How Not to Improve a Political Party’s Public Image

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The UK Independence Party (UKIP) seems to be having some PR problems. I’m not much up on British politics, but UKIP is, according to Wikipedia,

a Eurosceptic right-wing populist political party in the United Kingdom, founded in 1993. The party describes itself in its constitution as a “democratic, libertarian party” and, as of May 2013, has a membership of 27,000.

UKIP currently has 11 of the 73 UK seats in the European Parliament, three members in the House of Lords, one seat in the Northern Ireland Assembly and 147 local councillors. The UKIP performance in the 2013 local election was the best result for a party outside the big three in British politics since the Second World War, coming fourth in the number of council seats won and third in terms of projected nationwide votes. UKIP has not won a seat in the House of Commons to date.

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Stock photo found in a search for “trousers.”

The British media describes the party as “anti-EU.” The party seems to be having a problem with protests, including one in Scotland in which an angry mob shouting “racist, Nazi scum” led to police escorting the party’s leader to safety. What intrigues me are the views of its top contributor, “Greek shipping tycoon”* Demetri Marchessini. They are quite intriguing in their outspokenness:

Greek tycoon Demetri Marchessini, who believes not wearing a skirt is ‘hostile behaviour’, gave UKIP £10,000 this year – a fifth of all its cash donations.

***

He is the author of a book entitled Women In Trousers: A Rear View in which he photographed women from behind and then commented on their clothes. In it he claimed that the ratio Britain of women wearing trousers to skirts is 10 to 1.

‘The interesting thing about this phenomenon is that, because women cannot see themselves from the rear, the vast majority of women are unaware that trousers are very unflattering to them,’ he said in the 2003 book.

‘Trousers are made for men’s bodies, which are mostly straight up and down.

‘Women’s bodies on the other hand consists of curves. Women have big bottoms – they are meant to have big bottoms.

***

‘Women know that men don’t like trousers, yet they deliberately wear them,’ he continued in the bizarre coffee table book.

‘Walk along any street and you see women using trousers like a uniform every single day. This is hostile behaviour – they are deliberately dressing in a way that is opposite to what men would like.

‘It is behaviour that flies against commons sense, and also flies against the normal human desire to please.’

It goes on and on, including a description of Jennifer Lopez as a “Mexican tart.” And yes, there really is a book (one copy available for £12.95!)

Of course, the views of one donor, even a major one, cannot necessarily be imputed to a political party. It just doesn’t help the PR, does it?

People like this still exist, and I think it is important to point that out. People can have whatever opinion they want, but so can I, and my opinion is that sub-medieval b.s. like this should be called out. The Twitter exchange that led me to this story offers some cogent, if ad hominem, commentary:

The original point was sort of ad hominem against the women of the UK, so a little ad hominem going the other way ought to be fair game. Another fun exchange showed some other intriguing views of Mr. Marchessini:

 


I assume he is referring to Caligula, starring not only Helen Mirren, but Malcolm McDowell, Peter O’Toole, and Oscar winner John Gielgud. If you’re going to do “porn,” do it with some classically-trained, award-winning actors. (I haven’t seen Caligula, mind you, but that’s quite a cast.)

Seriously, though. Don’t mess with Helen Mirren.

Photo credit: Alvimann from morguefile.com.

* Really, is there any other kind of Greek tycoon?

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