It’s an ambitious task to take the complexity of a murder mystery and contain it to the stage, but it’s one that Charlotte Naylor handles adeptly in Black Blood. It covers a striking range of characters, locations and chronologies, all within (roughly) two hours and all while retaining cohesion. Particularly as a piece of new writing, that’s impressive.
The premise is relatively simple: the Holmes family (yes, like Sherlock) are found murdered in their house, with the youngest child missing. Cue detective Roman and his assistant Optime to solve the case. We follow them through the process of cracking the case, with plenty of clues and discoveries along the way, of course. The whodunnit itself doesn’t get hugely more complicated than that. The plot resolves itself fairly neatly and there isn’t the usual large array of suspects you might expect, nor the grand conclusory confrontation scene that’s become a staple of the genre.
All this is not to say that the play lacks intrigue, however, nor that it necessarily suffers from its departure from convention. The most interesting elements of the play are the characters themselves, and their relationships outside the murder plot. Undoubtedly the most developed characters are those of the detectives, Roman and Optime, and the play hugely benefited from the assured performances of Lam Guan Xiong and Bridget Harrington respectively. Each individually held the stage, but their chemistry together was particularly entertaining. After a particularly vehement shouting match between the two, one audience member even shouted “rawr”. The insertion in the second half of Roman’s husband, Jamie, into their relationship was also enjoyably messy, thanks in part to a great performance by Carys Howell. The play does, however, slightly overstretch itself character-wise. There are characters introduced in the first scene never to be introduced again, and the doubling up (or even tripling up) of roles adds to the difficulty of following what is already a complex play.
Perhaps most importantly, however, the play is funny. It doesn’t take itself too seriously and with a strong ensemble performance, it rattles along at a satisfying pace. Admittedly, it loses most of the suspense you might expect or hope of crime fiction, but the payoff is worth it: it’s far more enjoyable, for example, to laugh at Mr Holmes (Kian Moghaddas) shout “attagirl!” to his wife and call her a “hussy” than to witness the cruelty he’s presumed to have inflicted. The delightfully creepy character of Matthew leans in a similar direction, with a great performance by Man Shun merging the sinister and the hilarious. Kate Harkness was also excellent as the conniving Agatha. Few productions I’ve been to have generated such an animated response from the audience, who were laughing and gasping throughout.
The production really made the most of the versatility of the stage. With minimal scene transitions, and the stage becomes a liminal space in which different sections can act as an office, a murder scene, a restaurant, a street and a bar, among others. It can also span temporal boundaries, with flashbacks to the murder itself punctuating the detective process. In a particularly satisfying scene, Roman walks into the space of the unfolding murder to watch it, having finally cracked the case. This staging is certainly effective, but it does remove you somewhat from its believability at points. Combined with parodic sound effects and self-professed anachronism (is it Victorian? Is it modern day?), the play does become increasingly detached from reality. If you’re hoping for a consistent logic and a plot rooted in reality, this play might not be for you. But if you’re looking for a hugely enjoyable, sensationalist comedy incorporating the fun of a whodunnit, then it may well be.
Elections for the Oxford SU 2023 opened this morning, but do you know who you’re backing? Cherwell News spoke to the four presidential candidates to find out more about their motivations for running and their visions for the SU. If you couldn’t make it to the husts, read on to meet them…
Clay Nash
Why are you running for SU President?
I’ve been involved in student representation since I joined the university and even before that I did a lot of community action and charity work. When you’re a member of a marginalized community, it’s very hard to sit back and just enjoy the social side of things, so I got very involved in LGBTQ+ Society. Within a couple of weeks, I was hearing about all these problems that were affecting my community and it kind of snowballed with trying to make change. I’ve now been President of the LGBTQ+ society and Co-Chair of LGBTQ+ Campaign and I’ve done some policy work. I feel like President is the natural next step to continue the work I’ve started.
What’s the main thing you’d change about the Oxford system if you could?
If I could just snap my fingers and change one thing right now, I think I would make sure all of the policy behind the scenes was standardised across colleges, as a lack of this causes a lot of the problems for marginalized communities and it would create a more universal experience for everyone. If students could refer to standardised policy, they wouldn’t have to do all the work in advocating for themselves, which is a huge step for ensuring wellbeing.
As current Co-Chair of the LGBTQ+ Campaign, what would you say are some of the problems facing the SU and how would you solve them?
I think what I’ve seen is a lot of distrust and disengagement with the SU as a whole, so there needs to be a really sound communication plan, where the SU – rather than waiting for people to come to them with problems – takes a really proactive approach and goes out to communities rather than just sitting static. I think that’s a really good way of you know, boosting relevancy. I think it would make people see that the SU’s a lot more relevant to their general lives than they might expect.
What sets you apart from the other candidates?
I think what sets me apart is I see myself very much as a student representative. Although I really believe that the SU has political power, I don’t see myself as a politician. I see myself as someone that is really community-focused. I think I have a bit more of a different approach to things.
What’s the purpose of the SU in your opinion?
In my opinion, the SU is there to fight for students. It’s there to provide resources, collate information, and take that burden off of student volunteers in common rooms, societies and sports clubs. Because the SU sabbatical officers are paid and don’t have to do their degrees anymore, they have so much time to focus on the issues that are affecting students and push for those constantly. I really believe the SU can can make life easier for students if it utilises its resources in the correct way.
Wantoe teah Wantoe
Why are you running to be SU President?
I come from a very humble background and I’ve spent many years campaigning for women’s rights in Liberia. That was a situation with very complex issues and I had to create solutions for them. Now I want to make inclusive solutions for Oxford. I want to bring MCRs and JCRs together so the SU can empower them to create sustained change in the interests of students.
Which problems in the SU would you like to tackle as a priority and how would you solve them?
I think colleges divert people from the SU and the SU needs to be more visible and more accessible. MCRs, JCRs and societies could be effective partners to make the SU more representative as a whole and we have to foster better relationships with them. All of my other manifesto points circle around that.
Not many people came to hustings. How would you go about setting up these student relationships?
I don’t think SU events are poorly attended because the SU is not important – the SU is the most powerful platform in the University of Oxford. At the moment it is just an iinstitution which is far removed from student life, so I would try to make sure the student voice is more represented as a whole. I’m part of the Africa Society, which has a very exceptional diversity experience, and if we’re about to empower societies like that, we can have a more inclusive time on campus.
In your manifesto, you say you want to prioritise finance, dealing with racism, and climate change. What are your plans to tackle issues to do with LGBTQ+ discrimination, disability discrimination, and gender inequality?
Obviously these issues are also critically important. Leaving no people behind is the objective of my campaign. For example, when I was studying in the US, I worked with several senators to tackle racial inequality and these are things I think I can learn from.
Danial Hussain
What made you want to run to be SU President?
Firstly because I was frustrated by people believing that change in Oxford isn’t possible. If change wasn’t possible, I wouldn’t be here. I also have lots of ideas and want to address the differences between college experience. It’s a myth that it doesn’t matter what college you go to, as welfare, mental health, rent, rustication and suspension policies can be vastly different between colleges.
How would you make the SU are more active and engaging organisation for students?
I remember when I started Class Act, there was virtually no SU engagement, because it was very much an SU mindset rather than a student mindset, which is a distinction I’d like to make. The SU mindset is really talking to a minority and preaching to the converted, people who are already convinced that these issues are important. Then, there is the student aspect, where you need to encourage people who aren’t already activists to get involved. Regarding how I would do it specifically, I would increase transparency to make people feel like they actually have a stake in the SU. Secondly, I would engage more with JCR Presidents to make sure the SU is representing student priorities. Lastly, we need to show that the SU is useful. The JCR’s sort a lot of their own problems out, and to a certain extent think they don’t need the SU. We should bring JCRs together and make them feel like they can institute change.
