Dear Petition Supporters,

Despite 9 Ad Standard rulings against them in the past year, I'm appalled at how Honey Birdette continue to use pornified images of women, like attached picture I took last week at my local Westfield (pardon the novice editing to try make it less offensive). They have complete disregard to how it affects our sons and daughters. It saddens me to read about the tragedy that unfolds every single day all across Australia in the following letter from Jo in NSW shared with me from Collective Shout. 

"I wanted to share this real narrative to add support to the work you and CollectiveShout are doing to try and increase awareness of the exploitation of women that Honey Birdette is perpetuating and the negative impact upon both women and men this form of advertising is having on our culture. 

About 4 weeks ago I was at Westfield Carindale and was near the Honey Birdette shop - and getting angry as I walked by (as I usually do due to the explicit larger than life images of women!!). There were two older teenage boys out the front of the shop, smirking and pointing at the images in the window. I heard one say to the other ‘I’d like to f*#k that!’ and there was a snigger of agreement from the other boy.

Now, where I work we have a language cadence we use for speaking up to report issues of safety. I decided to put this approach into practice so I spoke up to both boys about objectifying women in this way and referring to a woman as ‘that’ and the implications this has for young girls in our culture- but also what it says about them as well. The main boy who said the original words told me to ‘f off’ but the other one at least had a look of shame on his face. I walked away from the boys - but I must admit now I regret not going inside the shop to let the staff know what had just occurred outside.

Again last week I was at Westfield Chermside and again walking past HB. A young boy, probably about 13 or 14 max, walked past the shop, stopped, stared at the pictures for about 30 secs, then walked away bright red and head hung low. He looked again quite uncomfortable and even a bit shamed. I really felt for the young boy because of the impact these pictures obviously had on him especially in this important time in his physical, social and emotional development.

So just two isolated events - both made me realise that the CEO/Director of Honey Birdette must be so focused on profit so their social conscience and understanding of social accountability is not present. This is why the work of Collective Shout is essential- to reorientate Honey Birdettes social responsibility compass that they are indeed not only exploiting young women with their choice of images used in advertising but perpetuating the pornification of our culture which is harming both young women and men.

Thanks Jo"

What a shameful TRAGEDY that unfolds for our boys and girls at our shopping centres every single day. And they just won't do anything about it.

Please continue to share this petition and write into your local MPs who are starting to get the message. Let's keep the pressure on.

Thank you very much,

Kenneth Thor