criticizes other women? Shouldn't we all just wear what we want? Maybe it's OK to have your cleavage pillowing out while you're interviewing a cabinet minister. Maybe your scoop neck will get your a scoop.

In part, I envy these young women's innocence.

In the '80s, before sexual harassment policies were in place, it was not uncommon to be lunged at by an older male colleague when the elevator doors slid shut (at least that happened to me), or be asked for late-night cocktails to discuss one's stories (ditto), or to have an editor offer to drive you home, but instead kidnap you because he wanted to show you his new sound system.

The '80s power suit, with the big shoulder pads, high-necked blouses and manly briefcases, wasn't just an attempt to blend in with our male colleagues, it was a suit of protective armour.

But the Paris Hilton disciples have waltzed into the workplace, semi-clad and semi-conscious. All the hard-won battles of earlier generations have earned them the right to be oblivious. Two decades after we fought to keep sex out of the workplace, they are overseeing its "pornification."

It's happening in workplaces throughout North America. And a backlash is building.

Experts in corporate etiquette are publishing lists of appropriate office attire that declare even open-toed sandals and bare arms inappropriate. Wimbledon has changed its dress code to rein in the outfits of female tennis players. Oprah's O magazine for June carries an eight-page spread exploring the "New Naked," asking "How Bare is Too Bare?" They interviewed 14 experts on this phenomenon, and most women came down on the trend, while the men interviewed were all for it.

Jaqui Lividini, former senior vice president at Saks Fifth Avenue, said she'd send a woman home who came to work too uncovered. "This is about work, not flirting in a sexy dress," says Maria Bartiromo, host and managing editor of CNBC's The Wall Street Journal Report. But Robert Verdi, host of the Style Network's Fashion Police, said that dressing sexy isn't an attempt to be "provocative or vulgar ... today we use fashion to tell the world who we want to be."

I would normally bristle at these attempts to make young women cover up, but still wonder why they're undressing in the first place. Is it liberation or are they shackled by inane and overly sexualized pop culture role models? I suspect it's the latter.

The best explanation comes from author Ariel Levy, who last year published Female Chauvinist Pigs, Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture. She says popular culture has embraced a model of female sexuality that comes straight from pornography and strip clubs, a sexuality in which the woman's role is to excite, titillate and perform for men. Women mistakenly equate sexual power with power. By embracing this cartoonish form of sexuality they have adopted a perverted form of feminism.

Levy has written, "There is a widespread assumption that simply because my generation of women has the good fortune to live in a world touched by the feminist movement, that means everything we do is magically imbued with its agenda. But it doesn't work that way. 'Raunchy' and 'liberated' are not synonyms. It is worth asking ourselves if this bawdy world we have resurrected reflects how far we've come, or how far we have left to go."

Let's face it, if you're standing in your workplace in a state of semi-undress, you don't have any real power over your probably-male boss because he isn't paying attention to what you're saying. You can say that if he's not listening, it's his problem, but it actually ends up being our problem.

Levy also writes, "Without a doubt there are some women who feel their most sexual with their vaginas waxed, their labia trimmed, their breasts enlarged, and their garments flossy and scant. I am happy for them. I wish them many blissful and lubricious loops around the pole. But there are many other women (and, yes, men) who feel constrained in this environment, who would be happier and feel hotter -- more empowered, more sexually liberated, and all the rest of it -- if they explored other avenues of expression and entertainment."

As long as we make our appearance the issue, that is what we will be judged on.

And as Levy says, if we actually believed we were competent, witty, smart and, yes, sexy, then we wouldn't have to dress like strippers, or act like men or anyone other than ourselves.

The rewards would be what many young women desire and deserve: freedom and power.

Shelley Page's column appears every two weeks. She can be reached at spage@thecitizen.canwest.com

CSI Las Vegas Bedroom Shocker!

2006-07-10T17:25:00.000Z

The final episode of this season's CSI Las Vegas, which is due to be screened in the UK during July, ends with Sara Sidle and Gil Grissom in dressing gowns chatting in a bedroom.

Apparently the CSI duo are having a relationship. Avid show fans are now eagerly awaiting the start of series seven. Many fans are concerned that CSI will lose its focus as a crime show and follow the well worn soap opera path with a heavy emphasis on relationships and bedroom scenes.