What sets you apart from the other candidates?
Firstly, my experience as the co-chair of OULC where I introduced a Welfare Officer position, a welfare procedure and an Access Membership. As Vice President of the Oxford University Pakistan Society, I helped organise a ball. Now, as Co-Chair of Class Act, I’ve massively increased our engagement to the extent that we have had events with over 200 people. In every single one of those societies, I saw what the problems were, and I reformed them. Secondly, I know how important change is at Oxford. Without a foundation year, I wouldn’t be here, so I want to make sure there is room to make change so more people get into Oxford and have a good experience.
Caleb van Ryneveld
What made you want to run to be SU President?
I think really, first and foremost, we need an SU that works with students and that engages with students. Low turnout at events and meetings shows we haven’t had the engagement we could have had in the last few years. I see myself as having experience in the SU and a lot of other student societies. I think that bringing my skills in connecting with students will make sure they are the priority for the Student Union, which is something I’m very passionate about
Other than engagement, are there any other issues facing the SU and how would you tackle them?
I think that students are facing very real challenges when it comes to cost of living, rent, and the treatment of students who rusticate. There is a lack of support. And I think that’s where the SU has the unique and very powerful position to actually advocate for students and stand up for them. Returning to engagement, I think referendums provide a wonderful opportunity to directly engage students with key decision making processes, so I would be all for putting on far more to those as well. In particular, I’m very supportive of the upcoming referendum on our affiliation to the National Union of Students.
What is the point of the Student Union?
The University of Oxford is one of the world’s premier educational institutions and the SU can help us to remember that education is ultimately the priority. You can’t do well as a student if you don’t have the correct welfare provisions in place or if you’re rusticated, and the SU needs to be looking at the way Oxford’s going to deliver the very best possible education. As well, the SU serves a very important function in representing students from across the demographics of the university. This is why I’m very passionate about bringing back the Vice President Women. I think, given that there are six sabbatical officers, there’s really no excuse for having removed the Vice President for Women. I would relaunch the review, which was conducted last year, into the sabbs’ positions, in order to ensure that there was effective representation.
Are there any other policies you’d be particularly excited to implement?
I think that we need to fundamentally reevaluate our relationship with the NUS. As the University of Oxford, we are in a uniquely privileged position to be able to engage directly with major stakeholders like the government. The government, currently, has refused to negotiate with NUS anymore because of how serious the challenges within the NUS have become. I think by taking a step back from the National Union of Students, as we’d be enabled by voting “leave” in the upcoming referendum, then we’d have a real opportunity to directly seize control of the agenda to make sure that students at Oxford have their voices heard by the university.
And… the important questions
Favourite kebab van in Oxford?
Clay: I feel like this is a divisive question… but I do have to say Hassan’s because he always gives me free food on my birthday and he let me go in the van one time.
Wantoe: I’ve had a lot of kebabs in New York, but here I can’t say.
Danial: Hassan’s because of the chilli sauce.
Caleb: Well, that’s quite a challenge. I’ll generally walk to whichever van is closest in the middle of the night. I’m not someone who’s going to go around curating them, to be honest with you, especially late in the evening.
Which two people, real or fictional, would you have dinner with if you could?
Clay: Frida Kahlo and Elton John.
Wantoe: Just the former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan.
Danial: Mohammed Ali Jinnah and Nelson Mandela.
Caleb: As a Christian, I would always want to have the opportunity to draw on the wisdom of someone like Solomon. But to be rather less pretentious, I think that you have some wonderful professors in Oxford, so the opportunity to sit down and have coffee with even one of the the wonderful lecturers that I’ve studied under at Christ Church would be wonderful.
Polls for the 2023 SU Election close on Thursday 9th February, with voting taking place over the SU website.
Political disengagement among the younger generation is neither apathy nor ignorance, it is a highly complex product of a post-political, hyper-normalised age of absurdity, in which culture has outrun politics.
In various conversations I’ve had recently, in mostly informal settings, I’ve come across more and more of my peers identifying as apolitical. I don’t believe it is a new word or concept but finding my peers at this University using it has led me to wonder whether there is a very particular context of its usage by our generation which could warrant attention, and I think there is.
My automatic response tends to be: “I hate it when people say that because it doesn’t mean anything, I don’t even think that’s an answer and if it is, it’s a lazy one.” That reply comes from basic logic which states that if you don’t care then you’re complicit, if you’re not angry then you’re not paying attention, and being in an educated and most likely privileged position, you should care about something even if you have the privilege of not needing to; thus being ‘apolitical’ is in itself a political action. Despite the farce of Westminster and modern political debate in the media, and the tired performance of the deconstructed pragmatic factions we call parties, politics is about government – people’s lives depend on it. A calculated excess death toll as a product of the Conservative Government’s austerity was placed at 300,000 (University of Glasgow, 2019). Politics is mostly a game that goes in circles and plays out in an educated middle-class space. Though on the surface its mode seems similar in tone to celebrity culture or reality shows, its impact is structural and immense. Somewhere in our parliamentary system, the real aim is lost. Tory MP Charles Walker, commenting on the fiasco of Liz Truss, said he’d “had enough of talentless people putting the tick in the right box not in the national interest, but because it’s in their own personal interest”. If party players were removed from the arena and governance was simply expert-led and democratically mediated, we’d have no spectacle or circus. It is in part this spectacle and circus that I think young people reject, though it’s important not to conflate disillusioned with apolitical, and I think that’s partly what people mean when they say that.
Aside from that, I also think there is a specific layer of context in that Oxford has an odd, low-level hostile environment for informal political debate. Thus, when someone says they’re apolitical, does that just mean you’re a Tory who doesn’t want to argue with me and be known as a Tory? Or a liberal who doesn’t want to be seen as an overbearing communist? There’s a hesitancy that somewhat evades explanation, however at the same time I can’t speak for the environment at other universities.
There’s definitely a feeling of fighting for space when it comes to expressing political opinions, especially, and not that I sympathise, if your opinions deviate from liberal hegemony (enter a victim complex). There is a presence of the two major parties on campus, but the atmosphere has changed in a way which I think also affects those traditional student grassroots organisations. In addition, it’s important to note that the Oxford Union refocuses a lot of political energy in Oxford. The odd micro-parliament in Oxford’s insulated bubble is perhaps not greatly affected by the deeply concerning changes facing political engagement, but the same cannot be said for life outside that introspective vacuum.
Something that led me to specifically think about student politics was a conversation with my mother, who was a first-generation university student, and the daughter of a miner from West Yorkshire. When she attended Keele University in 1978 she became a grassroots socialist campaigner, and later stood on the picket protesting the imprisonment of Nelson Mandela, working within the peace movement and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND). As I listened to her reminisce, the disparity between her experience and my own struck me. She said to me that if there were union strikes at the level we’ve seen recently when she was a student, they’d all have been there with them. I suppose our alternative is reading or re-posting a round up by SimplePolitics on Instagram and scrolling past a video of Matty Healy saying “we support the union strikers, can’t demonise it, it’s just how industrial action works” in autotune.
