Your voice does make a difference

#Winning

SONY has blocked the Western release of an 'adult role-playing game' that saw the player undress schoolgirls and fondle their breasts while on a quest for the holy grail.

The Video Standards Council (VSC) objected to its "setting within a 'school' environment”, saying it "clearly promotes the sexualisation of children via the sexual interaction between the game player and the female characters."

Collective Shout has campaigned for the end of the sexualisation of girls in pop culture, the media and mainstream marketing over the past decade. For instance, in 2016,6 Amazon was marketing a ‘Sexy Nurse Toddler T-Shirt', where the shirt had drawn in a fake cleavage, available in sizes for 2-6-year-old girls. Just recently, Collective Shout helped to remove child sex dolls from Amazon’s website. For a long time, Amazon has contributed to a culture of sexual abuse by allowing the sale of novels that normalises paedophilia. The sale of such dolls and similar material has earned Amazon a spot on the NCOSE's Dirty Dozen List for the past two years.

Naomi, a 13-year-old Melbourne student, saw this large billboard advertising DFO with the catchline: ‘Starving for Style’. She knew it was wrong, and got her Mum to contact us.

''I knew it was wrong, because it was promoting anorexia, sending a message that you need to be skinny to be fashionable, which is obviously not true!'' Naomi told me.

We called on the company to exercise Corporate Social Responsibility. Our in-house eating disorder specialist Sarah McMahon pointed out the harmful impacts of trivialising what can be a life-threatening mental health condition by associating it with fashion and style.

24 hours later, the company apologised, claimed it was an 'error', and withdrew the billboard.

Give now to help More Teens Speak Out

Growing numbers of young people are realising that they don't need to be passive victims of toxic cultural messages. They can be part of the change. Take Christie, 17, from Geelong Victoria, who writes:

''Today whilst listening to your talk, it was as though I was taking a step back and fully seeing the scale and magnitude of indoctrination and manipulation. Gender stereotypes and female exploitation have affected me and the people I know… I believe men are also victims of society’s conceptions and that their behaviours are partially due to their expected dominance / sense of entitlement. I would like to be part of the change, and I hope that I can help to spread this message to people in all aspects of my life. Thank you for dedicating your time and not being afraid to stand out.’’

Thank you to those of you who have given towards our end of financial year tax appeal. Since last Tuesday, we are over $5,500 closer to our target of $14,500.

Remember - a generous donor will match all donations received before June 30. Your $53 becomes $106 - doubling the impact. All donations over $2 are tax deductible.

Your gift today will help more young women like Naomi and Christie create cultural change in their lifetime.

Warm regards,

Melinda Tankard Reist & the Collective Shout team

Honey Birdette has been ordered to remove objectifying ads in a recent ASB ruling:

Overall, in the ASB's view, the advertisement did breach Section 2.4 of the Code which states that "Advertising or Marketing Communications shall treat sex, sexuality and nudity with sensitivity to the relevant audience. Finding that Honey Birdette's advertisement did breach this section of the code, the ABS upheld the complaints that it received.  

In another related win, The Adelaide Advertiser has reported that Rundle Mall Myer Centre manager Peter Lee has told Honey Birdette that their shopping centre will not allow these ads. Mr Lee has said:

“We have been liaising with the retailer’s national office in this regard and have requested the current posters be removed from display as soon as possible” 

LEAGUE players who have committed an offense of domestic violence, sex offences or disrespecting women could face life bans under new NFL guidelines to end a culture of “covering up” and paying “hush money” to victims.

In what would be a first for an Australian football code, the NRL has adopted a number of new punishments for players found guilty of violence against women, which could ­result in bans ranging from nine months to life. 

In a new crackdown on porn websites, the UK Government has announced that pornography websites will be forced to verify that the age of their users is at least 18 years old. 

The Berlin Government has become one of the latest to ban sexist advertising in public places.

Kids play centre Bounce has withdrawn sexualised music videos from their centres after body image activist Taryn Brumfitt wrote a blog post expressing her frustration at children being bombarded with sexist and sexually objectifying imagery while at the centre. 

Taryn Brumfitt, the founder of Body Image Movement and the director of Embrace documentary (which we are screening next month in Adelaide) wrote the following on her blog:

We're pleased to report that after years of campaigning against Wicked Campers for their sexist and anti-women slogans and imagery, Tasmania's Legislative Council has voted to deregister offending vehicles.