There have been plenty of bedroom scenes in CSI and the stars are all attractive. But the plotlines and direction in CSI are focused on the crime story and the characters. The characters in CSI Las Vegas are three dimensional people with flaws and imperfections. Above all the show is refreshing because the camera does not focus constantly on the cleavage of the female CSI stars. The directors focus on telling the story and developing the characters rather than providing easy titillation. The show definitely features plenty of cleavage but the recognition that a CSI detective is unlikely to constantly wear cleavage popping tops is welcome.

Since CSI has hit our screens over six years ago there has been a huge uptake in Forensic Science courses. This shows the power of the media to shape and mould the aspirations of the young. The media needs to take this responsibility seriously. CSI Las Vegas has inspired a generation to pursue forensic science careers.

CSI Las Vegas is one of the few shows where the drama has always been center stage. If you like crime shows and haven't seen this yet then you need to. This is a top-notch show and it is in a completely different class from either CSI NY or CSI Miami.

To return to the Sara and Gil relationship. I don't object to the Sara and Gil relationship on principle as in the real world relationships at work do happen. The chemistry between them has occasionally been hinted at. What I hope is that the show sticks to its successful formula and leaves something to our imagination and that the crime remains, as always, centre stage.

Lads Mags Regrets

2006-07-10T13:54:00.000Z

Jennifer Ellison, recent staple of the lads mags is interviewed in the Daily Mail. She seems to be trying to close the door on her lads mags career.

"Brookside encouraged me to do them because it was great publicity for the show, but I do think I was a bit too young."

"I did my first GQ cover shot when I was 15. Coming from Liverpool and being so young, I didn't even know what GQ was. I didn't realise how damaging it could be."

"Eventually I realised that all people saw of me was the blonde hair and the semi-naked girl, so I decided to stop all that and concentrate on being an actress instead."

Jennifer is due to start to star as Rosie in the west end show Chicago for five weeks at The Cambridge Theatre. A nationwide tour of the musical will follow.

Traditional British Egg Recipes?

2006-07-10T10:18:00.000Z

There was a debate a while ago about what Britishness is all about.

Well Lions Eggs have a new take on Britishness. Apparently its all about "getting your tits out for the lads". It's funny that there is no mention of this particular recipe on their website.

The advert on the right was a Lions Quality Eggs advert with the tagline "So Very British" in the News of The World. This is certainly a view which is commonly promoted in the tabloid press and lads mags. We cannot really expect anything else from the News of The World.

But British women should expect more from a leading British Eggs Supplier such as Lions Quality Eggs. Lions Eggs obviously do not feel that british women deserve the highest standards.

Lions Eggs will not be in my shopping basket or part of my next egg recipe. There are enough sexist ads in the world without eggs suppliers adding to the problem.

*********************************

It seems Lion Eggs have a bit of monopoly on the British Egg market. Every single packet of eggs in Tesco is Lions (even the value and organic). So much for customer choice. If you want to buy a non-lions product then Sainsburys have a selection of organic eggs which are not made by Lions. However most of their eggs are also made by Lions. With such a monopoly it is no wonder that don't they can do what they want.

Birmingham Women Fighting Back

2006-07-09T17:32:00.000Z

Women in Birmingham are organising a campaign against lap-dancing clubs in Birmingham.

Removing the billboards which advertise lap-dancing clubs on streets across Britain would certainly be welcome.

http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2006/07/344526.html

The Viewing Revolution

2006-07-09T15:45:00.000Z

A quiet revolution is happening in living rooms across the world. The rise of the Personal Video Recorder (PVR) is allowing viewers to control their own viewing. PVRs provide essentially the same functionality as a VCR, but it's all so much simpler and easier.

The key benefit of the PVR is the ability to record a particular programme whenever it's on and whatever channel it's on. There is no more searching through TV schedules. The icing on the cake is that PVRs make it very easy to fast-forward through the adverts. With a PVR a one hour programme becomes a 45 minute programme. Once you have tried TIVO, ReplayTV, MythTV or SkyPlus then your TV viewing will never be the same again.

For years viewers have used adverts as an excuse to make a cup of tea or pop to the toilet. But now increasing numbers of viewers are simply using their PVRs to fastforward through the ad breaks.

The advertisers are beginning to get worried about this. ABC is reputedly trying to get PVR manufacturers to disable the fastforward functionality. If this does happen one fallback is MythTV, an opensource system which allows you to build your own PVR system using a standard computer.

But be warned TV viewing without the constant interruption by the noise and visual pollution of adverts is strangely addictive.

