Bouncing back: topless girls remain face up on page three

It was a storm in a DD Cup. The news that British tabloid The Sun had finally ditched its anachronistic topless Page Three girls had however, bounced back a few days later, firmer than the rebound of new knicker elastic.

The pundits had, it appeared, got it wrong.

As author Stephen Bayley gleefully predicted, "The naked breast is now in retreat, but only one thing is certain about the history of British manners and taste in which it plays so important a part: things change. It will return."

And so it has. On Tuesday, the Sun's sister paper the Times said the tabloid would no longer feature Page Three girls. But, in fact, those cheeky journalists from The Sun announced otherwise with the perky flourish; "We would like to apologise on behalf of the print and broadcast journalists who have spent the last two days talking and writing about us."

As their topless photo of "Nicole, 22, from Bournemouth" revealed,those busty girls were just having a little rest, hoisting their wares into a nice firm sports bra no doubt, while the editors made that crucial decision – continue to exploit women's bodies for profit or not?

Indeed, in a time when journalists are imprisoned, jailed or killed for reporting the truth, when cartoonists are gunned down to silence their critical pens, The Sun editors had a bigger dilemma on their hands than freedom of speech or, I don't know, actually covering the news.

For a few speculative days, it appeared there was a cover up bigger than Watergate. A cover up of – dare we say – of mammary proportions. This was the really big one – as in, the DD Big One. This was about hauling the newspaper slap bang into the 21^st Century and declaring "Right lads, don't knock it but no more knockers, eh?"

There had been a groundswell of discontent about the topless girls in print. The No More Page 3 founded in 2012 campaign with support from groups including Girlguiding UK, Mumsnet and Breast Cancer UK hailed the "truly historic news" of the Page Three demise in a Facebook posting.

ABC's The Drum purred "The Sun has seemingly woken up from its cultural coma - realised it's 2015 - and quietly dropped the controversial page.

But it appears we all got our knickers in a knot for nothing.

The Page Three Girl is back. And I am in a perfect position to tell you why the editors are paying the girls to pose topless. Yes, it's about lack of imagination, and the sort of sexual imperialism that has historically seen men exploit women's bodies for a profit. But what really drives the Page Three girl is this - circulation and desperation. The editors shove a naked torso on the cover because they have no idea how else to get anyone else's attention and sell a paper.

I know this story because I have been part of it. I was complicit in it as a journalist in the 1980s on the now defunct masthead Australasian Post. Long before I worked in academia, before my doctorate, I spent 18 months writing you-beaut Australian yarns for the magazine.

When a man from accounts started reminiscing about the Ettamogah Pub at a university Christmas Party, I told him I had worked at Australasian Post in the 1980s. He shook his head condescendingly.

"Nah, luv, I think you mean Australia Post."

"I know exactly what I mean and where I worked – Australasian Post Magazine."

The shocked expression was priceless. You get a doctorate in creative writing and no one expects that you might have actually done the most creative writing of all possible – spinning a yarn about stories such as "I live with a punk ghost", or "I want to be buried with my pets", or indeed, writing about a woman who dresses her tree fern stumps as footy heroes. And covering stories that would be at home in any newspaper, such as a day with Federal Police Rottweiler trainers ("Canberra's secret Weapon! Cute – but he's trained to take your arm off!") –possibly the reason I own a Corgi.

I learned the tricks of the trade when accompanying photographers who had to take a detour from my feature photos to shooting the cover photo. Underwear must be taken off an hour before photos to avoid indentations – bra marks are so ugly, and in the days before the Brazilian, the photographer always greeted the girls with "you shaved, luv?" Body make up is very useful, and I have held many light reflectors in my time (good lighting hides a multitude of sins), and stood for hours assisting the photographer as that cover shot was taken. Trust me, I have seen enough string bikinis to last a life time.

But that's not the same as coercing – or assisting – women to pose topless for a paper, is it?

Clementine Ford (dailylife.com.au January 21) disagrees, writing that "[replacing] a fully naked woman in a newspaper with just a mostly naked one is hardly a win, nor is the fact that full breadth of nudity will still be available in a user-pays capacity online."

Why did the cover girls do it? For the same reason journalists wrote about them for the breathless cover blurbs, for the same reason anyone does anything in the media business. We did it for the money, the desire to work our way up to something better, and – ta da! - because it's a job.

Our cover girls no doubt hoped to hit the big time and big money, just like the aspiring glamour models in the UK who hope to crack a gig – and earn a fortune – with lad mags or TV work. Don't put the girls down, though. Were the journalists any better, playing the along with the game as pawns in the media wheel? We all hoped to move on to somewhere that didn't compromise our values and make us sell our souls – the reason so many left the media industry in the end for more palatable work.

BBC news reported that Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg said editors were free to publish "what they like", however, topless Page Three girls was not "in keeping with the way in which women both want to be and should be represented.

But Clegg should learn to expect the least from the editors of such rags, and ultimately those they report to, and not risk disappointment. Because let's face it, behind every Page Three pair of breasts is a newspaper editor who hasn't a clue how to sail the masthead into the choppy waters of 21^st century circulation figures, or find a way to create a modern media business plan. And a newspaper owner who is either asleep at the wheel of this 21^st century, or is happy to exploit anyone for a buck.

It's easier for such men to hide behind a naked woman. Always was. Always will be.