We can look specifically to our political parties today. Although an increasingly outmoded system, the partisan binary on which British politics has depended still commands political debate and its language. Perhaps through the turmoil of the last 10 years neither of the parties have seemed a credible option, and though young people are informed enough to see through the Westminster circus (and I believe this to be an important distinction), they have neither the desire nor the inertia to mobilise an alternative. Jeremy Corbyn can divide the left as well as the entire electorate. Love him or hate him, I think had an undeniable ideology. The Conservative ideology is to not have one, and I don’t believe Keir Starmer has any ideology other than murky centrist pragmatism. His reluctance to associate with the left and the leash which the Blairite old guard have him on will stop him from ever putting forward a convincing argument for some of his policies which are actually quite radical (recommending the nationalisation of industry and bigger steps to be Carbon-Neutral). Such a convincing argument could perhaps push past the political culture-stagnation that I will outline: There is an alternative to the non-functional inequality and capitalism in this country, and we are in desperate need of it. That which prevents the two major parties from providing credible change is part of the same cultural shift that has pulled the common mind of the youth into disillusionment. Culture has moved faster than politics, and that abrasive disparity produces apathy, cynicism and populism, leading to an interdependent cycle rendering politics as we know it obsolete.
It can be observed that it has been much easier for the far-right to mobilise young people, perhaps owing to the vicious cycle of populism. For example, people such as Andrew Tate and platforms such as 4chan both utilise the internet as a mobilising force, border on conspiracy and occupy liminal spaces outside of the political and cultural mainstream. They speak to a reactionary cultural niche of the digitally-literate generation, perhaps pushing back against liberal wokeness and a crisis of what is objectively appropriate and ‘liberal’. On the other side, there’s Momentum’s effective campaigning amongst 18-24 voters in the 2019 election, which I would argue combined effective media campaigns and genuine socialist policies which rang clearly for young people, who generally lean more to the left as a result of relatively progressive hegemony (Labour had a 43 point lead among voters aged 18-24). Despite these examples the dominant truth of the younger generation is a global cultural crisis which has coincided with, and in part contributed to, changing youth culture.
Without sounding shallow and trite, I can’t help but notice the feeling that being political is somewhat uncool. Even considering our language, we’d rather talk about an unimpeachable intuition of aesthetic judgement, vibes, than put forward an opinion someone might dispute with the ‘warring ethical imperatives of public discourse’ (see New Statesman article by Nick Burns ‘In defence of Vibes’ on how we are in a ‘sentimentally stunted’ age). Rather than using social media to voice opinions about things that will never change, we satirise our post-truth and post-woke era. We are ’chronically online’, shouting through a hyper-referential interface, hyper-engaged in compressed and digitised aestheticism that we obsessively categorise. The number of abstract concepts and jargon needed to describe online existence speaks to its surrealism and complexity. As a generation we champion being unbothered and unproblematic, as well as extremely self-aware and cynical. Perhaps the environment that produced Cancel Culture has removed the possibility for real political debate within our generation and made a mockery of its pretences. All of this then just results in bizarre online presences like Matty Healy, who purposefully provokes cancel culture in a hyper self-aware para-social performance. In the 21st century there’s been a cultural apocalypse which I don’t think many people have really comprehended. Coming from a generation that has known nothing else makes that even more difficult.
Not only have we only ever known a digital age, but we have only ever known a capitalist digital age. Mark Fisher coined the term ‘Capitalist Realism’ in his 2009 book, which is “the widespread sense that not only is capitalism the only viable political and economic system, but also that it is now impossible even to imagine a coherent alternative to it”, which can be considered to have been enshrined since Bush and Blair, post-neoliberalism and post 9/11. To consider again a left wing 19-year-old in 1979 holding a placard, my mum was a student at a time when there was an alternative to neoliberalism and capitalism, at least in theory. In addition, the marketisation of higher education over the last 10 years has changed the nature of student engagement and changed the perceived dynamic; rather than being part of a progressive and exploratory academy, students are paying customers. We no longer have the same cultural anchors and levels of class consciousness as our 20th century counterparts, partly as a result of a highly individualist post-neoliberal view of education.
Considering Britain in the 21st century, most political commentators would comment on trends of partisan dealignment and cultural embourgeoisement, and how Brexit and the precedent it set for democracy and debate did irreversible damage to political discourse in this country. These seismic events have contributed to the youth’s perception of the contemporary standard of modern British politics, and indeed this forms a substantial part of the last 20 years as one of the most culturally and politically bizarre periods of recent history. Beyond this however, there have been deeper and more subtle changes, which are much less remarked upon. We must consider the speed at which culture shifts as a result of globalised hyper connectivity, and the ‘hyper-normalisation’ of the deeply destabilising events of the last 20 years, from 9/11 to Trump, Blair to Brexit. Adam Curtis explores this concept in a slightly overlong art-film/political documentary hybrid (Hypernormalisation, 2016), which in short puts forward the idea that in the face of uncertainty and absurdity, we have retreated into an oversimplified version of normality, accepting a completely fake version of the world. The term itself was first used in Alexei Yurchak’s 2006 bookEverything Was Forever, Until It Was No More: The Last Soviet Generation, in which Yurchak puts forward that for decades the Soviet system was known to be failing, but as no alternative was imaginable, politicians and citizens were resigned to maintaining the false pretence of a functioning society. Over time this pretence was accepted as reality, thus this effect was termed ‘hypernormalisation’. As neoliberalism offered ‘a world without politics’ created through the democracy of commercial choice, politicians were concerned with managing a post-political world, what Henry Kissinger termed ‘constructive ambiguity’ or lying. Thus, the myth of trickle-down economics masks the reality of longer working hours, worse conditions, a dysfunctional housing market and the gradual decline of the welfare state. Curtis suggests this disparity between this narrative and experience has created a ‘cognitive dissonance’; he sets out that “the stories politicians and their collaborators in the media tell us about the world no longer make sense”.
This cognitive dissonance creates a distance and thereby creates space for counterculture, which I think young people effectively harness whilst being in tune with what created it. Though this may all sound far-fetched and complicated, I think it is something our generation has understood and done without realising it. Curtis also draws attention to the inherent flaw of ‘clicktivism’: Liberals expressing anger in cyberspace is only shown to other liberals as a result of the algorithms used by social media corporations, thus waves of mass public anger can gain no momentum due to the limited audience. The capacity for digitised cultural processing of the younger generation and their competence in using social media to gauge current issues means they are savvy to this loophole, and effectively laugh in the face of hopeless online activism and digitised politics. All the while millennials and older generations are trying to utilise the internet as a mode of campaigning, shouting into the void and further creating cynicism within their younger counterparts whom they are trying to engage.
Consider a platform like TikTok, where younger people are extremely culturally informed and use social media in a way which has a huge impact. However, I do think that we have a completely distorted understanding of representation and identity; social media has changed from ‘this is what I’m doing’ to ‘this is who I am’. In addition, prescribed identification is endemic; we all want to be told if we’re ‘a clean girl’, ‘a coquette girl’, or in our ‘feral era’. What colour is my personality? Do I want a Scandinavian summer? Am I into old-money core? Cottage core? We get our clothes from mood boards, reading lists from TikTok and our jokes from TV clips and memes. We love categorisation and reference: acute, generally meaningless aesthetic categorisation and hyper-specific reference. At the same time, there’s Marxist theory being discussed on TikTok, satirical edits of Liz Truss or of Zara Sultanah and Angela Rayner. When political commentators comment on youth disengagement, they tend to deem young people as lacking political awareness and interest or not understanding issues of class and the economy, but this is a gross misunderstanding of the nature of cultural engagement amongst our generation. In a trend that is eerily reminiscent of an Adam Curtis documentary, ‘Corecore’ videos trending on TikTok present internet niche aesthetics in surreal 15-second clips over emotional lo-fi, merging internet content in juxtapositions that generally criticise mass-consumption, focusing on themes of anti-capitalism. Their tone is not one of outrage or passion, but eerie dystopian hopelessness. I believe many young people have intuitively reached the same conclusion as Adam Curtis, without the reference point of previous decades free of capitalist realism and absurd societal fragmentation. In an age of the democratisation of information and images, young people mass process information, and have unconsciously become exhausted and desensitised. What is hyper-normalisation if you were born to it? It manifests as apathy, but it is really naturalised awareness to the point of static indifference.