Clean Flicks

2006-07-09T11:52:00.000Z

How many times have you watched a movie with a completely gratuitous sex scene? I would wager that it has been quite a few times. Hollywood has a tendency to add superfluous nudity and sex scenes to movies. Most of the times these scenes don't really add anything to the plot and merely provide titillation.

Well a company called Clean Flicks have been providing a service in the states where they edit these movies and provide clean versions for those that want them. This seems rather a good idea to me.

Well a court has now ruled against these "sanitizing" films. It is an illegitimate business that hurts Hollywood studios. Now companies such as CleanFlicks, Play It Clean Video and CleanFilms must stop their business and hand over their inventory to the movie studios.

Michael Apted, president of the Director's Guild of America said

"Audiences can now be assured that the films they buy or rent are the vision of the filmmakers who made them and not the arbitrary choices of a third-party editor".

Gratuitous sex and nudity scenes are now simply part of life in the movie industry.

This has spilled over into the TV industry as well. I enjoy NYPD Blues but The gratuitous sex scene at the end of every episode simply stops it being suitable for general family viewing.

Strong Woman Vital for Equality

2006-07-07T21:40:00.000Z

Joss Whedon who created programmes such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Firefly and Serenity and the soon to be released Wonder Woman recently made a speech at the Equality Now conference.

Here is just a snippet from the speech where Josh explains why he creates strong women characters.

"Because—equality is not a concept. It's not something we should be striving for. It's a necessity. Equality is like gravity. We need it to stand on this earth as men and women. And the misogyny that is in every culture is not a true part of the human condition. It is life out of balance, and that imbalance is sucking something out of the soul of every man and woman who is confronted with it."

It's rather refreshing to find anyone let alone a man with these views in the media industry.

A full transcript of the speech is availble on the Forgetting what is behind blog.

I haven't actually seen any of the above yet. But I shall be adding them to my watch list.

Sisters take back our sex

2006-07-07T17:41:00.000Z

Jill Scott, the grammy winning jazz singer, has hit out at the degrading portrayal of black women in the music videos and lyrics.

Scott urged those who were concerned about this to use their purchasing power to change things.

“It is dirty, inappropriate, inadequate, unhealthy and polluted. We can demand more. This is about choosing what we will allow in our lives. We can force things. We can change things. Challenge the music industry with your purchasing power.”

Jill was speaking at the Essence Music Festival during a "Who You calling a ho? sisters take back our sex!" seminar.

Women with Clothes in Billboard Campaign!

2006-07-07T12:42:00.000Z

Reports are reaching me that in the latest Dove campaign for real beauty the real women in the billboard campaign actually keep their clothes on. Now that is truly shocking and original!

This is definitely an improvement on the main campaign for real beauty which features six young women in their underwear. Using women in their underwear to sell products is a pretty old story. Unilever are attempting to promote this as a feminist campaign by saying that these are "real" women but Unilever are just the same old wolf but in sheeps clothing.

It is not essential to use half-dressed women to sell products. However within the advertising industry it has simply become the accepted thing to do. The female body is just another tool in the advertisers toolbox, just a commodity used to sell everything and anything.

If you object, then don't buy it!

********

Some excerpts from an article in the Sydney Morning Herald about Beauty focusing on the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty.

"Yes, these women are big and fleshy when compared with the anorectic adolescents usually trotted out to convince us to part with mega dollars for small pots of potion. But these confident, grinning women, with their perfect teeth and flawless skin, don't resemble those I see in my local shopping centre pushing trolleys. There isn't a wrinkle or a saggy behind on any of them.

What's more, and despite Dove's assertions to the contrary, these women are models. They were carefully culled from the crowd and paid to represent a product. Same as any other casting call. They're now celebrities, touring shopping centres and appearing on television in the United States - a marketing dream

Dove has acquired cachet, too, by hiring a prestigious place of higher learning to do its market research (more common than you'd think) and linking up with reputable women academics such as Orbach, Etcoff and Wolf. The last praised Dove at the Sydney Writers' Festival this year before admitting her proxy relationship with the company.

In the end, even though Dove may ask some useful questions and may even do some good, its measure of beauty is still calibrated by thighs not thoughts, visage not values and appearances not actions.

Dove's definition is just as disempowering and confining as any other definition of idealised beauty.

