The Sun has got its top on
January 20, 2015 9:51 AM   Subscribe

RIP Page 3. There has been no formal announcement but it seems the long tradition of having a photograph of a topless woman on Page 3 of Rupert Murdoch's flagship British newspaper, The Sun, is no more. posted by fearfulsymmetry (80 comments total) 8 users marked this as a favorite
 
This is a tragedy. Je suis page 3.
posted by Samuel Farrow at 9:54 AM on January 20, 2015 [16 favorites]


.
posted by josher71 at 9:56 AM on January 20, 2015 [1 favorite]


NEWSPAPER TRAILS REST OF SOCIETY BY FOUR DECADES
Sport Results pg. 20
posted by phooky at 9:56 AM on January 20, 2015 [26 favorites]


. .
posted by This_Will_Be_Good at 9:57 AM on January 20, 2015 [17 favorites]


Just turn to page 12, then quickly to page 15. After all, Jeremy Clarkson and Rod Liddle are still tits.
posted by Thing at 9:57 AM on January 20, 2015 [33 favorites]


When I am Queen, the beautiful will be the first against the wall.
posted by four panels at 9:57 AM on January 20, 2015 [1 favorite]


On first glance, I thought it was an obit for Rupert Murdoch, and I was flushed with hate-joy.
posted by penduluum at 10:02 AM on January 20, 2015 [7 favorites]


Well, it's a start, but there are still the other pages.
posted by The Card Cheat at 10:02 AM on January 20, 2015 [49 favorites]


As the links indicate, there will still be "girls" just now they won't be topless. Which is not really the issue.
posted by GuyZero at 10:03 AM on January 20, 2015 [7 favorites]


My friend Justin in London was saying given the weird and mental outcry from men he knows, he's guessing that soon the hashtag "jesuissometits" will happen.
posted by Kitteh at 10:04 AM on January 20, 2015 [1 favorite]


Wait, they just replaced them with pictures of women in bras? That's like addressing accusations of racism by casting Lenny Henry in your minstrel show.
posted by teponaztli at 10:05 AM on January 20, 2015 [15 favorites]


Yeah, I'm not really sure it's a win for progress when they are still showing sexualized women, only now they're slightly more clothed. It seems like all of the objectification but now with more body shaming.
posted by Kadin2048 at 10:07 AM on January 20, 2015 [3 favorites]


But what will Tom Robinson sing instead?

"Pictures of naked young women are fun
In Titbits and Playboy, page three of The Sun"

- "Glad to Be Gay"
posted by the sobsister at 10:08 AM on January 20, 2015 [2 favorites]


Not much illustrates the cultural differences between the US and the UK better than the presence of topless models in a daily newspaper.
posted by octothorpe at 10:09 AM on January 20, 2015 [9 favorites]


I remember being young and seeing Samantha Fox on MTV and, along with all my friends, being totally smitten with her. Then somewhere, probably in a Penthouse I "borrowed" from my friend's brother, I found out that she was once a "Page 3 Girl" and I got to see her naked breasts and it was the best day ever.

That was when I realized that, in England, newspapers had boobs in them. All ours had was Ziggy.
posted by bondcliff at 10:10 AM on January 20, 2015 [12 favorites]


Canada's equally crappy Sun newspapers have (clothed) "Sunshine Girls," which given the quality of the rest of the paper is probably still their second-best feature (after sports).
posted by The Card Cheat at 10:16 AM on January 20, 2015 [2 favorites]


*Sheds a tiny, pubescent tear.
posted by The 10th Regiment of Foot at 10:18 AM on January 20, 2015 [4 favorites]


Canada's equally crappy Sun newspapers have (clothed) "Sunshine Girls," which given the quality of the rest of the paper is probably still their second-best feature (after sports).

Are they still doing those? Blah. I only ever pick up a Sun when I'm waiting for food in certain fast food restaurants, and then I only read the sports section. And then I wash my hands. Twice. I still feel sick afterwards, but I'm not sure if it's the food or the Sun. Punishment, I call it, and a reminder not to eat in those places.
posted by nubs at 10:20 AM on January 20, 2015 [1 favorite]


It'll be back in 6 months after a 'grassroots campaign' touting 'a woman's choice to appear topless' and 'We at The Sun refuse to bow down to those who hate free speech', etc.

