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Updated 5pm
THERE ARE REPORTS that The Sun has stopped publishing pictures of topless models on page three.
The newspaper has not published a picture of a topless model on page three since Friday – after 44 years of doing so.
The Sun faced pressure from anti-sexism campaigners, politicians and student bodies claiming it was sexist.
The paper is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News UK and Murdoch himself described it as “old fashioned” last year.
The Guardian has reported that it had spoken to “a series of insiders” who said the feature has been dropped.
While The Times – which has the same publisher as The Sun – reported that the tabloid decided to quietly drop the feature.
However, the head of PR for the tabloid, David Sharpe, is tweeting about the reports calling them ‘speculation’:
However, very little clarity has been given by the paper on the issue:
A petition to stop The Sun publishing Page 3 gathered more than 217,000 signatures.
The No More Page 3 protest group wrote a message on its Facebook page which read:
Wow..we’re hearing the Sun may have dropped Pg3. This could be truly historic news and a great day for people power… We don’t know the details for sure and there’still lots to be done… But this could be a huge step for challenging media sexism.
Today’s edition features Hollyoaks actresses running along a beach in their bikinis. However, readers are told to go online to see “Page 3 Lucy from London”.
The Irish edition of The Sun dropped Page 3 in 2013. The Sun’s Irish editor, Paul Clarkson, told RTÉ’s Morning Ireland last year that he was listening to readers and that there were ‘cultural differences’ between Ireland and Britain.
He also said his decision was commercial and was about the need to retain sales and the possibility of attracting new buyers.
The news has seen huge comment online, with a range of opinions:
The Karate Suit / Twitterpretty sure there's loads of other stuff that should be banned first, like loose women for example, which is 383964 times more sexist #page3
— Dean (@thekaratesuit) January 20, 2015
Holly Flynn / TwitterMuch as I loath #page3 should we not be trying to get people to not just view topless women as meat instead of telling them to cover up?
— tismeself (@WexicaninDublin) January 20, 2015
A Fine Gael councillor who criticised ‘feminazis’ for the change later apologised for his comments.
What do you think of the move?
Additional reporting by Aoife Barry
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What will Chloe (19) from Essex and Stacey (21) from Cheshire do now?
Channel 905… Me mate told me
If people don’t like it, then don’t buy the sun paper !!!! Isn’t much quality reading the sun…
Government ministers and z rated celebrities…….life is hard
Simply publish pictures of topless men on pg4 as well – giving ‘something for the mammies’ will confuse the protesters … and we still get to look a boobies – simples
Publish the topless men on pg 2.
It’d be more romantic.
Easier on the eyes than the daily journal offering of female politicians. I don’t buy it but if I did it would be for the jokes ;-)
Pg 6 and 9 with one upside down ? . .
Is the page 3 topless girl thing not totally redundant now? Everyone has all the soft porn they want in their phones these days. Or maybe it’s for the auld fellas who haven’t moved to smart phones yet?
Only Soft Porn?
Haven’t seen a paper yet today.
I’m still in my bunker waiting for this code yellow frost, sleet, rain, snow, wind and lightening etc that’s been forecast by Journal and Met Eireann…
Who cares, it’s a rag.
‘Ow dare you. It ain’t ‘alf a good read. Full of proper stuff like what people like me like, like.
It’s only any good if you want to know where Elvis is or how they faked the moon landings or switched the Titanic with the Olympic.
Yeah Alan, gettin’ your bleedin’ ‘istory lessons for free mate!
Feminism has always argued that the traditional notion of covering up women’s breasts is a result of religious zealotry, while male chests are perfectly acceptable. Anybody else see the irony in ‘no more page 3′? Maybe women should be required to stay covered up all the time? These no more page 3 feminists should love that, right?
It’s not ironic – that’s a typical androcentric response. Women’s bodies are perfectly natural and women should not be required to cover them. But if you look, you’re misogynistically judging by outward appearances and that’s bad. Also, er, patriarchy. Basically, men are wrong. Once you get that bit, the rest will start to fall into place.
