Two special articles by two special women – friends and colleagues I have had the privilege of working alongside for quite a few years now.
First, Laura McNally, our gutsy new operations manager at Collective Shout, exposes the degradation fest that is Sexpo – and how it’s porny ads are being pimped to kids on school buses. And then, the inimitable Caitlin Roper, our W.A Campaigns Manager. I’m sure you’ll agree it’s great to see these issues get mainstream media treatment. And please don’t forget to sign our petition to get porn ads off kids buses below.
Laura McNally
Herald Sun, Opinion, Monday July 3, 2017
Every year the Australian public is blessed with the unrepentant presence of advertising for Sexpo. Sexpo is a puerile gala of live pornographic shows and adults humiliating themselves with ‘sexy’ costumes, they sell overpriced sex toys and false hope to perverts and the desperate.
Picture a group of people wandering around alongside giant inflatables in the middle of the day with odd pieces of clothes missing and body paint splattered around the place. More adult daycare than sexy.
But I digress. Sexpo markets itself as something to do with health and sexuality.
This year is no different than any other with Sexpo advertising common across Australian capital cities. The difference this year is that the ads now feature a live sex webcam site and that website was plastered all over public buses in Perth.
You read correctly, tax-payer funded buses are advertising webcam sex shows to the public, including kids on their way to school. Children can even sign up to the sexual services as there is no actual age verification other than a click-button confirmation. And authorities claim they are powerless to stop it.
“After seeing the ads and noticing the website included, I typed the web address into my browser. With no trouble at all, I entered what was a web-camming site, with young women offering sexual services complete with live videos depicting various women engaged in graphic sexual acts, including penetration with objects.”
These are the words of Perth mum and campaigner for Collective Shout, Caitlin Roper, who set out to query how public funded buses came to be running ads for web-cam sex shows. Ms Roper contacted Transperth, the Advertising Standards Bureau, the Outdoor Media Association, APN Outdoor, the Department of Transport and various state ministers.
None of the authorities were placed to take action about the web-cam ads because it was apparently outside of their remit. Which is to say that there is no effective regulatory system for advertising in Australia.
The current ‘self-regulatory’ body for advertising in Australia is the Advertising Standards Bureau. Upon receiving various complaints about the Sexpo ads the ASB moved to dismiss the concerns because they didn’t violate their ‘code of ethics’.
It’s fascinating really that if the Sexpo ad featured any kind of swear word (or even insinuation to a swear like the infamous CU in the NT ad campaign), the ASB would move to stop the ad with immediate effect.
The youth of today are apparently far too delicate for swear words, but being directed to websites that stream live shows of hardcore pornography is entirely acceptable.
Nonetheless, even if the ASB did move to uphold complaints against the Sexpo ads, their motion may have been entirely futile. Previous upheld complaints have included ‘Wicked Camper Vans’ who used slogans like ‘in every little princess is a slut waiting to try it once’. But the camper van company simply refused to comply with the ASB ruling. And since the ASB is merely a self-regulatory body, there is very little that can be done to curb these noxious advertisements when offending companies refuse to remove them.
What is also worrying for the Australian taxpayer is the amount of money that has been funneled into government inquiries that seek to understand the need for better advertising regulation, particularly with reference to advertising and online material that impacts on children.
There have been no less than four government inquiries in the last few years, all of which made reference to the harms of unregulated and explicit media and advertising, particularly on children.
And what was the outcome of these inquiries? Nothing. Not a single action.
Ms Roper did eventually hear back from one of the agencies she contacted. Transperth reassured her that the Sexpo ads would be removed with urgency. To date, the ads are still running on public buses in Perth suburbs. Sexpo is set to head to Brisbane and Melbourne, bringing its live sex show advertising with it. Expect to see it in Melbourne well before Sexpo opens its doors in mid-November.
Brisbane mother of 3, Angela Burrows has now launched a petition aimed at stopping the ads before they reach Brisbane buses. With more than 2000 signatures in the first few days, the Premier may be forced to respond.
