Hailed as a feminist triumph by many, the banning of Page 3 in The Sun has provoked a huge reaction in the UK this week. It was announced earlier this week that the 45-year-old feature in the tabloid would be no more. But, just as the scores of protestors thought they could claim victory, The Sun today featured Page 3 once again.
The apparent end of Page 3 in The Sun came after years of campaigning by feminist groups who claimed that Britain's most-read 'family' newspaper should not include 'sexist' images of women.
I admit, I sometimes felt a bit uncomfortable when flicking through The Sun because there was always an interesting story I wanted to read which was squashed down the side of Page 3. Every time, without fail.
But to ban it altogether seems a bit extreme to me.
Pictures used on Page 3 can be found on the internet in a matter of seconds and you only have to take a trip to a beach when in Majorca, Tenerife, Turkey and many other resorts popular with families to see topless women sunbathing and prancing around the beach. Sometimes, you don't even need to leave the poolside to see a woman in a tiny thong and nothing else.
Will this be banned next so that children don't see it and other people aren't offended?
Campaigners to get rid of Page 3 were celebrating at the fact that these "belittling pictures of women, which reduce an entire sex to nothing much more than a 'bit of skirt', will no longer be in a news institution" - and I'm sure staff at The Sun had a good little chuckle at this when deciding to feature a topless model again today.
To get rid of Page 3 because it objectifies women in a sexual manner and portrays them in a sexualised way is wrong, in my opinion.
Does this mean that the likes of David Gandy and David Beckham are to be banned from magazines and newspapers and billboards when advertising their new range of fitted underwear?
Full page adverts are regularly featured in newspapers and magazines showing men in nothing but a pair of snug y-fronts; they're plastered on billboards and in shop windows; and the advert of David Beckham running around Beverly Hills in his tight pants, with shots zoomed in on his pert bottom, are ok to be shown on television. So why are these sexualised images of men okay?
If Kayleigh with her 34FF boobs wants to make a career out of showing off her assets to the country - then who are these campaigners to stop her?
Women go into this career with their eyes open. Women choose this as a career and get boob jobs and enhancements in order to follow their dreams of being on Page 3.
If women thought they were being sexualised and objectified, they wouldn't do it. Nobody is asking these feminist campaigners to whack their boobs out and pose for Page 3.
As Chloe Goodman, the former Page 3 model and Celebrity Big Brother contestant, put it: "Why should feminist women tell other women how to live their lives? Women fought together to get the vote and so on and so forth, so why should women now be fighting each other, and tell each other what job roles to now take within the industry?"
If people were really so offended and put off by the topless models, people wouldn't buy the paper. But The Sun is the best-selling newspaper in the country and that wouldn't be the case if people were truly against their famous feature.
You don't buy The Sun for hard-hitting news, let's be honest. You buy it for it's light-hearted take on things, the celebrity gossip and the easy-to-read stories that you can understand at first read.
Page 3 is a platform for many women to the rest of their career and if it's okay for women to drool and gawp at David Gandy and David Beckham in their tight pants then men should be allowed to do the same at Page 3 models.
Everyone is entitled to their opinion, though, and those campaigning to be rid of Page 3 obviously have their own good reasons for it. But in this day in age when music stars such as Miley Cyrus, who is admired and supported by millions of youngsters around the world, are parading themselves on stage in minimal clothing and publishing explicit images of themselves - I don't see what harm Page 3 is doing.
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