The Home Office has published an independent review into the sexualisation of young people, conducted by psychologist Linda Papadopoulos.
The report warns that children are being increasingly exposed to sexual imagery through advertising, music videos, computer games, magazines and some children’s clothing lines.
From the BBC:
Unless sexualisation is accepted as harmful, we will miss an important opportunity… to broaden young people’s beliefs about where their values lies,” said Dr Papadopoulos, a psychologist. The report’s 36 recommendations include calling for games consoles, mobile phones and some computers to be sold with parental controls already switched on.”
Other recommendations include banning “sexualised” music videos before the TV watershed, making digital literacy a compulsory part of the curriculum from age 5, and labelling airbrushed images:
Evidence suggests that even brief exposure to airbrushed images can lead to acute body dissatisfaction. To help combat this, efforts to raise levels of media literacy should be accompanied by initiatives aimed at encouraging society to take a more critical and questioning approach to the harmful perpetuation of unrealistic ideals. I therefore recommend the introduction of a system of ratings symbols for photographs to show the extent to which they have been altered. This is particularly critical in magazines targeting teen and pre-teen audiences.
[Sexualisation of Young People Review by Dr Linda Papadopoulos, page 83]
The BBC, in reporting the findings, indulges in a little airbrushing of its own:
Both Labour and the Conservatives are examining the issues.
Where’s the mention of the high profile Real Women campaign led by Jo Swinson? (BBC ignoring Lib Dems? Surely not…)
Jo, along with Lynne Featherstone, met with the Advertising Standards Authority this week to discuss the use of airbrushed images, and told Lib Dem Voice,
The Government has been dismissive of Liberal Democrat proposals to tackle harmful airbrushing, but now the Home Office’s own review shows that this is issue which needs urgent action.
Pressure on children to conform to unhealthy body image ideals is something many parents are extremely concerned about, and we welcome Dr. Papadopoulous’ report. When it comes to children, airbrushed adverts aimed at them need to be banned.
We will be holding a body image debate in Parliament on 8th March to take this important campaign forward.
You can read the full report: Sexualisation of Young People Review by Dr Linda Papadopoulos here.
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29 Comments
I’m sorry – STOP BUYING THEM then.
Consumer power not state power. “SOMETHING MUST BE DONE”. “oooh, it’s for the sake of the chiiiiildren!”
Recipe to solve every ill in the world:
Give every person one set of clothes, identical, with no status symbols or decoration.
Grow one type of food and execute anyone caught smuggling or producing anything else.
Ban printing, cameras, computers, and only have a single official view-screen, one per person on which only those things that have been unanimously agreed to by the entire population in a plebiscite (execution if you don’t participate or vote the wrong way of course).
Why worry about “airbrushed” photographs – they are at least photographs. Nowadays one could just as easily produce some idealised “person” without it ever having been remotely linked to a photograph of a real person. That gets round it doesn’t it?
Oh Jock, surely if we’ve learned any lesson from the past twelve years it’s that there is no such thing as too many rules or too much bureaucracy, and that if a policy is well-intended then it is worth pursuing no matter how impractical or bone-headed it may be.
You clearly haven’t been paying attention.
I think this report vindicates the work done by Jo Swinson and others in their Real Women campaign.
The Liberal Democrats have been leading in this debate and I hope they will continue to do so.
Never in the history of mankind have children been subject to so much sexual stimulation than they have today through advertising and the media. This creates a desire amongst children to express themselves sexually before they are emotionally mature enough to do so. The consequences in terms of unwanted pregnancy and the spread of STDs are serious, as are the impulse towards eating disorders.
The government should look at how it should intervene effectively to mitigate the impact of what is happening.
None of these images involved a real human except for the one behind the computer.
Are you going to ban creativity as well?
What, this report by Dr Papodopolous vindicates Jo Swinson’s policy which was based on the last report by Dr Papodopolous which said exactly the same thing.
It’ll be done and dusted when Dr Papodopolous releases her next report then.
What an embarrassment, and a stark indication that the Lib Dems possess a nannying instinct at least as cloying and irrational as anything you’d find in the Labour party.
Jock: I’m puzzled by why you are equating labelling with banning?
I’m also puzzled why you think saying “don’t buy them” is an alternative? Imagine this scenario: a healthy but larger child is bullied at school because she doesn’t fit the expectations of size constantly pushed out in photos aimed at children. How is saying to that child’s parents “Well, it’s so simple – just don’t buy any publications with those photos in yourself” relevant? (Sure, you may disagree with other points in that chain, but I’m specifically puzzled by the idea that saying “don’t buy them” is relevant when the point isn’t just about the direct effect of such photos on you or your family but also about their effect on other people who use them to set the standards by which they judge you and your family.)