Bonus: Lots of free publicity when it returns.
posted by madajb at 10:21 AM on January 20, 2015 [3 favorites]


How could I forget!?!

Hacker: The Daily Mirror is read by people who think they run the country; The Guardian is read by people who think they ought to run the country; The Times is read by people who actually do run the country; the Daily Mail is read by the wives of the people who run the country; the Financial Times is read by people who own the country; The Morning Star is read by people who think the country ought to be run by another country; and The Daily Telegraph is read by people who think it is.

Humphrey: Prime Minister, what about the people who read The Sun?

Bernard: Sun readers don't care who runs the country, as long as she's got big tits.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 10:23 AM on January 20, 2015 [52 favorites]


Huh, the local rag for the City and the District of North Vancouver, the North Shore News, when I was growing up had alternating "Sunshine Girls" and "Sunshine Boys." Fully clothed, though. Had no idea that it was borrowed from a British tradition. Always wondered how they got chosen, though. I recall that some were not traditionally-considered-photogenic and were sometimes developmentally disadvantaged.
posted by porpoise at 10:25 AM on January 20, 2015 [1 favorite]


This is the breast news I've heard all day!
posted by El Sabor Asiatico at 10:26 AM on January 20, 2015 [2 favorites]


Where will I see breasts?

Commenting on the reporting; The Grauniad is kind of straddling issues generally, hoping to get clicks from different interest groups. I think Slate has tried to do the same. Probably Gawker managed this best [re reporting anyway] being a sort of conglomerate of interests divided amongst websites. Huffington post cornered themselves early on so they can only get rageclicks from one side. The New York Times manages to sneak in an article every now and then that is an ill-fit with their editoral staff philosophy under the guise of reporting.

It's all going to be Twitter soon anyway.
posted by vapidave at 10:31 AM on January 20, 2015 [1 favorite]


But that was the newspaper's only edge vs. reading news on the internet. How will they compete with the internet now?
posted by straight at 10:31 AM on January 20, 2015


my 3rd-wave side is kind of annoyed by the boob-shaming, my 2nd wave side is pleased that sexual objectification is being dealt with. My trans political side is pissed that I'll never be a 3rd page girl.
posted by Annika Cicada at 10:41 AM on January 20, 2015 [22 favorites]


Has any Page 3 girl gone on record against it? I must admit that, despite my general hatred for the Sun and lack of interest for Page 3, there is indeed a strong whiff of classism to the campaign, like working-class women don't know what's good for them. I didn't see Vogue being targeted, and they show a lot more photos of objectified women than the Sun.
posted by Spanner Nic at 10:43 AM on January 20, 2015 [2 favorites]


On first glance, I thought it was an obit for Rupert Murdoch

On first glance I thought Murdoch was doing Page Three. "SUN'S SASSY SULTAN REVEALS ALL!!!"
posted by octobersurprise at 10:50 AM on January 20, 2015 [5 favorites]


MetaFilter: It's all going to be Twitter soon anyway.
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 10:51 AM on January 20, 2015 [2 favorites]


/reads FPP, eyes lingering on final bit

"...Rupert Murdoch's flagship British newspaper, The Sun, is no more."

/sips tea whilst experiencing a quite frissony shudder
posted by Celsius1414 at 10:51 AM on January 20, 2015 [2 favorites]


Bummer.
posted by ReeMonster at 10:52 AM on January 20, 2015


This is one of those things like Miss America where I see something every year or two and think "They're still doing that?!"

Only now, it's just Miss America.
And the rest of our culture.
posted by Cookiebastard at 10:52 AM on January 20, 2015


When I was stationed in the UK, Samantha Fox was all the rage when it came to Page 3.

Since then? Parents embezzlement, born again Christian, reality TV, and fell in love with her female manager.
Little bit of this, little bit of that.
posted by John Kennedy Toole Box at 11:00 AM on January 20, 2015 [1 favorite]


"jesuissometits"

I read this as jesus is some tits
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 11:04 AM on January 20, 2015 [10 favorites]


I think I was about 20 when I learned about this, that one of the daily papers in the UK did a topless daily photo on its pages and I couldn't believe it and that was over 20 years ago, so I'm surprised it took this long to end.
posted by mathowie at 11:10 AM on January 20, 2015


Oh, it's all the fault of the Muslims... wait, what?!
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 11:10 AM on January 20, 2015


Great, now for the rest of the paper.
posted by kalimac at 11:10 AM on January 20, 2015


This is bullshit. Naughty girls need love too. Page 3 has really touched generations of Brits, I'm sure, helping them feel their bodies. Where else are kids going to go when they wanna have some fun and move their bodies all night long.

