Time to put news on Page 3

Something unexpected yet wonderful has been gradually happening online. Weeks ago, I signed a little online petition set up by someone called Lucy Anne Holmes. It called for The Sun to stop putting topless women in its pages. I don't generally bother signing online petitions on the basis that they're unlikely to do any good. On this occasion, I felt strongly enough about the cause to sign, then retweet it.

Fast forward to now and, at time of blogging, almost 35,000 people have signed. It's been mentioned on the news, discussed on Loose Women and reported in several national newspapers (not The Sun, obviously). Its creator has taken to calling it a revolution, which may be a tad optimistic, but there's clearly a massive depth and breadth of feeling here.

I'm staggered that this should even be necessary, but go on then - let's explore this. Why is it in any way inappropriate for a British national daily newspaper to show the bare breasts of a young woman prominently every day?

Oh good grief, that can't just be a rhetorical question. Some people need it answered.

Let's start with feminism, shall we, which for the politically challenged I shall simply rename equality. Which daily newspapers habitually stick a penis on page 3? Or even a partially dressed Diet-Coke-break type man? This daily reaffirmation that the principal role of woman is to be decorative is a daily setback on the road to equality.

Then there's the fact that I could have made that point at any point since 1970. Consider how far the world has come in those 42 years, including as regards gender equality, and marvel at how this has remained unchanged. The power of boobs is so strong that it has survived Britain's first female PM and The Sun's first female editor. Rarely do we like to appear stuck in the 1970s.

Then there's the sheer ubiquity of it. It's our best selling daily newspaper. Over 7 million people apparently read it every day! (figures from Wikipedia, so...) Over 2.5 million copies of every edition hang out in newsagents, railway stations, supermarkets, offices, staff rooms, hospitals, building sites, bus stations, tube trains...oh, and it's online too.

There's no way of controlling who those 7 million are. And that brings me onto my next, related point. Why are newspapers exempt from classification? Put tits in a film, video game etc and it's not a U certificate. In a tv show or an advert (including a recent one for breast cancer awareness) and it's post-watershed. The idea is to protect those who want to avoid it or those who should be sheltered (eg children). But a child can buy a copy of The Sun any day.

Where is the line between porn and non-porn anyway? If certain magazines are confined to the top shelf behind opaque coverings, why not FHM, Zoo, Nuts and The Sun?

Lastly, I'd like to invoke the trades descriptions act. Any organ claiming to be a newspaper really ought to be able to justify everything in it (ok, except adverts) as news. Everyone else has said it, so I might as well too - boobs aren't news.

I can't think of a good argument in favour of Page 3 girls. Certainly, The Sun aren't exactly busting a gut to put one forward.

Rather wonderfully, this campaign isn't calling for government-implemented press censorship. It's asking the editor of the paper to make the decision that this archaic, offensive feature be laid to rest.

You can sign the petition at http://www.change.org/nomorepage3 and follow progress on Twitter with the very regular tweets from @nomorepage3.

My first blog in the real world

This is just a test page to explain that I have created a second presence within the hideously-named blogosphere. This is for anything I might have to say which doesn't actually involve Doctor Who. Obviously, that won't be much.