According to a Daily Mail article, child protection consultant Shy Keenan of Phoenix Chief Advocates, an organization that seeks to help victims of pedophiles to better child protection, said, "It never fails to amaze us just how many ordinary High St household names are now prepared to exploit the disgusting ‘paedophile pound’ to feed a dark market that has no place in our society, let alone near our children."
Feminists and gender theorists have been pointing to fashion and pop culture for creating a pedophile-friendly society for years. Yet, I still notice when looking at this season's Victoria's Secret swimsuit catalog that some models look uncomfortably young--and sexy.
Despite the continued sexualization of young girls in Western culture, it's nice to see people speaking out about padded bathing suits for children. Last fall, when a Peruvian 9-year-old covered Britney Spears' "Toxic" video scene by scene, gossip blogs spoke out, getting the video pulled from YouTube. And last week when the padded suits made headlines, even right-leaning Fox news quoted Dr. Keith Ablow, Fox News medical member and psychiatrist, as saying, “It can be psychologically damaging to encourage girls at age 7 or close to that age to consider themselves as sexually attractive to boys or men."
Padded bikinis before puberty is disgusting, but not surprising. However, public outcry and media recognition of the continued oppression of young girls seems to be a step in the right direction.
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