"Ban Page 3!" say students

Monday 03 February 2014

Two 16 year-old Jersey College for Girls students are petitioning the editor of The Sun newspaper to drop topless modelling on page 3.

So far, 300 students at the school have signed the petition which was set up by Rowan Pilley and Eloise Smith. The girls are supporting a national social media campaign to get The Sun's Editor David Dinsmore to stop the pictures in Britain’s most widely-read newspaper, which they say “objectifies women.”.

Miss Pilley said: “It was important for us to share it with the rest of the school, especially because it’s a girl’s school and it’s an achievable goal.

“I think there are so many reasons why it should be stopped: young children seeing it, it’s not a positive presentation of body image, it objectifies women.”

The Year 12 students presented their case to the whole school in an Assembly, explaining how the national petition had come about when the organiser was horrified to see a page 3 model’s picture took up more room in the paper than that of the picture of heptathlete Jessica Ennis when she’d won gold for Great Britain at the Olympics.

Miss Pilley said the headteacher Carl Howarth had been really supportive of what they are doing and it was him who suggested they get their message across to the whole school in Assembly.

Mr Howarth said: “As a school we are keen to champion and raise issues which affect women. It’s encouraging the students to debate issues in the society in which they live.”

The national petition now has more than 100,000 signatures and the JCG girls hope they can get another 200 at the school putting their names to it in the coming weeks.