But above all I’m puzzled that on an issue when so many people so often say how badly pressurised they and their children feel, and the way that such pressures they feel wrecks lives, you think that throwing around sentences full of capital letters about how they’re all wrong is a humane way to respond?
Of course you may disagree, but is the tone you’ve taken in your comments the tone you’d be happy to take face to face with a parent who feels their child is frequently bullied as a result of these problems? Isn’t a little more humanity and respect for those who have different views on such an emotional issue rather more appropriate?
Humane?
So the correct response to bullying is to get the biggest bully of them all, the one who can take your business away, your liberty away and all the rest, to join in the bullying?
Bullying is bullying. If that happens, and I am sure it does, action should be taken against the bully, and his or her “responsible” guardians too. The majority of this campaign appears to be about the effect such idealisation has on the people that consume the media concerned.
I do rather find it ironic that arch-feminist Germaine Greer’s recent book actually calls for boys to be more “sexy”; to stop feeling they have to shroud themselves in bags to hide themselves.
But I cannot see how returning to the days of the Lord Chamberlain’s Office is liberal or proportionate. This is so obviously to me an issue for social action,. for consumer action and the like, but state action? Give me a break.
Besides – I don’t really mean that it’s only for “victims” to stop buying the stuff in particular, I mean for social action to make this stuff unacceptable as a whole. The messages of this report about what kids “consume” and how it affects them are much better directed at parents than at “agencies” or state action IMO.
Of course once upon a time, and not so long ago, it was a religion’s job to explain how “objectifying” people, especially sexually, was wrong. I for one will not tolerate any claim that it is the state’s job to replace that is a “liberal” solution. It treats us all as amoral imbeciles as far as I am concerned.
Now, now Jock. You know Mark is right. We should be more humane.
Just try to be More Like Mark.
(Not when he’s plastering Tory Councillors’ personal problems all over the Internet, of course, But that’s completely different. Votes are at stake there, for heaven’s sake!)
S’okay, I apologise. It’s my birthday tomorrow. I’m rapidly becoming an old man in a hurry. And in the process getting perilously close to the point at which anarchists start throwing exploding rum-ba-bas!
The most amusing thing about this policy is the idea that labeling these images will somehow magically help the “problem”.
An unattainable ideal is an unattainable ideal. Sticking a warning label on it makes it no less unattainable and, more importantly, no less of an implied ideal. The message doesn’t go away just because you’ve labelled it.
All this policy will achieve is to add a layer of bureaucracy and associated cost to the advertising industry which ultimately will get passed on to consumers. I suspect most ad guys will just live with the labels and they’ll become so ubiquitous they’ll lose all impact, a few will find ways around the rules, a few will intentionally provoke the ASA in order to get a bit of publicity, and a tiny number will adhere to the rules in the spirit they were intended but no one will notice because the only indication that they’re doing so will be the absence of a label that no one says attention to anyway. The images we see in the media won’t change substantively and so little girls (or psychologists, or MPs) with body-image problems will just have to lump it exactly as they do now.
(Just a reminder about our moderation policy as there have been some comments going beyond that.)
I was going to comment on this, but 1, Count Packula has already made the point I would wish to make – i.e. than giving people more information about what they are looking at does not equate to banning them from looking at it, and 2, the level of vitriol on here is depressing and off-putting.
Jock (in particular), I’m not convinced this policy would work, so I’m agnostic on it, but I don’t see why you keep ignoring the question that’s been put to you – what’s the problem, in principle, with labelling?
Surely a free market, like so many other things in life, works best with informed consent. What’s wrong with freedom of information? And why do you keep misrepresenting freedom of information as a “ban”?
And yet another in a series of comment threads on this site in which men decide they know what’s best for women. Lap dancing clubs, burkhas, airbrushing. This site depresses me.
Any liberal with a decent background in reading has to support this idea. Airbrushing encourages conformity, ignorance and clearly damages the society it is placed in. It is also a form of deceit.
@Andy: “Airbrushing” or more accurately “image modification” is a problem that affects both sides of the gender gap.
Go on then Huw, or anyone else who wants to have a go, please define ‘Image manipulation’ in a way that’s enforceable, i.e. that isn’t either so vague as to be meaningless or so wide as to apply to all images. And then describe the mechanism by which you would identify such an image and prove that it had been manipulated.
I’ve challenged proponents of this policy to come up with such a definition a few times but I’ve yet to recieve one. All I ever get is a load of hand-waving about how easy it should be.
I have a 10 year old daughter and am very worried at the pressures on her and her peer from various media which basically stipulates that a woman is worthless unless she conforms to a certain body image. That in itself is bad enough but there are ways of dealing with that.