(Note: I actually do not think this is bullshit. I just wanted to make a sting of Samantha Fox-based lyric jokes.)
posted by MCMikeNamara at 11:11 AM on January 20, 2015 [5 favorites]


Lest we forget .. here is Clare Short's account of what happened, back in 1986, when she first dared to suggest that Page 3 should be abolished:
As I spoke, putting the case for the removal of pornographic pictures from the press, a large clump of Tory MPs began to giggle and chortle and make crude remarks about me, my Bill and my body. [..] The press the next day continued to try to belittle me and my Bill, with the usual sexual innuendo and ugly photos. The parliamentary sketches in the so-called ‘quality’ papers were as dismissive as the tabloids. Having skimmed the press, I went to the post office to pick up my post in my usual way. I always receive a big bundle of mail but this day was exceptional. The bundle was massive. I hurried to my desk wondering what the letters would say. What I found were hundreds of loving, caring, supportive letters from women. They sent me pictures of their daughters and cards with beautiful pictures of flowers. They wrote to say how much they agreed with me. But the most urgent message was that they were shaking with rage at how I was treated.

Amongst all this warmth there was, of course, an ugly side. There were maybe 50 or 60 envelopes containing pornographic pictures with my head glued on to replace the original, with obscene threats scrawled across them saying that I should be quiet and go away because I was only jealous because I was too ugly to rape. [..] The Sun newspaper took a particularly virulent line in their attacks on me. They branded me ‘Crazy Clare’, ‘Killjoy Clare’, and assembled a number of unflattering photographs and printed them daily inviting their readers to write in Freepost to ‘Stop Crazy Clare’. They also produced a car sticker and invited readers to send for one. [..] The Sun continued its campaign for years. During the 1987 election, they printed a completely blank Page 3 with a little box saying this is how their paper could be if ‘Killjoy Clare’s’ party won the election.
Page 3 may have gone, but the culture of vicious, hateful misogyny it helped to normalise is still very much with us. Murdoch corrupts everything he touches.
posted by verstegan at 11:11 AM on January 20, 2015 [42 favorites]


Changing from a topless model on Page 3 to a "scantily-clad" model on Page 3 doesn't seem like much progress really. A slightly more prudish type of sexist objectification that will allow The Sun to pretend to be a bit more respectable than it really is.
posted by sobarel at 11:15 AM on January 20, 2015 [1 favorite]


Je suis page 3.

I believe you meant nous sommes charlies.
posted by yoink at 11:15 AM on January 20, 2015 [6 favorites]


The culture of vicious, hateful misogyny has been with us far longer than the Sun. I've not seen even an attempt at linking page 3 with increased misogyny, but now the girls who wanted to participate can't.
posted by Spanner Nic at 11:17 AM on January 20, 2015


No more tits, but the Sun will continue to print bollocks.
posted by Segundus at 11:25 AM on January 20, 2015 [19 favorites]


TOPLESS GIRLS NOT FOUND IN BRAINLESS PAPER
posted by chavenet at 11:34 AM on January 20, 2015 [12 favorites]


> all of the objectification but now with more body shaming.

there is your winner.

you know, if i were a woman, i would be mighty pissed that i am not allowed (in the U.S. at least) to walk outside topless. (i wouldn't do it; i would just be pissed that i couldn't if i wanted to.)

these folks are my heroes.
posted by mrgrimm at 11:36 AM on January 20, 2015


this is great. i didn't even know this was going on. i gotta send them something.
posted by mrgrimm at 11:38 AM on January 20, 2015


"It's only a matter of time before everything we do will be dictated by comfy shoe wearing... No bra wearing... man haters" - Rhian Sugden

better than everything you do being dictated by fat fuck old white men, eh?
posted by mrgrimm at 11:40 AM on January 20, 2015 [4 favorites]


How could I forget!?!

Even better with video.
posted by thomas j wise at 11:42 AM on January 20, 2015 [2 favorites]


better than everything you do being dictated by fat fuck old white men, eh?

