A protest took place on Cornmarket last Sunday in support of the demonstrators in Turkey. About 100 protestors attended the Oxford rally, which was organised by Oxford students.

The Oxford protest was held in solidarity with the thousands of people who took to Istanbul’s Taksim Square in criticism of the Turkish government. There have been similar supportive protests across the globe.

Taksim’s last remaining public park, Gezi Park, was set to be demolished by the Turkish government and replaced by a luxury residence and shopping centre. The protests in Istanbul began with a peaceful demonstration against the demolition but the excessive police suppression of the campaigners has led to a national movement against the government, exacerbated by the lack of coverage of the issue in the Turkish media. 

However on Wednesday the Deputy Prime Minister of Turkey, Bulent Arinc, apologised for the “use of excessive force” against the original protests at the demolition of Gezi Park.

One member of Oxford University Turkish Socciety told Cherwell, “We think it is important to protest these incidents since basic human rights and political rights have been violated in Turkey. The lack of objective news coverage in the media is also another reason why we think it is important to raise awareness.”

They added, “The turnout in the Oxford protests was higher than we expected. Our aim was to inform especially non-Turkish people about the situation in Turkey and raise awareness. I think it served the purpose and people were quite keen to talk to us and seek more information.
She continued, “We are trying to inform the university at the moment but there has not been any response from any of the governing bodies or the colleges. Expression of support and dissemination of the news about the real situation in Turkey is all we ask for.”

At the time of going to print, Oxford University was unavailable to comment.

Anil Kirmizitas, another Turkish student who took part in the protest, emphasised the ways in which protests have the potential to influence events around the world.

She explained to Cherwell, “After I posted a picture of the protest in Oxford on the Occupy Gezi-Oxford website I got a response from a protester in Ankara thanking us for the support. I have not even heard the name of this person in my life before.”

She also commented on the situation in Turkey, adding, “I lived in Turkey for 9 months last year and could not believe that it was worse than I thought.

“I was being warned by people not to post anything on Facebook against the Prime Minister or talk about him because it could mean losing my job.”
An OUSU spokesperson told Cherwell, “At present, OUSU Council has no policy relating to the Gezi protests, although students are of course welcome to submit an emergency motion on the subject to OUSU Council.”

A religiously motivated motion has been tabled in St Anne’s JCR, amid concerns over a welfare levy, soon to become compulsory, which will set up a board to discuss the matter at greater length in Michaelmas term.

The motion, which centred on the issue of payment for contraceptives through the welfare budget, passed, with 66 votes for, 16 against and 12 abstentions.

According to the minutes of the meeting, the debate became heated after Joe Collin suggested, in reference to the views of the proposers of the motion, “We should not be tolerant to intolerant minorities. We should not try and accommodate these views.” Another JCR member retorted, “This is totalitarianism.”

Nathan Pinkoski, President of the Catholic Newman Society, explains his opposition to the levy.

However, Collin immediately responded, “This is not totalitarianism! The JCR have and will vote on this.”

The potential difficulties of a new welfare system were also raised, with one second year pointing out, “We can’t have an overly impractical situation where people can’t come to welfare tea because they haven’t paid the levy… Would we have to have some sort of tick list? Welfare is available for all, it is very hard to discriminate against a few who have opted-out.”

The motion, which was debated in the Anne’s JCR meeting on Sunday 2nd June, noted that “there is diversity of belief in the JCR regarding the morality of contraceptives”, that “current welfare funding does not distinguish between general welfare and welfare concerning sexual health items”, and that in the future – due to the recent withdrawal of Chlamydia testing and the subsequent loss of funding for welfare provisions – new ways of funding sexual health items may have to be found by the JCR.

The motion went on to posit that no individual should be forced to donate to contraceptives against their conscience, and that as such “there should be a compromise found to safeguard various interests at stake here, i.e. freedom of conscience and sufficient funds for welfare”.
It concluded with the conjecture that a panel consisting of the JCR President, treasurer, welfare officers and other members of the JCR should be set up in Michaelmas to allow for further discussion about payment for contraceptives and to “seek a compromise that would balance the interests involved in this issue”.

The motion was tabled following concern amongst some students regarding where payment for contraceptives will now come from. Kat Zielinska, who proposed the motion, explained, “I proposed the motion for two reasons, firstly, because of my religious views, which were the driving force of this action, but also because as a lawyer I feel strongly about protection of various freedoms, including freedom of conscience and thought that this issue should receive some attention from St Anne’s JCR, especially given that some people felt seriously upset about it.”

She and her seconder, Xavier Wilders, seemed pleased with the outcome of the JCR debate and the passing of their motion, with Wilders adding, “Our motion speaks on behalf of these students who, if no compromise is found, are in the situation where they can only be part of the JCR if they agree to make a massive compromise with their moral code.

