A frequent argument made by opponents of the the No More Page 3 campaign is one where they suggest that in asking The Sun to stop showing an image of a topless woman on page 3, the campaign is tying to prevent The Sun exercising its freedom of speech. Detractors like to paint a draconian picture of censorship and bans and slippery slopes. The campaign always points out that No More Page 3 is not petitioning the government for a ban. It's politely asking David Dinsmore - the editor of the Sun - to rethink it's 43 year old daily feature of a topless woman.
Opponents say that even if the campaign isn't calling for legislation, it's still trying to stop something being published, and as such is against freedom of speech.
I want to live in a country where The Sun is legally allowed to publish a picture of a topless woman every day.
This does not mean that I won't ask The Sun to stop doing it.
I'm concerned about the effects of this image on society. If I have a concern and I feel that I want to voice it, then I'm free to do so. If I do that in isolation then I have very little chance of effecting any change, so it makes sense to discuss this concern with others to see if anyone feels the same. A group has more power than an individual, so like minded people should unite to voice a shared concern together.
It seems reasonable, when raising concerns over something to also present a possible solution to the problem.
The No More Page 3 campaign has brought together over 190,000 individuals with the same concern - that they feel that page 3 is detrimental to the position of women in society. We feel that the biggest picture of a woman in a national newspaper being one where she is topless and mute clearly sends the message that a woman's worth is to be pleasing to look at. This affects the way women are percieved as a whole. Society is continually sent the message that men's achievements matter, but women should be valued by their looks and sexual availability.
We are therefore asking The Sun to consider these concerns and to address them.
The Sun is a private publication. It can choose to ignore our collective voice, or it can listen and address the issues as it wishes. If it decides to stop publishing an image of topless young woman daily on page 3 it will be because it thinks that page 3 is now tarnishing rather than enhancing its brand. This is in no way a curb on free speech. This is an example of a company making a commercial decision to help boost sales. Just as it does every single day when it makes calls over content.
The Sun has no legal obligation to act on our concern, and in fact has not up to now. This does not mean that we should stop voicing our concern. The Sun exercises its freedom of speech every day when it publishes it's newspaper. I'm going to exercise mine to ask it to consider the wider effects of page 3.
This blog post was partly inspired by the recent xkcd webcomic entry on free speech, and the many discussions around it.