The apolitical alternative is so attractive to young people because it rejects the tired media circus of Westminster, throws the toys out of the pram when there is no longer an answer to our generation’s obsessive need for hyper-identification and sets us outside of a cultural monolith we see to be disingenuous. In this country it is testament to a party system that is no longer fit for purpose and is more broadly the result of a culture that has moved faster than politics, dragging it behind in the dirt and shredding it into bits for populist hounds which young people are generally too savvy to pander to. This is not an unfeeling generation that does not have the capacity for politics, but one that is unconvinced by the naturalisation of a global cultural crisis, as we were reared on the method of its preservation. I suppose I don’t want to write this as a call to arms, or some kind of attempt at mobilisation.
I do think that as a generation we need to wake up to the collapsing global capitalist system and the dysfunction of its political institutions, and I think we need to think more critically about what exactly has meant we have outrun them.
Popular crewdate destination Temple Lounge has shut down. The building, currently undergoing refurbishment, will soon become home to a new restaurant called Mint Lounge.
The old Temple Lounge premises at 21 Temple Street are currently shuttered and surrounded by detritus. Two paper signs stuck to the front door declare “New Mint Lounge Loading….” in big letters while the Mint Lounge website tells readers to “[s]tay tuned for Oxford’s largest premium shisha lounge”. The owner of Mint Lounge told Cherwell that it will be opening in three or four weeks time and also plans to host crewdates. They hope the new restaurant will be “much better” than Temple Lounge.
Naz Choudhury, who ran Temple Lounge, told the Oxford Mail in an article published on 24th January that Temple Lounge “has closed permanently”. He said the restaurant had been “successful for many years” and blamed the Oxfordshire County Council’s controversial low traffic neighborhoods (LTN) scheme for the closure: “The council’s decision to put these bollards up along Cowley Road was the main reason, people don’t want to travel here anymore. After Covid the council could not have done anything worse than what they have done to the Cowley Road area. They should be ashamed of themselves.”
Temple Lounge opened in Oxford in 2010 and offered Arabic and Asian cuisine in “a unique ambient heated Shisha Garden”. The venue became a favourite for crewdates. Balliol College Boat Club’s Social Secretary told Cherwell: “Temple Lounge closing is a massive detriment to the culture of crewdates. It’s a staple spot known and loved by many, and the uncertainty surrounding its rebranding really places a dampener on future socials for the boat club.”
Alex Burson, a Sports Rep at St Edmund Hall, told Cherwell that his favourite memory at Temple Lounge was from the Hall’s football Christmas dinner, where “the food was exceptional” and staff were “very allowing of the slightly louder atmosphere that these events can create”. Burson said Temple Lounge “will be very much missed as it was one of a few staple options for crewdates and events like this”, and added that he hoped the new restaurant might provide a similar experience.
Last Friday, a new vegan and vegetarian Pret a Manger opened in Oxford’s city centre. Located on Cornmarket Street, it is one of just five nationwide to take the leap to go completely meat-free.
Within a week of its opening, Veggie Pret has already attracted large amounts of customers, mainly students. The branch is busy all week, especially during breakfast and lunch hours on weekdays.
Oxford’s Veggie Pret serves various foods and beverages. So far, the branch’s most popular and best-selling items have been the ‘Breakfast Eggless Mayo & Avo’ baguette (£3.25), ‘All Day Vegan Breakfast Rye Roll (£4.35) and the ‘Artichoke, Olives and Tapenade’ baguette (£4.85).
The branch has also seen attraction to their vegan cookies and pastries, including the ‘Very Berry Croissant’ (£2.99) which has been the most popular to date.
When it comes to drinks, Pret’s all across the country are seeing a greater appeal towards alternative (dairy-free) milk options. In Oxford’s Veggie Pret, oat milk is the most popular alternative option amongst customers, followed by soya milk and then coconut milk.
One of the Oxford Pret managers, Angela Botero, told Cherwell that they currently have a relatively small range, with 26 unique items of vegan and vegetarian food. Veggie Pret, through undertaking consumer research, hopes to be able to introduce more products, having over 40 to 50 different meat-free product lines.
Oxford’s Veggie Pret will become the hub for trying out new vegetarian and vegan food creations on customers.
Having new, healthy and more environmentally friendly food options is a priority for Veggie Pret, which looks to evaluate sales and bring in more choices in a couple of months during the spring.
However, the branch still intends to serve all parts of society and don’t want to restrict themselves solely to the vegan and vegetarian communities. In fact, Veggie Pret claims that “our mission is to make meat-free food so good it can be enjoyed by everyone”. Its success will be determined in the coming months.
Oxfordshire’s six other Pret stores will all continue to sell meat options. Nonetheless, Pret certainly seeks to grow the potential of their veggie branches.
Many of the most dismal and unpromising narratives are saved by the inclusion of a protagonist, even an objectionable one, with the smallest amount of charm, talent, or value. Not so with Noah Wild’s I Will Delete This Story. A merciful judge might turn to the set design or supporting characters (which, to give credit where it’s due, were excellent) in the hopes of encouraging its salvation; but I am a lover of justice.
The Writer (Rei Ota) drags us and the characters backwards and forwards randomly over Sam Simpkins’ (William Fitzgerald) interminable sixth form years, interspersing scenes of awkward teenage chat (in indoor voices, no tonal modulation) with his own monologues, in which he asks faux-deep questions that invariably devolve into strings of unconnected, meaningless words. Ota’s performance shifts to match, becoming erratic in movement, meaning, and volume (indeed, line delivery seemed to be a problem throughout; for example, Fitzgerald’s speech was so quiet that I found many sections of his dialogue to be completely incomprehensible). This structure left the audience with little sense of any linear narrative. I have no objections to the general concept of “making your audience think,” but having to do mental arithmetic every time a new scene was introduced, often simply to work out which character was which, rather distracted me from my unsuccessful attempts to enjoy the play.
One of the greatest barriers to that enjoyment was the treatment of the female and non-binary characters in the play. The presence of a textually non-binary character seemed at first like a glimmer of hope – but it was not to last. Their gender identity, whenever it was mentioned, existed solely to provide opportunities for misgendering-based humour for the cishet male main characters. Sam consistently referred to Zara (Kay Kassandra) as ‘she’ – ‘they’ seemed to be a word unfamiliar to the rest of the characters, who pronounced it as though it were something they’d never heard said before. It would, however, be unjust of me to imply that Kassandra’s performance was anything short of delightful. She brought a very true charm and sense of joy to scenes which would otherwise have been slow and emotionless, a real achievement given the slackness of Wild’s dialogue and the ill treatment Zara receives from Sam and his friend Kieran (James Gardner, who gave a sympathetic and intelligent performance although hindered by a clumsy script). Sam fails to demonstrate at any point that he values any of the people he has romantic relationships with for anything other than their capacity to provide sex; the audience, through the Writer’s monologues, is invited to sympathise with him. A particularly repulsive scene comes as Sam asks Kieran to leave a house party early so that he can sleep with Zara, who has just turned sixteen – and, when Kieran has left, it is revealed that they have previously had sex. The problem lies not in the acknowledgement that teenagers often have sex before they have reached the legal age of consent, but in the hyperawareness of legality and ‘correct’ behaviour, and the secrecy regarding contravention of these norms. This and the objectification of Zara throughout make for a deeply unpleasant viewing experience.