It can be said that the only way it’s acceptable for women to not be covered up is if someone else profiting from it. I could be arrested for indecency if I walked around topless but if I’m in a newspaper it’s A-Ok.
Page 3 sexualises the female body making it something that’s all about titilation and therefore not appropriate in other contexts…. even to the point where breastfeeding is frowned on.
But I guess it’s easier to ignore how simple that logic is for the purposes of taking a pop at the feminists.
Aren’t the women great all the same with their big words?
Androcentric, wha’?
What a time to be alive.
Why not have a page 3 guy as well as a page 3 girl. That’s what I’d be campaigning for rather than expecting it to be gone all together. On the other hand though I do remember feeling very insecure when I was younger and looking at the bodies of page 3 girls in the paper so I suppose that’s one reason to get rid of it
Shannon, there already is a male version of page 3 males it’s called torso of the week in Heat Magazine but I don’t hear anybody calling that sexist or calling for it to be banned or removed from the magazine…
A lot of these feminists are starting to give women all round a bad name. They seem to think that we have to fight everyone for everything and always be right.
Plenty of commentary on women’s bodies in Heat magazine though so it’s not really a comparison.
I see your point but mine was that nobody does complain about male pictures being spread out in magazines or even of you look at male perfume ads how many times has Gerrard Butler or any other male model been topless on an A3 poster in debenhams? Again still don’t hear anyone saying that it’s wrong or sexist.
If a woman wants to model for page 3 who am I to stop her and who are these feminists to try stop her and tell her she’s in a demeaning job.
Relax deirdre they are replacing page 3 Tities with very scantly bikini dressed women
No one complains about male pictures because our media isn’t saturated with them.
Walk through the perfume section in boots and debenhams look at ads in magazines and flip through a vogue and cosmopolitan and then let’s see of still think the same and for good measure check out torso of the week.
Also, no one ever criticised the models, they criticised the publication profiting from women’s bodies. It’s not like there’s a shortage of media outlets that print naked ladies anyway =P
I’m aware Row-Sheen. Perfume ads have always been sexual for both genders. But what is the purpose of Page 3? Torso of the week is pretty shameless but it’s rare that men are objectified to the same extent that women are.
I can only speak for myself but when they do sexualise men, it’s not that attractive to me as a red blooded lady. I don’t really want to look at a waxed, oiled up mountain of muscles.. :(
Could it be that it’s less prevalent because we buy into it less?
Deirdre, there’s a difference between what women find attractive and what men think women find a attractive. There seems to be a one-size-fits-all when sexualising women (the Sun being particularly guilty of this having only shown 4 non-white women in the last 40 years). Women’s taste vary from oily muscle mountains to people like Benedict Cumberbatch. So it’s more difficult to sell male sexuality in the same way. If that makes any sense.
Us women, wha’? So complicated ;)
Wrong Joanna. Nobody complains about male models because nobody cares.
Couldn’t care less about the sun having topless models or not, but I get a little annoyed when jealousy and insecurity puts women out of a job.
Hmm, you’re the only one thinking of the devastating effects, The Doctor. It’s incredibly difficult these days for beautiful young women to find people to take pictures of them naked for money…. printed newspapers being one of the only areas I can think of.
Out of a job? Do those girls stay 19-22 forever? Lol
It used to be 16-17 year olds, but then someone decided that they were children, despite the visible evidence to the biological contrary. The end result is that it is perfectly legal for a 60 year old man to spend a happy weekend rodgering one of these buxom lasses, but if his 18 year old grandson takes a photo of her with her jugs out, he’s a paedophile. If that’s not progress, I don’t know what is.