What I don’t want is for my daughter to be lied to. I don’t want her to see a photograph of a perfectly formed woman and think that she has to be like that. Especially when she can’t because the image has been digitally enhanced to remove any blemish from the skin, any sign of wrinkle, where breasts have been enlarged and figure reduced to proportions which would not naturally occur. I think that she should look at such a photo and be able to see immediately that it has been altered and isn’t real. I don’t think that’s too much to ask.
Surely as liberals, we believe that information, and the skills to analyse that information are amongst the most important things a person can have. That’s why we’re so mad keen on education and always have been. That’s why we’ll fight for no tuition fees and for the pupil premium.
Informing people – not just girls, cos boys need to know as well so they don’t put pressure on girlfriends to be a certain way – that an image has been altered is entirely consistent with liberalism. It surely goes a small way to setting a generation of young girls free from a conformity that causes so many problems for them.
Jock, do you believe that artificial baby milk advertisers should be allowed to make claims for their products that aren’t true – as a number have been found guilty of doing? Do you believe that schools should be allowed to teach creationism as if it were fact? I suspect not – and if not, then why do you object to a potentially liberating piece of information being given on an image?
I think labelling would be helpful, but it’s also important for children to be media-savvy as adult body image messages are so commonplace.
My daughter (9) and I have been having a good laugh at Photoshop Disasters and comparing before and after versions of retouched photos on other websites.
And it’s not just girls who feel the pressure. My son (14) says the girls at school expect the boys to look like Abercrombie and Fitch models, which is totally unrealistic for boys’ developing bodies.
So it’s heartening to hear his mate, C’s advice: “Even if you’re bun, act like you’re the best-looking person in the room. And you will be.”
The only thing that bothers me about this whole issue is… that without airbrushing, surely there will me more pressure on models and performers to look absolutely perfect even without airbrushing. Certainly the idea of a rating system might help. That you can look at a picture and know instantly that it has been airbrushed. Also, in the long run, the better thing is to aim for a culture where all shapes and sizes are accepted, and attempts to make people look “perfect” are frowned upon, and seen as cheap and tacky.
I have a problem with the idea that we should look at ‘sexualisation’ as harmful. Not necessarily. That view easily leads to moralising prudish oppression, more harmful than any ‘sexualisation’ (which, if nobody has noticed, is natural).
Having said that there is no problem with labelling airbrushed photos, I would be mildly interested to know which have been.
Okay – not “banned” but “labelled”. Nevertheless other recommendations in the report suggest “banning” things – like videos before a certain time and so on. It all ends up the same way – “Governed”:
To be GOVERNED is to be watched, inspected, spied upon, directed, law-driven, numbered, regulated, enrolled, indoctrinated, preached at, controlled, checked, estimated, valued, censured, commanded, by creatures who have neither the right nor the wisdom nor the virtue to do so. To be GOVERNED is to be at every operation, at every transaction noted, registered, counted, taxed, stamped, measured, numbered, assessed, licensed, authorized, admonished, prevented, forbidden, reformed, corrected, punished. It is, under pretext of public utility, and in the name of the general interest, to be place[d] under contribution, drilled, fleeced, exploited, monopolized, extorted from, squeezed, hoaxed, robbed; then, at the slightest resistance, the first word of complaint, to be repressed, fined, vilified, harassed, hunted down, abused, clubbed, disarmed, bound, choked, imprisoned, judged, condemned, shot, deported, sacrificed, sold, betrayed; and to crown all, mocked, ridiculed, derided, outraged, dishonored. That is government; that is its justice; that is its morality.
Pierre Jospeh Proudhon – “General Idea of Revolution in the Nineteenth Century”, “What is government?”
Andy – what has saying “government should not…” got to do with telling women what’s good for them. In fact, saying “government should…” seems to me to be more akin to telling anyone, including the supposed “victims” what is good for them, and is therefore anathema.
Providing useful information isn’t the same as censorship or nannying. There’s always been resistance to it, of course – but ingredients labelling on food, film classification, and the like are a valued part of life. I expect that the airbrushing labels will become the same.
I also suspect that many people commenting here have little or no knowledge of young people, and how vulnerable they are to pressure. Naturally these airbrushed ads are just one part of a culture which puts overwhelming, damaging pressure on children, particularly female children; but every little helps. Bring on the labelling system!
(While writing, I wish to add that I’d be happier if the Government would be slightly less eager to employ people who have been on the telly, and slightly more eager to trust those who have relevant, respected research experience in the subject at hand. Sigh.)
Does every little help? If something does not work, it does not work. Crossing fingers will not encourage it to work nor will citing the fact that people feel under pressure to conform.
