Kerfluffle

Lucy-Anne Holmes of Hove doesn’t share my zeal for the female form. She’s petitioning The Sun’s editor David Dinsmore to remove what’s arguably the best part of the paper, the topless ladies on Page 3. Exhibiting the overinflated sense of self-importance often characterizing progressive crusaders, 18-year-old campaign supporter Yas Necati “We haven’t had much contact with The Sun, probably because they’re so terrified of us!”

One can only imagine the gut laughing that rang out in News UK’s offices if and when they heard Necati’s quip. Certainly not one to be given to hyperbole, Necati believes the fight against Page 3 is “part of a wider struggle for better representation, equality and human rights.” But hey, what 18 year old doesn’t think they’re the center of the universe?

Right now, the petition (which, in keeping with best practices, I will not link to here), has 240,627 supporters. For context, this is approximately .04 percent of the British population or roughly the Green Party’s vote share in the 2010 general election. A petition to keep Page 3 has a little over 3,000 signatures. Those quietly enjoying (or quietly skipping over) a bit of tit in their newspaper presumably have greater injustices and quotidian dilemmas to stress over than Britain’s finest boobs.

In addition, 30 universities have banned the paper in solidarity. To say that “universities” have banned the paper is, as I have discussed earlier, a little misleading. A more accurate description would be that 30 universities’ student governments banned the paper. Such organizations are necessarily always packed with leftist partisans who consider telling other people what to look at the highest of human callings.

Not missing the opportunity to generate thoughtful brow furrowing (and page views) The Guardian concern-trolled men. “Aren’t you gents a little insulted by the notion of being sold a paper because of breasts?” asked BBC presenter Tim Samuels in one of the paper’s most vacuous think pieces.

Mark Twain never actually said censorship was like telling a grown man he can’t have steak because a baby can’t chew it. That doesn’t make the observation any less true. If you’re troubled by naked ladies in newspapers, there’s a terribly simple solution open to all Britons: Don’t buy the paper.

Everyone buying The Sun knows what they’re getting when they laid down their hard-earned sterling: sensationalist news and the erstwhile empire’s most genetically gifted women. News consumers wanting something else have no shortage of options. They’re not handing these out willy nilly at grammar schools and Socialist Workers’ Party meetings. If you like the news but not the boobs, the pictorial feature’s name helpfully tells you what page to skip.

I’m sympathetic to wanting to prevent 6-year-old Timmy from spying Lorna (24, Clevedon) in all her God-given glory. I’m not sympathetic to a leftist jihad to keep grown folks from doing the same. We’ve not even talking about the morally questionable work of a hardcore pornographer. The worst thing anyone can say about Page 3 is that it gave the world the dubious fame of Samantha Fox and Jordan.

No More Page Three isn’t a campaign to convince people to put the paper down. If it were, we would all just chuckle and move on. Much as the temperance warriors quickly learned no one was voluntarily giving up demon alcohol, so does NMP3 know Britain isn’t giving up Page 3 of its own accord. And so, they’re now doing what progs do: Bullying their opponents into submission.

Which is sort of what sticks in my craw about this. My gut instinct tells me to oppose anything Russell Brand, the National Union of Teachers and the Every Day Sexism Project support. When those who “know better” attack institutions of the hoi polloi, my gut Yankee prole reaction is to put my fists up and fight back. Are the topless images on Page 3 liberating women and all of society? Probably not, but who said they have to?

Or perhaps more to the point, why does every page of every newspaper have to conform to the standards of New Labour’s cultural diktats? I don’t buy The Sun because it’s not to my aesthetic tastes. There are dozens of other newspapers I don’t buy for the same reason. I would raise a glass to toast the demise of The Guardian. I can think of no worse use of my time than petitioning for the removal of its patented “Wow, just wow — it’s 2015! How do these people even exist?!” editorial format.

There’s a sort of irony in play here: The same sort of people who thought that Belle Knox’s facial abuse porn was a blow against the patriarchy are also of the mind that cheeky and playful nude photographs are the height of oppression. So what gives? At what point do public displays of female sexuality morph from degradation to liberation?

Precisely whenever the left wants them to, I suppose. These are, again, roughly the same sorts who think the world of Femen’s topless tinpot tyrants — so long as they’re targeting Christian places of worship. There’s no principled stand to be found here: It’s just about whatever vehicle is best for a narrow cultural elite to attack their supposed inferiors. Anyone looking for consistency will be sorely disappointed.

I expect that Page 3 will soon go the way of saucy postcards and Carry On films. The British Bolsheviks always get their way in the end. Nowhere is this more true than with the simple pleasures of the UK’s drinking class.

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