Emma (played engagingly but sometimes inexpertly by Marianne Nossair) receives similar treatment. It seems, for a time, that she is acting as a voice of reason in this play; indeed, she encourages Sam to talk about his feelings and continue his creative writing as a way of dealing with his past experiences (experiences which he is adamant no longer affect him). It seems, for a moment, as though we are watching a play about a deeply damaged man surrounded by reasonable people who are trying to help him. However, this is followed instantly by an extended physical sequence of Emma trying to pick up rubbish from the floor as she cries, and more rubbish is dumped around the stage, until she can no longer cope with the volume and retreats to the back of the stage to thrash about and sob violently. Admittedly, this is one of the more engaging performance moments in the play, but the message is less palatable. Emma – who up until now has seemed outgoing, reasonable, and sweet – is portrayed as someone deeply volatile and troubled, with very little grip on reality. From this point on, in her argument scenes with Sam, it is clear that she is supposed to seem overemotional and unreasonable, while Sam – adamant throughout that he is in the right – is supposed to seem balanced and calm. There is, here, a clear employment of misogynistic tropes used (perhaps unconsciously) to promote Sam and the Writer’s narrative of self-importance – again, one we are invited to sympathise with.
While this renders the text and characters within the play largely unpalatable, there is something to be said for the production design. The clearly delineated chain from Writer to text to stage was embellished by the costume and set choices, as colours linked certain cast members and set pieces to each other, and the visual effect of the set (furniture painted white with dialogue from the play written on in black) was striking. However, the set was clumsily used, with unnecessary movements between scenes which may have benefitted from an emptier stage altogether. The same is true for the props, which seemed to hinder rather than help the actors. When one is pretending that the cup one is holding is full of beer, it is best to keep it upright, or the audience will notice it has been spilt.
It is entirely possible, of course, that the weaknesses in performance were due to misdirection; Ota and Fitzgerald in particular had some promising moments which indicated that perhaps, under slightly different circumstances, they would have given skilled and entertaining performances. The general effect of this inconsistency in the focalised character was to create a blurry and distorted lens through which the audience were expected to interpret the play – I, at least, have as yet failed to reach a conclusion on whether Sam is being praised or criticised for his behaviour (behaviour that, devoid of narrative lens, I find to be reprehensible), which indicates to me a fundamental failure to communicate accurately whatever message or feeling the play may have been intended to convey. Overall, I found that I Will Delete This Story left me wishing that the titular promise had already been fulfilled.
Almost exactly a year ago, Cherwell published its first ‘Sextigation’. Now, after multiple weeks of data collection and over 400 responses, Cherwell’s sex survey is back again for 2023.
In an almost exact parallel to last year’s survey, the (mean) average Oxford student in 2023 has had 5 sexual partners since coming to Oxford. However, the types of averaging we choose to use can tell a very different story, because some particularly active individuals massively skew the mean. The mean female student has had 4.3 sexual partners since coming to Oxford, but the median has had 1.5. The mean male has had 5.9, but the median is 2. For nonbinary students, the mean is 4.8, but the median is 3.
Significantly 43.7% of students have had one or no sexual partners since coming to Oxford, with 16.9% having had no sex since matriculating, and 8.6% of students being virgins. Ultimately, what this survey shows us is a ‘tale of two cities’: one half highly promiscuous, the other having had very few sexual partners.
Indeed, those who are having sex seem to be having a lot of it. A whopping 17.3% of students claimed to have had sex with two or more people at once, with 56 respondents owning up to a threesome, 10 to a foursome, 9 to a fivesome, and 1 to a sixsome.
This year, 50.4% of respondents identified as heterosexual, 30.7% bisexual, and 11% homosexual, lesbian, or gay. The remaining 8% identified as queer, asexual, pansexual, didn’t know, or preferred not to say. This is surprisingly similar to the results yielded by a survey run by Cambridge’s Varsity paper, where “49.7% of the respondents identified as heterosexual, whilst 11.9% and 29.7% identified as homosexual and bisexual respectively.” One Oxford student who seems to be having a little too much fun on their year abroad termed themself “Españiosexual”.
There seems to be a significantly different experience of sex at Oxford based on students’ sexual orientation. The mean straight student has slept with 3.1 people since coming to Oxford, but for the median student, this number reduces to 1. For those who identified as queer, the mean post-matriculation body-count is 6.96, with a median of 3. Multiple respondents attested to “a huge gay hookup culture”, with Plush being voted the best club for finding a one-night-stand. As one slightly less eloquent respondent put it, “Grindr go brrrrr”.
The overall impression that the survey has given of Oxford’s sex scene is decidedly ‘mid’. One respondent went as far as to say, “the only good sex I had in Oxford was with a Warwick student”, whilst another remarked, “the odds are good… but the goods are odd”. A majority of students rate their sex lives at 3/5 or below, a value that stays consistent across all sexualities and genders. However, different colleges show markedly different satisfaction levels: the mean Teddy Hall student rates their sex life 4/5, but those at Univ award it a measly 2.9/5.
This variety of satisfaction ratings may owe to the fact that when it comes to colleges, some seem to be hosting a lot more action than others. St Peter’s came in as the college with the highest mean bodycount, at 13.5 since Oxford, 17 total. It seems that when the phrase “Merton is where fun goes to die” was coined, “la petit morte” may have landed surprisingly close to the truth, since in a surprising turn of events, the colleges with the next highest mean bodycounts were Merton (12.5 since Oxford, 14 total), Christ Church (7.8 since Oxford, 16.7 total), Magdalen (7.3, 11.5), and Teddy Hall (6.6, 10.5). However, since the median Mertonian has a bodycount of 0, it is fair to say that some have been skewing the stats. Indeed, none of these colleges made it to the top 5 last year, and Magdalen was relegated to the five that “get the least action” in 2022. It seems that a lot can change in a year.
As for the colleges seeing the least sex, the bottom five were Univ (1.4 since Oxford, 2.5 total), Somerville (1.9, 2.9), St Hugh’s (1.9, 3.4), Lincoln (2.8, 3.9) and Pembroke (3.1, 4.3). We want to give an honourable mention to LMH, with a mean body count of 4.8 since coming to Oxford, but which reduces to 0.4 when we exclude one very prolific but anomalous undergrad.
As for subjects, it’s perhaps time to stop sympathising with the medics, who have still found time to be the top-shagging degree with a sizeable average of 16.4 partners since coming to Oxford. They are unsurprisingly followed by E&M (15.8, 22.3), Theology (8.4, 11.6), Music (8.1, 10), and Geography (8, 10). Four out of five of these subjects are new to the top rankings, replacing last year’s “degrees which get the most action”, English and modern languages, law, ancient and modern history, and biochemistry. However, Theology students have retained their title for another year.
Psychology comes in as the subject having the least sex, with a mean of 1 sexual partner since coming to Oxford and 1.9 in total. They are followed by maths (1.4, 2.1) and engineering (2.2, 3.5). The high performance of just two Computer Science respondents has lifted them out of the bottom spot that they occupied in 2022.
However, a low body count should not be read as an absence of sex. When asked “If you are currently in a relationship of any kind, how often do you have sex with your partner?”, 47.2% of respondents claimed to be sleeping with their partner at least once a week. With a quarter of respondents having had a relationship with someone of the same college, it seems that action does not need to come from one night stands. Hertford has seen the greatest number of incidents of college-cest, with 46.7% of their respondents having had a same-college relationship. They are followed by Trinity (37.5%), Linacre (35.7%), and Balliol (28.6%).
