Somerville JCR got more than they bargained for at last Sunday’s meeting, as JCR President John McElroy was mandated to perform a striptease.
Birthday boy McElroy was ordered to perform a strip tease whilst singing a song, “preferably Abba”, in an emergency motion proposed by David Sankey and Stavros Orfanos.
The motion was amended, stating that McElroy only had to strip to his boxers. The altered motion passed with only two objections, though McElroy challenged the mandate as his name had been misspelled.
He said, “I thought I may have found a loophole when I discovered that my name had been spelt wrong in the first clause, but this was hastily corrected in an amendment – I was flattered by the tenacity of certain supporters of the motion.”
At the end of the meeting, McElroy began his striptease though the meeting was closed by JCR chair Philip Sellar before he was able to complete the dance.
McElroy said the striptease had been “thankfully brief and relatively modest.”
He told Cherwell, “Stripping is not an activity in which I engage with any regularity, and my dancing is questionable at the best of times. Personally, not falling over was an achievement in itself…
“I’m glad my birthday was able to provide the opportunity for something a little less serious.”
Somerville JCR VP Iain Moss said, “At the end of the meeting the Chair asked him to begin his striptease. John, feigning tears, got as far as removing his tie and running it under his crotch before the vast majority of the 30-odd audience felt awkward and uncomfortable and elected to leave instead of being witness to this potential visual abuse.
“Some however remained, myself included, and were definitely left wanting more…He was not forced any further than was decent, but those of us wanting a bit of indecency to lighten up JCR meetings (which had been heated of late), were disappointed.”
McElroy’s girlfriend Ashleigh Grant said, “I have previously witnessed the presidential dancing, and in all honesty I was more worried about the effect this would have on the mental wellbeing of those watching, than the nudity itself. John has a fine pair of legs and I think that it was for this reason, rather than any other, that the motion was met with such enthusiasm.”
She further commented, “As his girlfriend I cannot condone this practice, though as a member of Somerville JCR I fully support the inclusion of stripteases at the end of meetings, for the look of utter mortification alone.”
One Somerville student who wished to remain anonymous, said, “Having never attended JCR meetings previously it was something of a shock to encounter the levels of depravity that were treated as merely a legislative procedure. John is a good friend of mine, and in any other context he – I once believed – would not have endorsed such debauched activities.
“The JCR treated this as customary, but I was personally offended when John used the very tie that I had bought him as a birthday present in such a lewd and sexual manner.”
McElroy said, “It remains to be seen what effect my ‘dance’ will have on attendance at future meetings.”
