Unexpected result of Leveson has been to expose sexism

Four separate groups - End Violence Against Women, Equality Now, Object and the rape charity Eaves - have called on Leveson to look at how papers treat women.

EVAW's 27-page submission refers to "poor reporting of violence against women stories which were either intrusive, inaccurate, which misrepresented or were misogynistic, victim-blaming or condoning violence against women and girls".

Though at least one piece of its evidence - that the Sun published a "countdown clock" to Charlotte Church's age of consent - has been shown to be false, the group might still have a point.

There cannot be a shadow of doubt that women are routinely presented as sex objects across the media - in films, on TV shows, on billboards, in hundreds of magazines and in newspapers. What is at issue, however, is whether this prompts men to act violently, or merely badly, towards women.

I am not sure: men have been acting badly towards women throughout history and I would contend that the situation for women in advanced societies such as ours is better than ever before. The American television series Mad Men contains scenes in which men unashamedly treat women as second-class sexual playthings that, for those of us who were around in the early Sixties, are easily recognisable.

That the show is centred on advertising reinforces the point. In a telling scene, the "hero", Don Draper, explains to the ambitious - and lone female - copywriter why she should accept a blatantly sexist TV ad: "You know how this works, Peggy. Men want her. And women want to be her."

Though advertising still operates on this assumption, the reality is that women such as Peggy are no longer ploughing a lonely furrow. Women's status in society - at home and in the workplace - has improved hugely since the Sixties, though I concede there is a long way to go.

That's why it's important for women to maintain pressure to achieve full equality. But when it comes to newspapers, there is a fine line, perhaps a wavy line, to be drawn between ethical purity and censorship. How, we must ask, is it possible to achieve both? I note that one of the submissions to Leveson came from a group called Turn Your Back on Page 3. It reminded me of the long history behind this particular phenomenon where it has proved virtually impossible to establish that "glamour" modelling both demeans its participants and harms wider society.

Ever since the Sun began publishing its regular Page Three it has been accused of sexism. Though the word itself was rarely used at the time, it is what the original critics meant. They argued then, as have many since, that it amounted to sex discrimination. The models denied it, saying they did it of their own "free will".

The Sun's editor at the time, the late Larry Lamb, knew it was controversial but viewed it merely as a "modern" and more daring form of the pin-up pictures - known colloquially as "cheesecake" - that were used by his former paper, the Daily Mirror, and other popular titles of the period.

Lamb and the paper's owner, Rupert Murdoch, saw it as not only a reflection of the increasing permissiveness of the era but a wholesome contribution to the sexual revolution. It was a gamble and they most certainly would have dropped it had there been reader hostility. Just the opposite occurred; the Sun's sales, barely 800,000 in 1969, took off throughout the Seventies and by the end of the decade it was out-selling every other daily paper.

Sexism was popular, and the Mirror reluctantly followed suit for a short time. The Daily Star ran its own Page Three from its launch in 1979. And the Sport titles were even less inhibited in their choice of pictures.

A high-profile campaign against Page Three, launched in 1986 by the former Labour MP Clare Short, failed to change the minds of the paper or its readers. Short renewed her campaign in 2004 but found herself on the receiving end of disgraceful ad hominem attack by the Sun, which superimposed her face on a model's body and accused her of being "fat and jealous".

The paper's then editor, incidentally, was a woman - Rebekah Brooks. And, to complete the paradox, one of her most famous campaigns at the Sun was against domestic violence by men.

Roy Greenslade is Professor of Journalism, City University London and writes a blog for the Guardian