Perhaps more importantly, a lack of sexual partners does not necessitate a lack of sexual pleasure. 3 in 4 Oxford students masturbate at least once a week. However, masturbation statistics varied wildly by college, with 95% of Magdalen students pleasing themselves at least weekly, but 57.1% of St John’s students masturbating ‘rarely’.
Casual sex does not see overwhelming popularity amongst Oxford students. 40.1% of respondents said they had never had a one night stand. For those who had, Plush was rated the best club for pulling, with 24.4% of the vote, followed by Parkend / Atik at 19.3%.
With 44.8% of students having had sex in a public place, clubs are clearly not the only place for a hook-up. Our most interesting sex spots include many a college chapel (shout-outs to Exeter and Wadham), the LMH talbot laundry, Christ Church porters’ lodge, St John’s squash courts, Lincoln Entz cellar and college library, Magdalen deer park, Worcester gardens, and the Catz moat (we’re hoping next to and not in it). Students also testified to “head on the Oxford Tube”, using “a remote vibrator at a college formal”, and having sex with someone who “had a life-size cardboard cutout of Tony Blair in his bedroom”.
Fortunately, the more insidious side of hook-up culture, such as both prude-shaming and slut-shaming, seems to be disappearing, with low numbers of respondents testifying to the presence of either. However, when broken down into gender, there are still identifiable disparities in students’ sexual experiences. Only 1/5 of total respondents claimed that there is a pressure to engage in hook-up culture, but this increased to nearly 1/4 among men. Conversely, whereas 27.8% of overall respondents believe there is a slut-shaming culture, this increased to 33% among women.
The range of statistical responses we gained told us a complex story, ranging from tales of Oxford’s top shaggers with total body counts in the 100s to testimonies from those who remained happily and proactively chaste. The comments clearly revealed that Oxford’s sex scene is perceived differently by all who do (or don’t) participate in it; yet the overall results suggest that sex is not as significant a factor in most Oxford students’ lives as might be assumed. As one person pithily remarked, it’s “very vanilla”.
Issues of college accommodation come into play here, as one person complains “squeaky single beds against paper thin walls kinda ruin having sex in my own space”, but several others put it down to being overworked. In a wider sense, the insularity of the university space is also a concern: “casual sex is relatively easy to come by in Oxford but often chaotic and emotionally challenging – especially when you have to keep bumping into that person for the rest of your degree”.
This idea of an incestuous dating pool is echoed by others: “everyone knows everyone – you have to keep up”. One person refers to the “whole thing about work making it ‘too hard’ to form a meaningful monogamous relationship”, while another grumbles that they’re “too busy thinking about my essays to have casual sex”, and one ambitious Blue puts it down to “high workload and sports commitments”.
But amongst complaints about casual sex, many attribute a lack of sex to difficulties in maintaining a relationship. As one person aptly analogised: “trying to sustain a relationship in this place is like trying to eat soup with a fork”.
The logistics of making time for dating, sex, and relationships at a University where even scheduling sleep into a 24-hour period is a struggle for some seems to be overwhelming. There are perhaps questions to be asked about the shifting attitudes to balancing ‘work and pleasure’ as an Oxford student: the decades-long mantra of ‘First, Blue, or a Spouse’ seems to have been swayed in a direction that favours the former whilst devaluing the latter.
However, a ‘lack of time’ for relationships seems to be only a small part of the problem. A recurrent complaint amongst our respondents is the misleading duality of Oxford’s reputation, as someone writes “I think Oxford is a place of both intense sexual excitement and shyness. It’s known for being both a city of nerdiness and a city of debauchery”. Recent initiatives like Oxshag (“for the overworked and undersexed”) have attempted to capitalise on this situation, aiming, in the words of its founder, to “spice up the Oxford casual sex scene (which is underwhelming and/or hard for a lot of people)”. Indeed several comments affirmed this stance, with someone writing “If I was single, I cannot imagine where I would meet people outside of using hookup apps”.
What these platforms have brought to light is the difficult co-existence of cultures of peer-pressure to have sex and slut-shaming. In the course of the survey, Oxford has been compared to both “love island” and “a city of nerdiness”, with one person lamenting that “There’s no space for people who want meaningful relationships but also casual flings with interesting people”. They go on to say, “You’re either a slut or married. There’s no in-between and it’s extremely polarising and awful for the culture”.
For most of those who do feel peer pressure to have casual sex, the pressure is often more subtle. One person suggested sex is “so prevalent and often talked about that those who don’t participate may feel that they are missing a part of their ‘university experience’”. Another person responded that the pressure is “not explicit but [there are] feelings of exclusion if not involved”. Someone else makes the argument that “casual sex is standardised, and many feel that traditional relationships are boring or unviable”. These pressures are embedded in our social activities, from crew dates which “valorise being a shagger and having funny sex stories” to Bridge and Atik, where there’s a “pressure to hit the club and hook up”.
The story looks slightly different when considering the dating experience of LGBTQ+ respondents. One respondent said, “I think a lot of LGBTQ+ identifying individuals start exploring their sexuality at university, so there’s a notion of ‘jumping in at the deep end’ that straight people don’t really have”. Another said their experience was “originally a bit traumatic; there was a real pressure to take part in that scene when I wasn’t ready.”
Another wrote, “Oxford is a tolerant city but a lot more closeted than I expected. The small size of colleges means rumours spread quickly so people are less likely to come out.”
A different respondent stated that “women seem less likely to date a bi man here”. However, they finished by saying “I’ve had a lot more sex at uni than my straight friends and acquaintances though.”
“Casual sex culture feels more pressured than with my straight friends,” said one student. This seems to be a common theme throughout responses, with another noting, “I think there is more hook-up culture for men who have sex with men.”
Hookup pressure is the most common comment, with another telling us: “Sometimes I feel like there’s more pressure to get with more people to prove your queerness, but I’m okay with not adhering to this anymore. I know I’m attracted to women and I don’t need to make out with one every other week to prove that.”
Many respondents were candid about the additional challenges attributed to their LGBTQ+ identity. One respondent told us that “As a demisexual person, it’s hard to meet people enough to form a relationship because there isn’t enough time or opportunity”, and another told us that “As a gay man, Body shaming and pressure to be skinny aka a twink is very common.”
“I think if you’re queer but not very outwardly queer presenting then it would be very hard to be noticed by other queer students. I find that I’m not entirely comfortable with other queer students because I feel like I am not queer enough around them (which may just be a general issue).”
These challenges seemed harshest for trans people. One said, “being gay and trans makes hookups a very strange prospect, most of my prospects are people I already know.” Additionally, “dating/hooking up as a gay trans person is hard, because you worry about how people perceive you and whether or not it’ll be safe, whilst also worrying about how having to acknowledge your own body too. If you find someone that’s supportive, though, that makes things a lot easier.”
However, there were positive comments too: “I have found dating quite easy in Oxford. I appreciate that the other person will have a similar workload to me, and therefore it is important to designate discrete times to see each other. This works very well for me as someone who likes to compartmentalise my day. I don’t think this is much different to how heterosexual relationships must work in Oxford.”