£££ might have something to do with it.
posted by josher71 at 11:57 AM on January 20, 2015


Bye bye boobies, bye bye,
Bye bye boobies, don't cry...
posted by Splunge at 12:07 PM on January 20, 2015


Well, you know, Sugden isn't the first person in Old Media to lose a job. One trusts that she can take her formidable talents elsewhere.
posted by octobersurprise at 12:10 PM on January 20, 2015


So... they replaced topless photos of willing models with paparazzi shots of unwilling subjects in states of undress? I'm going to have to call this one a step backwards - like stepping out of acid into lava or something.
posted by Joey Michaels at 12:20 PM on January 20, 2015 [2 favorites]




my 3rd-wave side is kind of annoyed by the boob-shaming

Boob shaming? This is everything that is wrong with 3rd wave feminism.
posted by Summer at 2:00 PM on January 20, 2015 [1 favorite]


It'll be back in 6 months after a 'grassroots campaign' touting 'a woman's choice to appear topless' and 'We at The Sun refuse to bow down to those who hate free speech', etc.

Bonus: Lots of free publicity when it returns.


You're probably right - I can't help but see this as a marketing stunt using some modified McRib strategy, but this one is not just taking it away and putting it back, but playing both sides for maximum effect throughout.
posted by chambers at 2:05 PM on January 20, 2015


McBoob is back!
posted by octobersurprise at 2:22 PM on January 20, 2015


I'm torn on this one. On one side I can see the positives of not sending a message to young people all over the country that women's only value is for their qualities as flesh and of not supporting a societal perspective which is reductionist of women's contributions to whether they are attractive and appear available. On the other wide what about the right for blokes at work to crank one out in the toilets? Its a tough call.
posted by biffa at 2:35 PM on January 20, 2015 [4 favorites]


This Is The Times, It Ends Soon (link to a link to a link?)
posted by oneswellfoop at 2:36 PM on January 20, 2015



That was when I realized that, in England, newspapers had boobs in them. All ours had was Ziggy.
From the American national anthem:

O say can you see by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming


Apparently it's a rhetorical question. ;)

Jokes aside, I applaud the change. The Sun is still objectifying women, but at least the front line in that battle has moved in the proper direction.
posted by swr at 2:44 PM on January 20, 2015 [2 favorites]


Poor Murdoch. Even Cialis has deserted him.
posted by benzenedream at 3:02 PM on January 20, 2015 [2 favorites]


Another paper product killed off by the internet.
posted by telstar at 4:12 PM on January 20, 2015


Piling puritanism on top of sexual objectification does not seem like much of an improvement.
posted by brundlefly at 4:41 PM on January 20, 2015 [2 favorites]


Boob shaming? This is everything that is wrong with 3rd wave feminism.

Care to say more?
posted by Annika Cicada at 6:10 PM on January 20, 2015


Yeah, not much of a win since the result is still sexually objectified women with their nipples covered. It's like the most deliberately stupid way of missing the point that the Sun could have gone. No you twits, it isn't the nipples that are the problem, it's objectifying women in what's supposed to be a newspaper that's the problem.

But they covered the nipples so now they can claim to have tried, and if anyone is still complaining they can point to the covered nipples and say that the people complaining are just crazy.
posted by sotonohito at 6:45 PM on January 20, 2015 [2 favorites]


Kudos for the great title.
posted by IndigoJones at 7:15 PM on January 20, 2015


Like, with the ubiquity of internet access, from phones even, what was even the point anymore? All I can think of is that it was not just important to see pictures of breasts, but to be seen seeing them. Which is... kinda fucked up, to be honest.
posted by Zalzidrax at 9:33 PM on January 20, 2015


I can't remember now which paper it was but in the early 80's one of the Philly tabloids was bought by Murdoch's news corp and for a short period had a page 7 (I believe) girl. Seemed like an all around good fit honestly. Can't imagine what went wrong with that one, though perhaps all the words got in the way.
posted by evilDoug at 9:58 PM on January 20, 2015


my 3rd-wave side is kind of annoyed by the boob-shaming

Sounds like you are projecting a US cultural debate on to a non-US cultural issue. The right for women to go topless in public has not been a significant UK issue (if you google the top hits are mostly reporting the US debate), while the objectification of women via topless and other shots in large elements of the media (widely available magazines as well as newspapers) has been on-going for some time (see for example the response to efforts by an MP to ban Page 3 in 2004).
posted by biffa at 2:52 AM on January 21, 2015


So shaming of overt representations of the curves of women's bodies' in the UK doesn't happen with such puritanical fervor over there, and a U.S. citizen commenting from that perspective amounts to colonialism, while sexual objectification is something that's experienced similarly enough across the two cultural landscapes that perspectives and experiences can be more readily shared and understood?

