Madam, - I seem to remember that the front page of The Irish Times this time last year also showed the mini-skirted legs of teenage party-goers as they celebrated their Junior Certificate results. What message are you trying to send with the repeated use of this image (The Irish Times, September 14th)? Is it intended to prompt debate about what the nation's teenagers get up to when they go out dressed like this? Or could you possibly be taking a leaf out of the book of your tabloid brethren, who are well aware of the sales-boosting power of bare flesh in print?
And lastly, is anyone else disconcerted by the fact that the flesh in question belongs to girls who, having just completed their Junior Cert, are clearly minors? - Yours, etc,
ORLA SHANAGHY, Dunmore Road, Waterford.
Madam, - A photograph, two years running, of Junior Certificate girls' mini-skirted legs in a South Dublin disco queue. Is this obsessive, biased, or simply a record? - Yours, etc,
MAIRÉAD GALLAGHER, Ballymurphy South, Innishannon, Co Cork.
The photograph is a reflection of the times in which we live. That is the message it was intended to convey. The faces of the students were not shown precisely because the young girls are probably minors. - Ed, IT.