If Lib Dem are so keen on education, then it should start at home and they should educate themselves about the evidence for this scheme actually working.
The point is, though, that these images are *lies*. There is extremely good research which shows that these lies do indeed have detrimental effects (eg Groesz et al, 2002). Whilst I always encourage policymakers to implement some sort of effectiveness measure along with new initiatives, I truly can’t imagine why a lie – particularly such a damaging one – shouldn’t be flagged as such, and the benefits of this action monitored later.
I’m with Voter. It still seems to me there are some logical disconnects in this idea. In order for this idea to be evidence-based policy we need to prove four things:
1) these images are damaging to women/young girls to an extent that warrants interference with them
2) this damage can be removed, or greatly limited, by our policy
3) it is not possible to achieve the outcome of (2) in any other way
4) the policy is practical and can be framed in such a way that it will not result in the airbrushing equivalent of “false positives”
I think number 1 has been done to death, here and elsewhere. Time and again I’ve seen people produce evidence for the psychological damage of these images on women and girls as if the damage by itself proved that our policy response is the correct one. It does no such thing. “If you agree there is a problem, you must agree with my solution” is common Labour party shtick and we should not be indulging in it.
On number 2, I don’t see how we can quantify the reduction of psychological damage and prove that it’s a gain proportionate to the cost of interference. It’s plain no-one who supports the idea can see a way of doing this either, and I wish they’d just get on and admit it. Renarde comes close by suggesting the gains be “monitored later”. Well, no thanks. Call me old-fashioned, but I don’t want policy introduced on a basis of “well, frankly we’ve no way of knowing what effect it’s going to have, but let’s see how we get on, eh?” We are supposed to be liberals. We need a concrete reason to interfere, not an absence of a reason not to.
Second point on no 2, I still personally cannot see what divides an image that is unattainable because it’s airbrushed, and an image that is unattainable because it features a very beautiful model in expensive clothes and make-up being lit and shot by a professional photographer. Women can’t realistically aspire to the latter any more than they can the former.
3. What Helen D said about educating children (hell, people) to be more media-savvy. Surely what we really want here, what we’re all after, is a society in which women or girls could look at any image and not feel personally threatened or forced to conform or belittled in any way. That’s the main goal, right? Going down this road in the highly totemic way we have feels like a bit of a distraction. It feels, to be honest, as if we’re more interested in looking like we Campaign For Wimmin than actually analysing a problem and solving it.
4. Again, this has been covered on previous threads. How do you deal with images where the model hasn’t been airbrushed but the background has? Aren’t most images airbrushed one way or another, so how do you distinguish between them? Do you just stick to labelling images where there was deliberate intent to make the model more attractive? How do you define attractive? How do you police any of this? Etc.
Now, I think some of these arguments I’ve set out are stronger than others, but even allowing for that I do not get a sense that anyone has actually sat down and worked this through the four stages. I’m getting more “Here is a problem, we must do something, this is something, therefore we must do it”.
Oh yeah, and also – something that really made me doubtful about the joined-up thinking was the campaign’s response to the pulling of the Twiggy advert. That was hailed by Lynne Featherstone and, I think, Jo Swinson as well, as evidence that their campaign was necessary and/or working (I was never quite sure which). Actually, it just proved that the actively misleading cases of airbrushing are already covered by the existing code. It was certainly a PR success for them because everyone came to them for quotes, but that’s a different thing.
Alix, good post. I would say though that having a little notice ‘this photo has been airbrushed’ is pretty harmless (and ineffective, but anyway) so I have no problem with it.
I think there is another confusion to the ones you’ve outlined: what is this targetting? The Home office quack said this was about sexualisation. I see that as unplausable. It may be about expectatations and conformity pressure (in which case, it would inlcude women, as you say, not just girls), which is a good thing to tackle in principle, but I don’t think this, or any other solution I’ve heard will help. It really is about parenting and education: there may be things the government can do, directly or indirectly, and things indeed may be going on as we speak to that effect. But culture is (thankfully) out of the hands of government to a large extent.
I know that as people wanting to get votes, MPs will trumpet minor adjustments as game-changing solutions, but it just seems a bit weak.
I find myself agreeing more with Heresy Corner on this one.
The airbrushing policy is not about effective regulation of a kind of image, it is merely regulation of one way of producing these images.
On bullying, I would blame the bullies, not the media. Bullying existed long before the infantile mass media, and will continue to exist after it has gone.
But the importance of a policy like this, I suppose, it to signpost how much we care about the issue of body-fascism, and the challenge for us skeptics is to find an equally powerful symbol of our own opposition to body-fascism.