Asking in all earnestness. I'm still in training wheels on some of my perspectives, also I'm going to Europe in May and would like to significantly reduce my dumbass levels before I go.
posted by Annika Cicada at 4:00 AM on January 21, 2015


I have been toying with the idea as to whether sometimes there is an imposition of a kind of cultural imperialism at work in US dominated web spaces, wherein the US framework for discussion of a topic becomes the default and this can exclude significant areas of concern from online debate about other cultures. To give a big example, the US model for privilege tends to consider race, gender, maybe wealth and maybe sexuality as the chief sources of privilege, which if applied in UK situations ignores class, which is a major source of privilege here (there have been a couple of links in the blue about this in the last 2 days). More widely I think debates on similar topics often evolve specific to cultures, going one way in one, and another way in even an ostensibly similar culture and I don't think its beneficial for representatives of one culture to assume their culture's position should be the default in debates specific to other cultures.

(This is just something I think is a general issue, based on what I have seen in previous threads you have given far more thought to gender issues than me and know far more.)

We could find lots of instances of control over female sexuality and body image in the UK cultural environment, and there is plenty of body shaming, probably in very similar places to in US culture (though I'm not so sure about boob shaming so much, but could have missed it). However, there has also been a long term and I think recently growing concern, about wide ranging objectification in the media, and some quite vicious backlashes against women advocating change (see my Clare Short link, but there are plenty of others more recently) and hopefully there is more impetus for change, which might have influenced the Sun's decision and might still drive other change. I guess I am saying there is a factor in play that is specific to the politics of the UK and another factor which is less manifest in the UK than the US (and thus is much less significant than the first factor in the UK discourse) which makes them less comparable. This is how the situation in the UK looks to me anyway, but I'm a bloke so pinch of salt, would be interested to hear the perspective of more UK women.
posted by biffa at 5:42 AM on January 21, 2015


Ray Walston, Luck Dragon: "jesuissometits"

I read this as jesus is some tits
I consistently read the hashtag #jesuischarlie as "jesuit charlie".

Not inconsistent, but neither is it very indicative.
posted by IAmBroom at 9:12 AM on January 21, 2015


Summer: my 3rd-wave side is kind of annoyed by the boob-shaming

Boob shaming? This is everything that is wrong with 3rd wave feminism.
I can't keep up - which is the current, correct rev?

And are they backwards compatible? I'm gonna hate it if I have to buy new copies of The Feminine Mystique. I mean, at least when they upgraded Uncle Tom's Cabin to Roots it was so long overdue that everyone was ready to replace their civil rights tech, anyway.
posted by IAmBroom at 9:30 AM on January 21, 2015 [2 favorites]


Page 3 goes tits up.
posted by kirkaracha at 10:19 AM on January 21, 2015 [2 favorites]


So we've gone from objectification to prudish objectification? Win?
posted by deadwax at 2:48 PM on January 21, 2015


Great news, everyone!
posted by Joey Michaels at 3:50 PM on January 21, 2015


Now, that's some successful trolling-cum-advertising. Trollvertizing?
posted by yoink at 3:55 PM on January 21, 2015 [1 favorite]


trolling-cum-advertising

In that order.
posted by Joey Michaels at 6:16 PM on January 21, 2015 [2 favorites]


Never mind.
posted by Chocolate Pickle at 7:15 PM on January 21, 2015


Superb.
posted by gnuhavenpier at 12:43 AM on January 22, 2015


We’re a bit surprised The Sun managed to get an issue out at all today, to be honest. The editorial team must have been struggling to see through their tears of laughter after they managed to get two days of free publicity in every rival newspaper in the country and a ton of coverage from national broadcasters over a completely imaginary decision to stop featuring topless models on Page 3.

posted by rongorongo at 6:40 AM on January 22, 2015 [1 favorite]


WHBT.
posted by nubs at 7:12 AM on January 22, 2015


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