St John’s College JCR declared war on Lady Margaret Hall JCR yesterday in response to the latter declaring war on Sweden. LMH’s JCR maintains that the Scandinavian country is responsible for the college’s bop ban this term.
In the interests of the war effort, LMH has also voted to start a nuclear arms programme and initiate a process of granting their JCR president power to single-handedly pass legislation and to dismiss and appoint members of the executive committee.
The St John’s motion stated that “the granting of legislative powers to the president is a worrying move towards dictatorship,” appealing to the college’s duty to “protect the democratic integrity of the University’s JCRs.”
The JCR war urged to “honour current and former students’ commitment to preventing the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction by any means necessary.”
The motion resolved to “mandate the JCR President to commence ‘Operation LMH Freedom’, which will aim to invade LMH, shut down their nuclear programme and restore democracy within the LMH JCR by deposing and bringing to justice so-called ‘Field Marshall Tulloch’.”
St John’s JCR President, Christine Jiang, told Cherwell: “As a bastion of freedom and democracy, I’m heartened to see that St John’s JCR have picked up on LMH’s egregious violation of the Rome Statute. We do not accept unilateral declarations of war nor the threat of nuclear arms, and will not stand by idly while Sweden’s national security is undermined.
“St John’s currently employs a falcon, Missy, and a falconer, to address the extensive pigeon problem in Tommy White Quad. I expect that Missy will be weaponised as part of our Armed Forces.”
A fourth year chemist at St John’s, Dan Sowood, was alone in opposing the motion.
Sowood told Cherwell: “Despite my impassioned speech to the contrary, I am sad to say that the Motion passed with large majority. With the small amount of remaining time I have here, I intend to vigorously and wholeheartedly pursue peaceful negotiations between any and all parties as an alternative to the actions proposed in this Motion.”
Another St John’s student, Charlie Clegg, told Cherwell: “I’ll admit to being somewhat mercenary in support of or opposition to war against LMH. Having previously stated that war would be good, however, I now agree that peace is better. I hope LMH ceases hostilities with the Kingdom of Sweden, not least because ABBA are re-forming and I’d really hate for anything to jeopardise that.”
Whilst others appear to take the coming war quite seriously, Alfie Deere-Hall, the motion’s proposer, sees it as a joke.
When asked about how he reconciles his proclaimed pacifism with his motion, he told Cherwell: “I believe that LMH ‘declared war’ on Sweden as a joke; in the same way, my motion to declare war on LMH in response is a joke. Student politics needs to be fun; the laughter which greeted my motion and my speech strongly imply that the joke was funny.
“My pacifism does not, I contend, need to be reconciled with my motion.”
LMH Field Marshall Josh Tulloch (who until recently held the title of “President”) and the Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs have been contacted for comment.