Row see that’s in a magazine aimed at women while page 3 is in a newspaper. I think there should be a men’s pg 3 in newspapers too if there is a women’s one
There isn’t much comparison with men showing their torsos though is there? They are not considered ” naughty bits. ” like women’s breasts are. Now if they started showing pictures of men cradling their testicled but not the ahem willy then it might be like for like I’d say. Any all a load of nonsense. It’s not like pictures of boobs are not freely available everywhere. The truth is there is no harm is sexuaising woman and men sometimes because we are sexual beings. It’s to ensure procreation. The problem occurs when you only present women or men a sexual beings and nothing else and actually the sun doesn’t do that. Soft or hard porn sites do but not this newspaper
I think there are certain parts of the internet where you can look at breasts.
Tesco.ie. Two chicken breasts for 4.99. Full of water though….
So your saying the ones on the Internet are fake?
Despicable rag!!
Any pictures of this filth??
I wouldn’t mind seeing the back of all this. The front for 44 years got a bit boring….
Bums instead??
I could live with that.
Yeah Ailbhe, they could mix it up a bit and show arses for a while
You and both know there’s nothing wrong with seeing the odd gluteus maximus now Brendan!
GM till I die
Arse ….. Feck ………girls
Je suis néné (o)(o).
I guess some are à la carte when it comes to freedom of expression.
Freedom of expression and objectifying human beings are poles apart.
You lost me at the carefully considered ‘human beings’.
First they came for the expletives and I didn’t say shite… …When they came for the pronouns and I was the only one left.
There’s no question of whether or not they are objectifying WOMEN on page three, but there’s a price of admission and effort exerted to reach page 3.
No more Sunny delight. …
I was really hoping we would get 45 years of page 3 hunks instead to balance things out a bit. Ah well =(
All good things must come to an end.
I wish that rag would just stop publishing full stop!! #JFT96
And what was on page 3 was the most educational part of the paper!
women are fragile creatures…they get offended way to easy.
Yeah. I get offended by people who write ‘to’ when they mean ‘too’.
Funny… I think the same thing about men when I read the comments section in The Journal.
Only a rag of a paper anyway. The Quicker they bin it around the world the better for every1.
Im surprised they got away with still having some baps out on page 3 for this long, usually the PC/Feminazi brigades are more affective then this. Any stock images of what the Page 3 format currently looks like btw?
Hopefully they will get rid of their more material….. Which is everything else basically
Gay is the new topless.
We will have to make the breast of it from now on-
I think Leo Varadkar had a double page spread yesterday ?
It’s your own decision to go topless, look, buy the paper if you dont like it then don’t go topless, look, or buy the paper.
That comment was either genius or a string of English words pretending to be a sentence. I’m inclining to the first one.
I think he means you have to be topless to read the paper – I hope he’s wrong.
Not for me, mind you, I’m always topless when I read the paper, but I suspect most people have been breaking the rules.
I will never buy the sun again. Shame
Outpouring of reaction on Twitter as The Sun stops publishing topless pictures
Page 3 girls have led the backlash against The Sun’s decision to end its topless tradition, claiming the move has been “dictated by comfy shoe-wearing, no bra-wearing, man-haters”.
Former glamour model Jodie Marsh insisted that “telling girls they shouldn’t do Page 3 is not being a feminist”.
She said she “loved” posing for Page 3 and that it made her feel powerful and earned her good money.
“Women should empower and encourage other women,” she wrote on Twitter. “For that is the only way to truly be ‘equal’ and have rights…”
She said campaigners should focus on more important issues that affect women, such as female genital mutilation.
Feminists red thumbing you there. Green
What a strange time to stop publishing page 3 topless women. #JeSuisCharlie
With terrorists trying to censorship our Western media.
I would have thought they should have waited a few months and then released a statement about modern media is changing and they’re changing with the times. Some rhetoric like that.
Fact is, until the internet came along, page 3 was one of the few places that teenage boys and their puerile dads and big brothers got to see women’s breasts on a regular basis: now you just have to type some obscene sex act into Google and you get a cornucopia of porn choice.
Question…
I worked a lot of working class/student jobs in my 20′s why is it acceptable to bring this shite to work and have your soft core porn lying open round the break room/employee rest areas?
