Women's NGO Women’s Aid Organisation (WAO)  has taken offence at a headline in an English daily which it claims is “sexist and disrespectful to all women and culturally insensitive”.
 
WAO was seeing red over a sports page headline in The Star on Oct 12, 'Hot Porn' with reference to Thai lady golfer Pornanong Phatlum who was taking part in the Sime Darby LPGA Malaysia in Kuala Lumpur on Sunday. 
 
“The headline is not only sexist and disrespectful to Pornanong but to all women. Furthermore, it is culturally insensitive. 
 
“WAO would like to urge The Star to adhere to the Malaysian Press Institute Code of Ethics which states that sensational and provocative headlines should be avoided,” said WAO in a statement. 
 
It also took The Star to task for stating that their online readers in their comments should not be “offensive towards any gender, ethnic, religion, race or culture” but does not apply the same standards to its own editors and journalists who write for the newspaper’s sports section. 
 
Meanwhile, The Star acknowledged the anger among its readers over the headline and issued a statement short of an apology. 
 
“We take note of the displeasure over the play of words in our headline on the back page of Oct 12 and assure that no offence was intended. We will be more sensitive in crafting headlines in future,” stated The Star. 

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