Under the current system, children can be exposed to ads for strip clubs, pornography, brothels and whatever else miscreants can dream up.
In the meantime, taxpayer funded buses will continue to promote hardcore porn for Sexpo. As long as no swears words are used, the show goes on.
Laura Mcnally is a psychologist, author and PhD Candidate.
@LauraGeneM
(Reprinted with permission of the author)
By Caitlin Roper
As sex trade survivor and activist Rachel Moran said, “There is not now, nor has there ever been, a feminist case for the commodification of females.”
This should be a no-brainer, that as feminists – supporters of a social and political movement to liberate women from male oppression – we’re not on board with media and institutions that brutalise women for the enjoyment of men. It shouldn’t be super controversial to say this. But these days, feminists who are critical of pornography are met with a fairly standard response: “Why? What’s your problem with sex?”
That any objection to pornographic material is characterised as anti-sex puritanism illustrates just how effective the porn industry has been in aligning its product with sexual liberation rather than sexual exploitation. Pornographers have successfully taken acts of dominance, cruelty and abuse and called it sex. The industry has so thoroughly permeated our notions of sex and sexuality that even some self-identified feminists embrace pornography as empowering.
Back in the 1970s and 80s, second-wave feminists clearly identified pornography as the objectification and sexual subordination of women, rallying against pimps and pornographers. Only decades later, liberal feminists promote porn as progressive, liberating and a woman’s choice. Critical analysis of pornography in popular feminist media outlets is largely limited to “hey, whatever floats your boat”, with women encouraged to incorporate pornography into their intimate relationships and pat themselves on the back for being so cool and open-minded.
(Reprinted with permission of the author)
See also:
Sexpo and the Death of Sex, MTR, ABC The Drum
Allowing images that depict children as keen for sex makes them more vulnerable to abuse and violence. How Eros Association promotes fantasies for little girls. MTR Online Opinion
One Response
‘Sexpo is a puerile gala of live pornographic shows and adults humiliating themselves with ‘sexy’ costumes, they sell overpriced sex toys and false hope to perverts and the desperate.
Picture a group of people wandering around alongside giant inflatables in the middle of the day with odd pieces of clothes missing and body paint splattered around the place. More adult daycare than sexy.’
Hmm where is the critical disaggregation of which sex is doing what to which sex? Who are these ‘adults/perverts/desperate?’ No guesses they are all adult males gleefully viewing women being portrayed as mens’ dehumanised/disposable sexual service stations!! The ones wearing the ‘supposedly sexy costumes’ are women or rather they are primarily not wearing any clothing because that is how the male customers want to view women.
Nope the boys who created this porn show called Sexpo aren’t selling ‘false hope’ rather they are reinforcing what men have always claimed and that is ‘man cannot sexually torture/sexually humiliate/sexually murder any woman/girl because she is just a dehumanised disposable object.’
Not forgetting the boys are earning huge profits by selling women to the boys and yet this is never ever mentioned because magically somehow the women are ‘enacting their choice and agency!’ Sure just as enslaved women and girls supposedly enacted their ‘choice and agency’ to become white mens’ slaves!
The boys’ Male Supremacist System has always engaged in worthless ‘male supremacist initiated government reports’ because this makes it appear the women-hating male controlled governments are challenging/refuting male pseudo sex right to sexually prey on women and girls with male impunity. These worthless male initiated government reports are presented as a ‘sop’ to us women and we are expected to believe male action will be taken. Well it hasn’t and it won’t because the boy politicians are colluding with their male pornographer bros by refusing to accept what is really happening.
If it was adult boys who were the ones being routinely sexually tortured by women then the boy politicians would swiftly act to criminalise such actions as ‘sadistic female sexual violence perpetrated against men’ but because it is men profiting and getting male sexual pleasure at viewing sadistic filmed male sexual violence against women and girls nothing happens!’
This is the reality for us women and girls living in a world wherein mens’ Male Supremacist System continues to reign supreme because the only default humans are as usual the boys!