I constantly thought about either brining in gay porn and scattering it all over the coffee table to make a point or going to HR but I don’t like to cause a stir. I usually just put it in the bin.
A bit of professionalism please…
Professionalism and the sun should not be in the same sentence!
As you said, it was a “working class/” environment, let the working class have their fun.
“Scousers Never Buy The Sun” …
The people who campaign for this to be stopped are the worst kind just to make their life’s seam more worth while they say it degenerating to women and by doing this their helping women, their not tho the Sun never force these women, there’s plenty of men and women out there who like this kinda work. Why don’t help dose crying for help??
If these people genuinely wanted to do some thing good they should campaign for the end to child/human trafficking, forced prostitution, women beast feeding some thing worthy.
Jesus. Beast feeding?! That’s awful. As are the 13 grammatical/spelling errors. I’m no expert, so there may be more….
are you just randomly bashing the keyboard with your fists?
Yes, and @ Ailbhe O’Nolan people like you to so what if i made a few errors is your day/life that boring you pick on anything just to make you your self/life seam better.
I’m really struggling to decipher what you’re saying…..something about a seam, but the subject is no about clothing or tailoring, it’s about the lack of clothing.
*not
Morto for you Ailbhe
Ahahahaha dope, looks like your patronising sneering at spelling mistakes just bit you on your gluteus maximus
There is a difference between 13 spelling and grammatical mistakes and a recognised typo boys. Or can you not distinguish between them?
Could be worse, I could be beast feeding!!!
Farage’s mother might be on it?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2816357/U-strip-thought-Nigel-Farage-colourful-Meet-mum-naked-calendar-girl-age-74.html
Have never understood the fuss about what are really two lumps of fat stuck on a chest.
I suspect that’s because you see them just as two lumps of fat stuck on a chest.
I suppose more people will have to buy it today just to check if it’s true?
I’ll miss the boobies!
That’s the sun f@cked so.
Next thing you know they’ll be wanting women to wear a bag over their heads, oh wait a minute, someone thought of that already, I say, control freaks go play with traffic ffs
Thanks for the mammaries!
Ah comment of the year!
Where’s the freedom of the media if their given into anti sexism campaigners?? Yet everyone’s using the same excuse to justify cartoons that IS and still will cause distress to millions of people and is causing people to kill !?
There will always be a page 3 as long as tits like Sun Political Editor Tom Newton Dunn exist.
No, Rupert is going to pose topless!
Did the Irish edition of The Sun publish pictures of topless models on page three?
The sun may have its knockers, but the mirror also needs to look at itself
This is the thin end of the wedge, this is how the Taliban started. Burkas will be next, mark my words!
The mobs are everywhere these days 217,000 out of 60 million or more. If they got 4-8 million complaints it should make the news.
Sheer numbers of people these days, too much import given to relatively few loud voices. Pen protesters forcing opinions down societies throats. It isn’t half as bad on the street as people’s opinions online…
Lots of chicken shts out there with power issues hidden in dark rooms with no jobs and no experience with life
On the same day I see this article I also see an article for a free the nipple campaign. I know that Page 3 isn’t the same thing but if there is a campaign to try and give women the right to walk around topless and bring acceptance and equality so a topless woman is seen as no different to a topless man then perhaps getting rid of Page 3 may be a step in the wrong direction. Maybe instead of getting rid of it it should have changed and reflected a more diverse selection of women and maybe have alternated between a topless man one day and a topless woman the next. As people have stated the paper doesn’t need the feature but if it offends you there are plenty of other papers to choose from.
Replacing it with a Page 3 Sheep…
Have female sports reporters and staff stopped going in the mens locker rooms during shower time while female athletes get privacy and respect?
Have female prison guards stopped strip searching male prisoners while female prisoners get privacy and respect?
Have women stopped barging in to the mens room with impunity while men are using the urinals yet?
Take a look at how you treat men, ladies, and ask yourself just how full of hypocrisy you have to get before someone pukes.
have your say