“And let us remember the issue at stake: these students believe abortion is murder, so to them funding abortion is the equivalent of supporting acts of manslaughter. No student should be forced to agree to this just to be part of the JCR.”

The motion was subject to some change, however. An amendment was made to alter the wording of the resolution from “representatives of members of the JCR with conscientious objections regarding contraceptives” to “members of the JCR with an interest in the issues discussed”, with regards to those who would be able to attend the further discussion in Michaelmas. Stefan Harvey, who suggested the amendment, explained, “I thought [the amendment] was vital given that, ultimately, the motion would be put before the entire JCR. It would then only be fair to have a committee remotely representative of such a diverse group, so as to avoid the motion being highly one-sided.”

He added that he was proud of his amendment, stating, “I would also like to take pride in doing so because several members of the JCR took the discussion as an opportunity to criticise the objectors for their religious views. I am openly agnostic and in no way side with anyone that follows a religion especially.

“I nevertheless found it highly upsetting that other members of the JCR attempted to ‘beat down’ a minority group when they were merely proposing a productive way to develop a motion that reflected their views. It was not their place ostracise members of the college, so once the amendment was passed, I voted in favour of it.”

Zielinska has demonstrated her support for the amendment, saying, “I had no objections to that, quite to the contrary actually. The amendment to the motion had my support – the purpose of the panel is to gather different opinions and create an environment for a constructive discussion about funding contraceptives.”

St Anne’s JCR President Oscar Boyd seemed pleased with the outcome of the discussion.

He told Cherwell, “It is clearly important that issues regarding personal freedoms are brought to the JCR and discussed as they were, and hopefully the meeting motioned for will provide a forum in which the issue can be resolved.

Katie Colliver, OUSU Vice President for Welfare and Equal Opportunities, commented on the situation, “I am pleased to see that St. Anne’s JCR is taking a thoughtful approach.”

An Oxford University researcher and neuroscientist has denied reports that she implied religious fundamen­talism may one day be treated as a cur­able mental illness, insisting that she has been “misreported.”

Dr Kathleen Taylor, who describes herself as a “freelance science writer affiliated to the Department of Physi­ology, Anatomy and Genetics, Univer­sity of Oxford,” supposedly made the comments speaking during a ques­tion and answer session at the Hay Festival in Wales on Wednesday. Her remarks about religious fundamen­talism were then reported by several major news outlets including the Times and the Huffington Post, where the story attracted tens of thousands of comments and shares on social me­dia sites.

Taylor was reported in the Times as having said at the festival, “One man’s positive can be another man’s nega­tive. One of the surprises may be to see people with certain beliefs as peo­ple who can be treated. Someone who has for example become radicalised to a cult ideology – we might stop see­ing that as a personal choice that they have chosen as a result of pure free will and may start treating it as some kind of mental disturbance.

“In many ways it could be a very positive thing because there are, no doubt, beliefs in our society that do a heck of a lot of damage.

“I am not just talking about the ob­vious candidates like radical Islam or some of the more extreme cults. I am talking about things like the belief that it is OK to beat your children.”

She was also reported as warning about the ethical concerns of such de­velopments, adding, “But, and here is where I worry about the positive ver­sus the negative, there are also huge libertarian implications for that as well.”

Taylor, speaking to Cherwell, claimed, “I have been misreported (it happens).”

She also clarified her position, say­ing, “I did not claim that religious fundamentalism was a mental illness that neuroscience would someday be able to cure.”

A full rebuttal and explanation is understood to be forthcoming later this week in the form of a public letter sent to the Observer.

This clarification, however, has done little to dampen the media reaction to her comments. Writing for the Guard­ian, Raymond Tallis said, “Studies that locate irreducibly social phenomena – such as ‘love’, the aesthetic sense, ‘wis­dom’ or ‘Muslim fundamentalism’ – in the function or dysfunction of bits of our brains are conceptually mis­conceived…It will not boil down to something a scan could pick up, such as over-activity in the brain’s Qur’an interpretation centre.”

No one from the Times or the Huff­ington Post Uk was available for comment.

Turl St Kitchen hope to open a new takeaway service opposite the main site, in the former Barclays bank premises.

The proposed ‘Turl Street Pantry’ would serve as a bakery, serving takeaway sandwiches and coffee as well as bread and other goods. It would use “freshly made, healthy, locally sourced” and “ethical” food.

The planning application states the enterprise aims to bring “what is now a dreary corner of Turl Street back to life with a vibrant café space.” The proposed development follows the closure of Blackwell’s Music store on Turl Street, which moved into the nearby Blackwell’s on Broad Street.

Turl Street itself is used by around two thousand people per hour and the application claims: “If we can bring just three per cent of the average daily footfall in Turl Street through our doors, we could be one of Oxford’s busiest cafes.

“Serving around five hundred people daily, Turl Street Kitchen demonstrates this demand.”

