A petition to boycott The Sun in retail outlets is struggling

A campaign by Leicester students to boycott the The Sun until Page 3 is removed is faltering.

The proposal forwarded by University of Leicester Womens’ Officer, Rachel Holland, has been circulating for several months but has only just reached half the required number of signatures.

The petition calls for The Sun, the third most popular newspaper on campus after The Mirror and The Daily Mail, to be banned from all University of Leicester outlets.

Ace HQer @Anne_L_Kershaw was selling tees at @mmu_hssr today. Check out those red ones!! #Awesome pic.twitter.com/JHZiRVSzPj

— NoMorePage3 (@NoMorePage3) March 5, 2014

It claims: “University is a place of work, not somewhere for soft pornography to be so readily accessible – the presence of Page 3 supports the idea that women are only valuable in terms of their breasts.

“Is this really the image of women we want in our university? There is nothing wrong with breasts, they’re fantastic and we need to see more of varying shapes and sizes throughout the media – however, when women are reduced to this in an apparently ‘family newspaper’ suggests that the main message that women should be projecting is their sexual availability.”

The full text of the petition hosted by change.org

Those that sign the petition can comment why they agree with the plan. One commenter, Ross Henderson, said: “If we can slowly ban The Sun one page at a time. This is the page to ban first.”

Another signatory, Corinne Fowler, said: “We need page 3 as much as we need more buildings named after male academics.”

Rachel Holland was unavailable for comment at the time of publication.

So proud to walk with @HelenPankhurst for @careintuk on #IWD (and there were lots of NMP3 tees there too!! : ) pic.twitter.com/9a30ivVhqq

— NoMorePage3 (@NoMorePage3) March 8, 2014

The situation has been made more complicated by the appearance of a rival petition calling for people to prevent the controversial newspaper from being banned in campus.

The petition has been started by former Engagement Officer candidate, Katrina King, who told The Tab: “I am running this petition because I don’t think union council should be allowed to ban things within the union, it happened with Blurred Lines, even though it was temporary and it shouldn’t happen now.”

“Students should be allowed the choice of what they read watch and listen to in the union without censorship. I understand the concerns with page three but if we ban The Sun it is only the beginning. We should then ban fashion magazines and other newspapers due to photoshopping or political opinions.”

“I do want to say that I do not support The Sun anymore than other papers or at all for that fact. I’ve never bought it but that’s not the point, it’s about the freedom of choice for students.”

Cheryl’s back! Read the full, exclusive story in today’s paper or here: http://t.co/0agrE1gSUQ #XFactor pic.twitter.com/ld0S4fmFDG

— The Sun (@TheSunNewspaper) March 11, 2014

She added: “If people want to boycott The Sun that is a personal choice and I’m all for it, but If people want to ban it thats another thing entirely.”

The decision to start a petition and gain support for the movement has prompted a number of students to share their opinions on the matter.

The movement to ban or boycott The Sun until Page 3 has also been knocked by a student glamour model in the past, who slammed the campaign as making “women subordinate to men”.

Emma Kuziara, a third year Sociology student at Nottingham, has featured in The Sun, Daily Star, Nuts and Zoo. 

She spoke exclusively to The Tab Nottingham, saying: “The concern I have with the ‘Anti-Page 3 campaign’ and other bans which involve topless glamour modelling is that they fail to recognise that they are effectively contributing towards the inequality between men and women.”

She added: “We CHOOSE to be glamour models, we enjoy what we do and, upsettingly, many women are trying to take these jobs off us. I personally feel that glamour modelling provides the complete opposite to objectification; both the Daily Star and The Sun newspaper celebrate the beauty of the females’ body, whatever size or shape, and it allows us to feel empowered.”