Merseyside Women's Movement

A photo project documenting the saturation of sexist and objectifying imagery on the streets of Liverpool.

please email any pics to: sexismonthestreets@hotmail.co.uk

Take Action:

Phone Liverpool City Council on 0151 233 3000 to register your complaints.

A note as to why we are doing this

Why are we highlighting this, surely ‘it’s only a poster’? What harm can a few pictures of pretty women not wearing very much do?

The truth is this is far from being one image. These images do no operate in a vacuum, they are part of an overriding culture of objectification which uses overtly sexualised women’s bodies to sell anything and everything, including the very bodies of women themselves (and lets not kid ourselves, that is what lap dancing clubs sell, access to women’s bodies). These images cannot be looked at as ‘just a poster’. That is what this project aims to do, we aim to show that whilst one image in isolation may not seem a big deal when viewed in their true context as part of a wider of culture of sexual objectification they do indeed become problematic.

The issue of ‘choice’ is also a misnomer, we cannot choose to not look at these images when they are on our streets, when we have lap dancing bars opposite bus stops when we have to walk past posters advertising ‘escort agencies’ every day. These images do affect us, not just women, they affect us all. In an age when the vast majority of women are unhappy with their bodies, when teenagers view hardcore pornography online and as a result view what they see as normal for adult sexual relations, when non airbrushed and surgically enhanced bodies are rarely seen outside the ‘before’ pictures, when women are referred to as ‘whores’ in pop music, when being a pimp is idolised, when prostitution is viewed with a smear of vaseline over the lens (and god know where else) as a fun way to fund your Phd.

This has nothing to do with prudishness, sex and the naked human body. For a movement that spawned the ‘Vagina Monologues’ and urged us all to masturbate, when one of the most famous feminists of all times states ‘If you think you are emancipated, you might consider the idea of tasting your own menstrual blood – if it makes you sick, you’ve got a long way to go, baby.’ it is somewhat perplexing that we get painted as ‘prudes’ hell bent on repressing sexuality. It is not sexual repression that makes us abhor these images it is the very opposite. To view female sexuality purely as passive, purely from the ‘male gaze’ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaze#The_Male_Gaze_and_Feminist_theory) and above all as a commodity, as a visual aid to sell and be sold, is far from the freedom and choice we are promised. True sexual freedom is to be at home in our own bodies, to not feel under pressure to wax, bleach, starve and cut them open for acceptance. When our natural bodily functions are still seen as something ‘un-feminine’ , when whole industries thrive on covering up our basic bodily functions. True sexual freedom is not to be bought, sold or used as a marketing tool. True sexual freedom is when our bodies are accepted as they are, not ridiculed as ‘gross’ and ‘un-feminine’ when they have not been subject to a whole barrage of expensive and often painful cosmetic treatments.

To pick some choice examples from our gallery, is it really freedom when we can buy a cake detailing naked sugar paste women lying prostrate or performing from a shop in a busy train station? Is it freedom when advertiser have no qualm juxtaposing a Slavery remembrance day poster next to one advertising a lap dancing club? (with the worldwide sex industry being a form of slavery for many women).

This is why we are doing this, to highlight the proliferation of sexist imagery on our streets, streets that we have to walk down to go about our daily lives, streets we should be free to walk down without a daily reminder of the objectification and exploitation of women.

Chloë Emmott

August 2010