Another season of 'Poldark', another debate around whether it's okay to objectify Aidan Turner. Well, the Irish actor isn't bothered if you do or not it seems.
In a recent interview with the BBC, Turner said he has "never felt objectified on the show".
His comments come in the aftermath of an article written by Mariella Frostrup for The Radio Times which questioned whether it was sexist to lust after Turner in 'Poldark'.
"Admiring the physical attributes of the loveliest manifestations of the human form, and objectifying, commercialising and demeaning one sex for the pleasure of the other are two very different pursuits," she wrote. "Only one of them reduces us to a flesh-market."
She concluded: "As we crawl slowly toward equality I hope both sexes can confidently express desire without demeaning the object of our admiration."
Aidan said "Sure, I think everyone should be, I don't see the problem there. I've never felt objectified. I think sometimes other people want to feel that for you, which can be quite a strange thing. But personally, I haven't. You say objectify, but it just sounds like [Frostrup] was sort of admiring that character of Ross Poldark or physically how he looks or whatever."
He later said: "It seems like there is a double standard, yeah, it does seem that way. But I try not to get involved in [that debate]," he added.
Turner also talked about the recent shirtless image of him (eh, the one used in this article) being splashed across newspapers in the UK saying: "These photographs were stills from the show, so in context it makes sense. When you pull them out and stick a photograph on the front page of a national newspaper it becomes something very different."
"We're not doing anything in our show that... I mean, 'Game of Thrones' probably has far more nudity, or 'Vikings', or any of these shows, than we would have. So I never quite understood why our show was picked in particular, or why these images were concentrated on more so than any other shows, or other images of actors who've gone topless for any sex scenes... "
You can catch 'Poldark' on BBC1 on Sundays at 9pm.