Trashing is banned. But what does the banning achieve except pushing students further from the centre to more perilous waters?
Recently, Brasenose students were threatened with £150 fines from the University for trashing on the grounds of littering. The Oxford University ‘SMART’ guidance states that “Littering as a result of ‘trashing’ is illegal and will incur a £150 fine”. Fining students is a deterrent. But attempting to stamp out trashing with increased patrolling and irregular fines for littering will not succeed and only addresses part of the issue.
It seems that the university isn’t trying to help students celebrate exams safely and limit environmental damage but to save their reputation against an arrogant Oxford tradition. But trashing doesn’t have to be obnoxious. It can be a carefully managed, safe, and fun way to cast off exams that comes at little cost to the environment and actually celebrates everything that is great about Oxford.
The two problems with trashing are that it creates litter, and it’s dangerous. ‘Trashing’ is when students who have just finished exams gather near a water source. Their friends throw coloured powder, silly string, confetti and shaving foam on them. Sometimes students throw food like eggs, flour, and even beans and soup at their friends. They are often sprayed with alcohol like prosecco before jumping into the water in their subfusc.
Bottles and all kinds of litter can be left. Powder can stain pavements and all the crap students are covered in is washed into the waterways. The University’s 2019 sustainability blog states that it costs “the University more than £25,000 each year” to clean up trashing debris. Moreover, trashing can be extremely dangerous. Crowds, alcohol, and inhibition near water can lead to fatalities. Last year, a Brasenose student died trashing in water at Port Meadow.
This is exactly why fining is so dangerous. Trashing is fun and will continue to happen, with students finding new locations to celebrate in. They will be pushed away from the centre to more remote areas to jump in or to have a celebratory swim.
There are ways to trash without littering: remove all packets and bottles; only use biodegradable materials; use products from EcoTrash, a business run out of Keble which creates biodegradable powders made from cornstarch which quickly dissolve; trash in a limited area and clear up.
Stopping littering is important, but fining students seems like a surface level approach to save face for the University rather than ensure student safety.
Students won’t be stopped from trashing and, in my view, they shouldn’t be. Trashing has a cathartic element that can be achieved at a limited cost to the environment. Exams are awful, and stopping students from following traditionally hard exams with traditionally exuberant fun seems to lack the wonderful balance between hard work and hard play that Oxford attempts to strike. The University’s ‘avoid fines’ advice in their SMART guidance states that “‘trashing’ isn’t an Oxford tradition, it’s anti-social behaviour”. I admit that trashing done badly is anti-social behaviour. But it is an Oxford tradition. The Daily Mail suggests that trashing started in the 1970s, making trashing older or as old as admitting women to study at Oxford. Anywhere else, 50 years is a long time. Celebrate the tradition and simultaneously tighten college communities by allowing students to trash safely, in colleges.
This solution to the ‘trashing problem’ could be implemented very easily; it is already in practice at Jesus College and is being trialled at my college, Brasenose. Colleges could designate a spacious, less historic area away from the library with drainage, perhaps near the bikes or in a newer quad, where the colleges’ students can trash each other. This way, students’ safety can be monitored and littering can be contained. Buckets filled with water can be chucked over students and reused. Colleges could enforce policies on only biodegradable materials like those sold by EcoTrash being used, stopping waste by excluding food products. Perhaps college JCRs could even link with EcoTrash and have a trashing levy (a Mansfield JCR Treasurer’s review recommends the products to all JCRs), so biodegradable products are always available to students.
The experience could be much safer for everyone. Looking away won’t solve the problem. Forcing something underground only makes it more dangerous. So, make it safer – make it integral to the college experience.
It’s reasonable that students would want to celebrate their exams as people have done before them. It’s unfortunate that that tradition appears very similar to stereotypical images of rowdy, wasteful Oxford students with no consideration for the Town. The solution is easy, and it isn’t a fine that will push students further from water easily accessed by the emergency services. It’s organised trashing in college where college communities can celebrate their victories together. Because compromising student safety to save the University’s face? That’s trash.
