Charlotte Church defends Kim Kardashian over naked selfie

Charlotte Church has said Kim Kardashian's much talked about naked mirror selfie could be seen as "quite a feminist move".

The singer and activist, 30, said "there are all different sorts of strands of feminism" and added that she has become more "liberal" in recent years.

Reality star Kardashian, 35, sent the internet into a whirl when she posted a naked picture on social media earlier this week, with many condemning her for having done so.

Talking about feminism at Southbank Centre's Women of the World festival, Church said: "There are people who are more conservative in their feminism and don't think that there should be ... that women necessarily in the music industry should go and twerk in videos and wear thongs and stuff.

"But then there's another sort of feminism which says that they absolutely should, they should be able to do exactly what they want."

She added: "It took me a little while just to think there's no right or wrong. It's just what my idea of it is."

In her John Peel Lecture in 2013, Church attacked the sexism of the male-dominated music industry - which she said was increasingly creating and promoting "child-like" sex objects.

Speaking at the festival event in London, she told the crowd: "When I did the John Peel lecture, I feel like actually I feel quite differently now, not very, I'm not too far away from the things that I said in that lecture."

Indicating that she was more disapproving back then, Church gave the example of how she disagreed with Rihanna's music videos and worried about whether her children should see them.

She added: "Whereas now I'm a bit more on the more liberal side. So there was that picture recently of Kim Kardashian tweeting a picture of herself naked on her Twitter.

"And obviously lots of people were sort of up in arms and said 'This is totally not cool and what are you doing Kim Kardashian?' And then she sort of said 'Well this is a photo from a year ago when I was 25 pounds lighter and much hotter', or whatever she said.

"But you know, she's just had a baby, so maybe actually that is sort of quite a feminist move."

Church said Kardashian could be using the picture as "motivation". She added: "None of it's black and white. It's all shades of grey."

Church, who appeared at the festival alongside Baroness Doreen Lawrence to talk about their activism, also discussed pop star Miley Cyrus.

Church's 2013 speech came when there was increasing concern about sexual imagery to sell music with Cyrus appearing naked in her video for the single Wrecking Ball.

At the festival, Church referred to Cyrus's famous VMA performance, saying: "She was a massive topic of conversation. Whether what she was doing was right or wrong or good for women or bad for women. And a lot of people had a lot of opinions on that."

She said she "went in quite hard" on Cyrus during her lecture, but looking at what she has done since, her charitable work for example, Church said now she thinks "more power" to her.