Turl Street Kitchen was opened in 2011 to support the Student Hub charity, and employs twenty five people. It is hoped that the proposed expansion would lead to 8 more jobs.

Josh Powell, the President of Oxford Hub, said, “Both the TSK and the Turl Street Pantry will be part of Hub Commercial Ventures CIC and so the profits will initially go back to Student Hubs. However, ultimately some of these profits will cover Oxford Hub core costs, reducing our need to spend a lot of time chasing trusts and foundations. Clearly, in the current economic climate a further move towards long-term financial sustainability is highly welcome since income from trusts and foundations is uncertain.

One student said, “I think it’s a really great idea, although I do think the area around Broad Street already has a lot of sandwhich shops. Hopefully there will be a high demand, and the prices will be student friendly. TSK itself is a great venture and I think loads of students would be keen to get good, healthy food, all while supporting the Hub.”

St Anne’s College JCR has resolved to buy a 15m by 15m airbag for their quad, following the proposal of a motion at a JCR meeting last Sunday.

The motion noted that extreme sports are fun and that stairs take a long time to walk down. It also mentioned that members of the JCR have been tempted to jump from balconies overlooking the Wolfson quad. The airbag is therefore a measure in order to ensure the health and safety of JCR members and to prevent them from being “hindered” by the use of stairs.

The motion passed by five votes and mandates the JCR to purchase the airbag “emblazoned with the St. Anne’s crest” for €22,000, and place it on the quad beneath the Wolfson balconies. There was debate which included discussions of safety standards, the expansion of the programme to other buildings, the possibility of JCR sleepovers and the possibility of eliminating journeys upstairs through the use of a “rocket system”.

Oscar Boyd, the JCR President and original proposer of the motion said, “We proposed the motion because extreme sports are underrepresented at St Anne’s and this one simple bit of equipment will fix that. It will also save people time as they no longer have to walk down the stairs to get places, they can simply jump off their balconies. This is hopefully just the start of a multi-stage project, where every building will be equipped with an airbag, and going downstairs will become redundant. Obviously we’ll have to consult with college about the best way to implement the airbag.”

Lush, Oxford staged a protest on Saturday 1st June on Cornmarket Street against the use of drone strikes in Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen. Lush, the cosmetics chain which has a shop on Cornmarket, alleges the “military targets [of drones] are individuals who have been blacklisted by the US or UK agencies for displaying suspicious activity.” The protest formed part of a wider campaign against drone strikes organised by Lush and human rights charity, Reprieve.

The demonstration took the form of a flash mob ‘die-in’, performed by eight campaigners.

The sound of a drone in flight was played through a megaphone, whilst performers who appeared to be ordinary shoppers dropped to the floor as though stricken by a missile. “Each campaigner was drawn around in chalk by a fellow performer, indicating that every dead body killed by a drone is someone’s loved one,” Lush Oxford explained.

Rowan Parkes, the organiser of the protest, said, “Raising awareness about drones is particularly important to me because of the child fatalities they have caused, and the psychological impact they are having on children… and [their] parents.”

Concern has been raised by Mansfield students over the welfare of their college cat, Erasmus, over the course of the long vacation. It is uncertain who will feed him.

The age and origins of Erasmus are unknown, but the feline friend appeared at Mansfield several years ago and since then has become a regular part of college life. The cat currently serves as Mansfield’s Cat Rep and has an online profile on the JCR’s website, as well as his own Facebook page.

According to Mansfield JCR website “Erasmus’ position as Cat Rep covers many roles and responsibilities ranging from biting people to sitting on top of you as you try to write an essay. He is also known to show affection at times, but any evidence of this is purely anecdotal.”

However, concerns have been raised about how he will be fed over summer. Recently the JCR website posted a notice asking students to donate food to keep him sustained over the long vacation. 

Natassia Dhanraj, a second year theologian at Mansfield, told Cherwell “I think perhaps there’s a yearly cycle of him getting thin over the summer months when students aren’t there to feed him. I, along with other people in the college, am looking into ways to encourage students to buy food for him. I usually spend about £20 a term on my own feeding him in my room – he eats a hell of a lot and is bigger than a lot of dogs.”

Dhanraj continued “He is a vicious little sod at times and will often bite people if you try to pick him up or are sitting in the chair he wants to sit in, but he also provides much needed comfort to many.”

Dana Mills, a postgraduate student at the college, who helps to feed the cat during term time, posted a message on Erasmus’s Facebook group “Erasmus is short on cat food. Could you contribute a bit? Every little helps, and you know he will repay you in love and cuddles!”

Mills stated “I reminded undergraduates to leave food before they leave for the long summer vacation. Erasmus is a much loved and well fed cat, and lacks nothing in this world.”

At the time of writing it is unclear how much food has been collected for Erasmus over the summer vacation. Erasmus himself was unavailable for comment on the situation.