Would Dove really be so concerned about my self-image if it weren't trying to get me to buy its products? Would the company still bankroll its social and educational programs, if sales declined?

If Unilever, which owns the Dove brand, was really committed to the body image issue, wouldn't it change the advertising (its worldwide media budget is $8.6 billion) for all its other beauty products: Pond's, Lux, Pears, Sunsilk and Rexona among them? Wouldn't it be concerned that it's the maker of Slim-Fast?

If this was anything more than the savvy implementation of a marketing angle, would the same company have given us LynxJet, the most sexist advertising of recent times?

Call me cynical, but I guess there must be real beauty in those dollars."

Sainsburys Introduces Modesty Screens

2006-06-30T15:36:00.000Z

Three Cheers for Sainsburys!

In all Sainsburys store lads mags are now displayed on the top shelf. Additionally most of the magazine apart from the title is hidden behind a metal modesty screen.

Megane 2006 - A Well Hidden Male Bottom

2006-06-29T13:35:00.000Z

This is one very sexy bottom. A bit too much for prime time TV! This is another sexy male bottom in the Renault Megane 2006 "Still Shakin It" TV advert. Once again Renault ensures that the female population is not too aroused by its TV adverts. I suppose there have been a bit too many male bottoms on tv adverts lately. Us girls must be protected from our baser instincts.

Megane 2006 - Male Ass Shaking

2006-06-29T13:30:00.000Z

The male ass shaking in the new Renault Megane 2006 advert "Still Shakin It". Such close-ups on those buttocks! Its nice to know that Renault is keen to preserve male modesty. Its very reassuring that even in 2006 the media still keeps its double standards whereby male modesty is guarded and female modesty... Well it doesn't exist!

Shaking that ass

2006-06-29T12:34:00.000Z

Renault Megane have been cheekily "shaking ass" since 2003. The 2006 "still shakin it" campaign is to celebrate the launch of the new megane 2006. Now in 2006 the ass shaking is mostly being done by females in skimpy bikini bottoms rather than smart city shorts or capri pants.

The only men shaking their ass in the advert are fully clothed and there is not much ass visible. There are some pictures of this male ass shaking in my other postings today. But please be warned there is bare male shoulder and even some lower leg clearly visible in one of the photos. There are definitely plenty of fine male arses out there. Renault clearly cannot find them.

These adverts highlight the fact that Renault perceive their buyer to be male. They certainly have not made an effort to woo the female car puchaser. The fact that Renault are now using such a vulgar sales pitch as bottom wiggling girls to sell cars on prime time tv is a bit sad.

I shall not be buying a Renault.

http://www.renaulttv.co.uk/

Lads Mags

2006-06-28T15:34:00.000Z

On newsagents and supermarkets shelves across the united kingdom, lads mags such as Zoo and Nuts jostle for space with childrens publications such as CBeebies. The images on the covers of these magazines are frequently fairly explicit and lewd. The material is undoubtably adult in nature.

The National Federation of Retail Newsagents has a voluntary code which says that these magazines should be out of the sight of children. However even major newsagent such as WH Smith ignore the code. Legislation is needed to ensure these publications are moved to the top shelf.

Claire Curtis-Thomas MP has introduced a private members bill to deal with sexually explicit material. This sexually explicit material bill is due before parliament in October.

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/media/comment/0,,1807216,00.html

Please lobby your MP to support this bill.

http://www.parliament.uk/directories/directories.cfm

Soft Porn is now acceptable

2006-06-28T08:54:00.000Z

The fact that publications such as Nuts, Zoo and The Daily Sport are available without any restrictions is quite shocking. They need to tone down their front pages or they should be on the top shelf. Soft porn has become an acceptable part of our society. If this continues then in about 20 years time the front pages will have gynaecological close-ups.

If you object to these publications then you need to start complaining now. Contact the head office of the supermarket or newsagent that is stocking these publications in general view.

You can also complain to companies who advertise in this magazines. Many supposedly family-friendly companies such as Burger King advertise in these publications.

Adverts in Zoo and Nuts:

* Virgin Mobile and Megastores
* Burger King
* Three Mobile

Adverts in ZOO:

* HMV
* Drench Still Spring Water
* Halfords
* Sony Ericsson
* VO5 Hair
* Vodafone
* AA Loans

Adverts in Nuts:

* Currys
* Phones 4 U
* Blockbuster Videos
* O2

Charliegrrl's blog listed all these companies. Please take action and complain now.