Statement of retraction: On Tuesday night, we received a complaint about an article which had been published in our Life section and which was intended as satirical in tone. In the context of Oxford’s socioeconomic realities, however, the humour was in poor taste. The article was taken down the same evening, although cache delays meant it was visible for longer. We have reiterated our rigorous editorial policies to our staff to prevent such errors in future. If readers would like to discuss this or any other editorial policy, we can always be reached at [email protected].
Pieter Garicano, Cherwell Editor-in-Chief:
This week’s front page, detailing some of Liz Truss’ escapades as an undergraduate in the 90s was possible not just due to effective reporting then; it also required a willingness to name the subject and store it for posterity. Having a historical record is useful. Indeed, over the summer an unnamed London publication approached Cherwell looking for information on the fresher adventures of Truss’ then-opponent, Rishi Sunak. One has to wonder if today’s Cherwell, more hesitant to name names and write about other students, would be the same source of archival material when the current crop of hacks become cabinet members two or three decades from now.
John Evelyn, for example, is a column dedicated to chronicling the exploits of other undergraduates. Over time, this has come to mean the Union politicos and their electioneering — and not much else. However, the use of increasingly elaborate nicknames for the subjects observed means that it has become virtually inaccessible for all but the most informed hacks. A staffer going through the archives in 2047 would not find it easy to understand who ‘Major General Chosen One’ or ‘DJ Gladstone’ are.
However, the benefits of the historical record are also its downsides. Permanence can come at a cost. Some of the most frequent requests we receive are from embarrassed graduates asking whether articles featuring their names can be anonymised. A bemused banker emailed arguing that a decade-old piece reporting on his arrest for streaking Cornmarket was defamatory as he had been ‘detained not arrested’. When choosing whether or not to report on student events, a sense of what’s proportionate matters. Cherwell reporting on students can easily become punching down, simply due to the size of the platform. Some Oxford papers do not name students at all. Cherwell only does a select few. Even if the choice is made to name them now, this does not necessarily mean naming them in perpetuity. Individuals can grow and change. Many of the decisions made aged 18 do not reflect what someone is like aged 40. Should those mistakes then still chase them?
Leah Mitchell, Cherwell Editor-in-Chief:
Why do we write?
This might seem a strange question for the editor of a newspaper and a humanities student to ask; I am more or less constantly absorbed in reading and writing. But I think it is useful nonetheless, as with most things, to think about why. To refuse to take it for granted.
Writing of course takes many forms and so has many purposes. The sharing of information which is in the public interest alongside discourse about it, and the role which the publication of this kind of writing has in underpinning a democracy comprised of informed (and opinionated) citizens, is of course a major function of a newspaper. In our own small-scale way – in the context of Oxford and the University – I like to think we contribute to this task at Cherwell. However, if I’m being honest, I personally have never been much of a reporter; and yet, I have always been a writer, from short stories and diary entries through to (bad) poetry and (I hope slightly better) essays. Most of what I have written for this very paper, though, is perhaps best described as confessional writing. The thing is, I cringe even to describe it in these terms; it sounds so pretentious and self-absorbed – and what sin is it that I am even supposedly confessing?
And yet, while like almost any writer I look back on old work and cringe a little at the odd clumsy word choice or underdeveloped idea, I am by and large quite proud of it. And the messages I have had from readers who have told me that something I have written has resonated with them – felt like an articulation of their own thoughts, or helped them to understand others a little more – constitute without a doubt the most meaningful and soul-enriching feedback I have ever received. Writing has for me provided a gateway to some of the purest moments of connection I’ve ever had with other human beings – especially with people I don’t often talk to, or whom I would never have expected to have any interest in or anything to learn from what I think about in the shower or while lying in bed at 1am. Then again – why wouldn’t they? I am always interested in what other people think about when there is nothing to distract them. In fact, I think that this curiosity, this straining towards understanding and connection, is nothing short of a fundamental human impulse, and one which underpins the best writing and art in general, just as it underpins the best conversations.
Telling the truth that lies inside you is not some scandalous “confession”. It is rather something essential and human and beautiful – and perhaps even a step on the path to our collective liberation from our increasingly atomised and polarised social environment. What happens in your head at 1am is not (just) individualistic and self-indulgent nonsense, but may just constitute the most basic collective truth of all. So this week, pore over our (excellent and highly interesting!) news pages by all means – but make sure to look elsewhere too, including, and perhaps most of all, inside yourself.