All in all, our survey has told us that whilst there do seem to be sex ‘trends’ at Oxford, every respondent’s experience is different. Initial surprise at the high mean average bodycount of students was replaced by equal surprise at the low median. Whilst the picture is not as clear-cut as one in which “Oxford students don’t get laid”, there is no formula that can be applied across the student body. Perhaps most interesting was the fact that lots of those having little sex assumed that they were in the minority, whilst many of those having lots of it thought that Oxford was not very accommodating for casual hook-ups. One student told us that “I feel guilty for putting so many ‘no’ and ‘not applicable’. I really need a therapist to tell me that being a virgin is ok here in Oxford.” In contrast, another told us that “there is a bit of a cliché that Oxford students should have a lot of sex to alleviate stress.” It seems that Oxford doesn’t really have a strong sex culture, either pro or anti, yet our respondents frequently measured themselves against standards that simply don’t exist. In reality, sex doesn’t seem to be a defining aspect of University life after all.
Although Oxford is home to a plethora of student bands, Velvet is one that truly stands out from the crowd. If you haven’t heard of them, you should have. One month before what you could consider to be their upcoming magnum opus gig at The Bullingdon, I sat down with bassist Rupert, guitarist George, drummer Joel, and keyboardist and singer Dec to find out more about the band.
With the band forming at the end of their first year at Oxford, in June 2021, Velvet has accomplished a lot in a short space of time. They formed much like any other group, with a few friends in St Anne’s College deciding to make a band, yet less than two years later, there are few venues in Oxford where they haven’t played. Starting off in college bars, Velvet worked their way up to paid gigs at multiple balls including Merton, Brasenose, and Exeter, “a LOT of Freud”, as well as at the Crankstart Ball most recently. Dec caught sight of them for the first time at an open night, before joining them in time for a Pink Week gig. While their line-up has changed a little over time, occasionally needing some deps for bass and keys, and now playing with their new saxophonist, Rupert, the band has mostly kept the same members, forming a close knit group of friends. Although they have so many members, the Merton Ball was a clear favourite event, with a circular stage and a great crowd, although Oxford Pride in Westgate was a close second.
The gig that the band are most excited for, however, is their performance at The Bullingdon on the 21st of February. With early bird and first release tickets already sold out, and second release selling fast, this is not one to miss. Velvet have wanted their own gig since the start and are excited to show a big project they’ve been working on after doing two years of sets at events. The gig at Bully will be the first time that the band have really been able to craft a performance, as many events don’t provide as much freedom about the set. Joel describes it as “the pinnacle” of their work, especially as it may be one of the last chances to see the band perform in their current iteration, with many members graduating this year.
While the band scene in Oxford is also mostly dominated by funk bands, Velvet leads more into Neo-soul, ditching the big brass sections of the funk band and experimenting with different instrumental mixes. One of their defining features is the presence of their flautist, Izzy. Joel’s idea of adding a flute to the mix for a cooler texture is extremely effective and is complemented by the presence of BNOC Adam Possener’s viola playing. The use of the flute and viola, especially now that Adam has a new electric viola, has completely changed the band’s texture, giving them a unique and defining sound. Although the band has tried more classic funk songs in the past, like Corinne Bailey Rae’s Put Your Records On, they decided that it “didn’t feel like them”, showing a clear sense of their identity. Despite having a strong idea about what they want to play, the band is certainly not against experimentation. They explained how Hannah, the lead singer, leads the direction and sound of the band, and how the others like her ideas because they’re different and original.
Although Velvet tends not to do remixes of songs, one of the things they are aiming for is for the songs to blend into each other more during performances, with less talking time in between each one (although George adds that this would also mean less clapping time). There is also the exciting possibility of them performing their own song at the Bully gig on the 21st of February. Joel describes how Hannah is writing bits of melody for a beat that he found, and the aim is for the other members to eventually add parts so that it becomes a fully fleshed-out song. However, he adds that it is difficult to come together and write something when there are eight band members with different ideas, so the only way we can find out is by attending the gig.
Despite the difficulty of bringing all their ideas together into one cohesive song, the differing tastes of the eight members contribute to the band’s identity. Each member brings a contrasting background in music to contribute to Velvet’s own sound. For example, Izzy plays a lot of folk music, so adds this influence and texture. Dec, meanwhile, is a member of Out of The Blue, which while being very different from playing in a band, still adds to the performative and creative process. Similarly, the band members generally listen to and draw information from a wide range of artists. Joel is into D’Angelo and Erykah Badu and enjoys playing RnB as it’s well-known but they’re also able to jazz it up. George on the other hand is a fan of Tom Misch and Radiohead, while Rupert likes rock and metal. None of the members are confined to one genre however, with music taste being shared. Dec describes how he is big into Bruno Major, lo-fi, and jazz, but is now getting into D’Angelo and Voodoo as well thanks to Joel’s influence.
The band also show a lot of freedom in the way they rehearse, explaining how it doesn’t feel like a chore, but rather more of a process. Their covers of songs are unique to them as they often play without parts. They begin by playing by ear and then writing a chord sheet, with everyone reacting naturally to the music, adding an element of improvisation. Particularly as some of the members don’t know music theory, playing things off of YouTube is an especially useful tactic. Although many believe that music theory is a necessary part of being able to make music, Velvet proves that it is more than possible to do so without, with Dec reflecting that it was often helpful to keep things simple, and to engage with the music through playing it.
One of the most common issues that bands have to deal with is performance anxiety. The band members reflected that some gigs feel more relaxed than others, but that bigger ones can be more nerve-racking. An event organised by the Jazz Society was especially scary as people would generally know the song, and there was more of a sense that they were listening carefully, so certain members felt the pressure a bit more. This wasn’t an overwhelming problem though, with there being a consensus that the best way to deal with it was “have a pint” and enjoy the performance while trying not to worry about judgement.
Focusing on the fun of performing is the best way to ensure the audience’s enjoyment. Velvet is the perfect band for anyone looking for an event filled with lively and unique music that guarantees a good night out. The gig on the 21st of February promises to be an exciting and unmissable show, as well as a refreshing dose of live music in place of another night at Atik.
Thanks to George, Rupert, Joel, and Dec for the interview.
Professor Nigel Biggar has accused Bloomsbury Publishing of cancelling his book on colonialism, in which he suggests that the British Empire has been overly criticised. Bloomsbury, a London-based publishing house, has opted to pay off Biggar rather than publish his book despite initially describing it as a work of ‘major importance’.
Biggar, an eminent Oxford academic whose research includes the ‘ethics of empire’ and nationality, reports that the company approached him in 2018 to write a book about colonialism. The finished book was titled “Colonialism: A Moral Reckoning” and was presented to Bloomsbury in late 2020. The book broadly deals with the historiography of the British Empire and argues that some historians have overstated the sins of the empire. Biggar argues that the abolition of slavery provides evidence that the empire increasingly came to be defined by liberal ideals and humanitarianism. He concludes his book by suggesting that despite moments of brutality and exploitation, empire also exerted a ‘civilising’ influence on its colonies.
Biggar’s work on rehabilitating the empire is controversial and has been criticised by other academics, particularly in light of an increased emphasis on anti- colonialism within academia and the ‘Rhodes Must Fall’ debate. Pratinav Anil, lecturer in History at St Edmund Hall, Oxford, wrote The Times: “Biggar makes a good Samaritan of a gold digger. His Cecil Rhodes is an unrecognizable reformer, an altruist among entrepreneurs, rescuing African men from a ‘life of sloth’ and inebriation, donating land to natives, hammering out an interracial peace. This is hard to square with the facts of his life.’
Nevertheless, Biggar’s editor at Bloomsbury reacted with enthusiasm to the finished manuscript, remarking: “your research is exhaustive. Your argument is conveyed with care and precision. This is such an important book.”
