Stockholm City Council has enacted tough new laws against the public display of sexist adverts, enabling it to forcibly remove offending material within 24 hours of it appearing on out of home sites in the city.
The vote to ban any imagery which depicts men or women as "sex objects" or a "stereotypical image of gender roles" comes as part of a broad crackdown on "demeaning" displays that are judged to be "sexually discriminatory".
The Swedish capital is currently marketing itself as a 'city open for all'
Explaining the rationale behind the decision, Green Party deputy mayor Daniel Hellden said: “It affects a lot of people, especially younger women. It makes them think about their own bodies and how they look and feel in a negative way.
“Maybe the companies won’t put up ads which are sexist or objectifying if they know we’re going to remove them after 24 hours. So if it’s working well, we won’t have to use this legislation.”
However, contentious advertising will still be permitted on public transport, which falls outside of the city council’s jurisdiction.
The new law will come into force in just three weeks’ time and follows similar crackdowns in other European capitals, including attempts to ban ‘body shaming’ ads on the Transport for London (TfL) network by mayor Sadiq Khan in 2016.