However, three months later, Biggar received an email from Sarah Broadway, the Head of Special Interest Publishing at Bloomsbury, stating that “conditions are not currently favourable to publication”.
When asked for clarification, she explained: “we consider that public feeling on the subject does not currently support the publication of the book and will reassess that next year.”
Biggar replied asking for further clarification and pointing out that public feeling was ‘diverse’. The Times reports that in his email to Broadway, he questioned: “which public feeling concerns you; in what sense is it ‘unfavourable’ to publication; and what would need to change to make it ‘favourable’ again?’
Broadway emailed back, concluding that Bloomsbury had found the criteria ‘difficult to define objectively’. She added: “we have concluded that this subjectivity could lead to your book being in a limbo lasting more than a year or it might not but we don’t wish to put you in that position of uncertainty.” Following this, she suggested that Biggar would be released from his contract with Bloomsbury. He replied: “it is quite clear … the public feeling that concerns you is that of – for want of a more scientific term – the ‘woke’ Left.”
He added: “Rather than publish cogent arguments and important truths that would attract the aggression of these illiberals, you chose to align yourselves with them by de-platforming me. In so doing, you have made your own contribution to the expansion of authoritarianism and the shrinking of moral and political diversity.”
Biggar has previously been criticised for his ‘Ethics and Empire’ project, starting in 2017, at the McDonald Centre at the University of Oxford. Its aim was developing ‘a nuanced and historically intelligent Christian ethic of empire’. Jon Wilson, Professor in Modern History at King’s College London, responded in his blog: “Developing a ‘Christian ethics of empire’ is not an intellectually sound, let alone an academically robust, endeavour – it is a political project much as an ‘Islamic’ or ‘Hindu’ ethics of empire might be.”
In this collective statement Wilson further stated that ‘as scholars of empire and colonialism, we are disappointed that Oxford is prepared to support such a project.’
When asked by Cherwell whether he thought there was been a recent pattern where books are left unpublished due to ‘public concerns’, Biggar responded: “There is plenty of evidence that in both the USA and the UK publishers are either censoring or refusing to publish material that does not accord with prevailing orthodoxies about gender, race, or colonial history.”
He cites the example of Bruce Gilley, who has had ‘several publishers cancel contracts they’d made with him under online pressure from activists.’ Biggar has previously defended Gilley’s article ‘The Case for Colonialism’.
When asked about the implications this has on future research, he told Cherwell: “it means that important topics will not be examined and cogent lines of reasoning will not be pursued, for fear of not being able to publish the results and wasting one’s time.”
“Colonialism: A Moral Reckoning” is now due to be published by William Collins.
Beginning the case against the current societal obsession with self-improvement is already attended with a problem of my own guilt and failures. The very notion of critiquing society, rather than oneself, is a refusal to take upon what is dubbed in psychological terms the “internal locus of control”. Someone with an internal locus of control believes that they are responsible and able to control events in their lives, which in turn makes them more optimistic, conscientious and productive, whereas externals, believing their fate to be largely out of their hands, are more neurotic, lazy and unproductive. Self-improvement channels and authors often view people within this binary, clearly privileging the internals over the externals.
The issue cannot be so clear-cut, however, because anyone’s judgement on the issue of the locus of control is itself affected by one’s own locus of control. It affects how one thinks and perceives the world, such as one’s political beliefs: on a very general and simplistic level, the right tends to be more internal while the left is more external. One can interpret the Peterson–Žižek debate (one between a self-help guru and a cultural critic) along this axis. Peterson tends to espouse the vital importance of having an internal locus of control, evident from his teaching that everyone should clean their room before attempting to change the world, whereas Žižek tends to consider things from the other side, confronting Peterson with the question: “What if in trying to set your house in order, you discover your house is in disorder precisely because of the way the society is messed up?” Žižek goes on to clarify that he does not believe that people should forget about their own houses, but that there is not a necessity for a binary between societal and individual problems.
Having an internal locus of control may be the best way to be productive, according to psychological studies, but just because something is useful or practical does not mean that it is right. Common sense dictates that people are always controlled by both internal and external forces. Someone who believed their life and their successes and failures to be entirely under their own control would be unhealthily delusional, incapable of seeing reality. Unfortunately, this level of delusion is encouraged by some self-improvement coaches, who often attribute no positive qualities to externality. An inability to accept any negativity is criticised as a societal ill in Byung Chul-Han’s book The Burnout Society (Müdigkeitsgesellschaft), where he describes how, due to our current orientation towards constant achievement, we have become exploiters of ourselves. Similarly, the binary between internality and externality as purely positive and negative is a highly left-hemispheric way of thinking, as McGilchrist describes in his book The Master and His Emissary, which McGilchrist believes reduces the human experience to absurdity.
Self-improvement in its worst iterations typically functions on such black-and-white binaries, purporting to effect transformations from one negative state which it implies the consumer is currently in, to the privileged, positive state which it implies the coach occupies. Common sense again reveals that self-improvement is a continual process, never a mere one-way transformation. But the self-improvement industry does not always allow for nuance, subtlety or the acceptance of imperfection. This can be a strategy for exploiting consumers. The worst self-improvement coaches entrap an audience by enforcing unhealthy, perfectionistic binary expectations upon them. This not only creates an audience where otherwise many may have been content with their imperfect yet ordinary lives, but, when people inevitably, humanly fail to enact fully the transformation that was promised them, may force them to continue buying or consuming the content from the same coach. Consumer capitalism creates a demand where none existed previously.
Self-improvement, the desire to be a better human being, has been the endeavour of philosophers since ancient times and is obviously integral to the human experience. Modern self-improvement coaches do not begin to approach the enormity and importance of this question with the requisite humility, however. The aims of modern self-improvement are faulty and simplistic, and consumer capitalism garners a lot of attention for the most foolishly self-assured to spread their generalised, simplistic judgements. Such a great deal of the trouble and chaos of today is caused from people telling others what to do or making out as if they know what others should do to improve their lives more than anyone else. Life is far too complex, everyone’s individual situations, histories and aims far too different for most advice — however much it might have helped the coach in question — to be applicable on a widespread basis.
The self-improvement industry in an ideal world would not exist, because it is a paltry imitation of ethical philosophy. Many self-improvement coaches would do well to try to replicate some of the intellectual humility of Socrates, popularly known for the phrase “I know that I know nothing” (although he did not precisely ever use those words, which is another thing that we think we know but don’t). Asking people questions rather than providing them with answers would be far more conducive to their real wellbeing. Unfortunately, questions are not very marketable. They are also not necessarily conducive to productivity. Yeats’ dictum that “the best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity” is an unfortunate truth of the modern world, for those who are certain that optimising productivity is the way that everyone should be living their lives rarely ever question their premises and are, of course, very productive in telling others what to do. Socrates, meanwhile, never wrote anything down.
Adopting a total Socratic ignorance may lead to quietism and complete inaction, which would problematise my writing of this article. I may be committing the very mistake that I am accusing self-help coaches of doing, of believing that I know better what other people should be doing with their time. But I don’t, and I don’t claim that I do, and I acknowledge that self-improvement may be useful for many people. On the other hand, I think the unquestioning value that some self-improvement coaches ascribe to self-improvement, and the absurd notion that people are only good so long as they are improving and productive, is ultimately harmful and needs to be challenged more urgently. We need to learn to accept the negative side of externality, the idea that we may not be totally under our own control. The modern obsession with productivity is as dangerous as the 19thcentury’s obsession with utility. We have not yet learnt the lessons the Romantics taught us: we still lack Keats’ “negative capability” and Wordsworth’s “wise passiveness.
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