Sunday 20th July 2025
Blog Page 2160

Week 4: The Papers

Aldate
-
0
Week 4: The Papers

Cherwell’s front page stays true to the colour of its mast-head. Lovely tabloidese about “urinating students… punches thrown… blood on T-shirts… bicycles thrown”. The editorial went one better, expressing Sun-worthy indignation about how the evening “descended into something altogether more sinister”. OxStu had the same story, but oddly played it down, giving plenty of column inches to reasonable-sounding JCR reps and college authorities. 

Still, points to Cherwell for national coverage. A quick google throws up the Sun and the Telegraph chasing the tale.

Meanwhile, the Oxstu’s front page was not sensational enough. Over an acronym-packed 3 page spread, much of the interesting quotes came at the end. The top line made it sound too much like a inter-Christian spat.

Rest of the news sections were pretty much on a par – Oxstu finally a bit neater.

Over in features, nice piece on couch-surfing, peer support: yawn. Cherwell take the mature route and include lots of giant phallus pictures (Tee hee hee). And more Israel-Palestine – isn’t there enough of that in news?

Finally, the ever-impartial Guy Levin reviews another play for Oxstu. 4 stars? How kind.

Verdict: Draw

Impressive Blues make a splash

Joe Cruttwell
-
0
Impressive Blues make a splash

Having won the Varsity match for the first time since 1999 last year, this match was either an opportunity for Oxford to begin a period of dominance in the pool or for Cambridge to cancel out last year’s loss. The Oxford team arrived at the Parkside Pools in a buoyant mood having already beaten the Tabs in BUCS competition earlier in the year, making the national final and seeing Cambridge relegated to division 2. However, the opposition produced a strong performance and the closest and fastest match in over 20 years followed, eventually leading to a dramatic Oxford victory.

In the Varsity swimming match there are seven individual events with each team entering two swimmers, as well as two relay events with one team entered in each. Oxford started strongly in the women’s 200m Individual medley with Alex Holderness finishing first and Rozz Bray third to take an early lead. In the men’s individual medley Will Alle decimated Cambridge, but a harsh disqualification of Osband allowed the Tabs to reduce the deficit. Two impressive swims in the female backstroke from Cambridge led to them taking the lead at 16-13. The Oxford backstroke boys however, swam strongly to finish second and third behind Tom Rootsey, a Cambridge fresher who posted the fastest ever time by a swimmer from either university.

The women’s 200m free drew Oxford back to onto level terms with a Dark Blue one-two from fresher Ann Hyams and girls captain Clare Kane, with Kane storming through in the second half of the race to touch out the tab. The men’s 200m was an incredibly exciting race with Oxford record holder Richard Hildick-Smith ahead at half way, but another impressive Cambridge fresher, Andy Corley, had too much in the second half of the race and Oxford finished in second and third. The times being swum by both teams however were remarkable, as the third placed time in that race would have won Varsity in eight out of the last ten encounters. Cambridge took a small lead in the women’s 100m butterfly finishing first and third, but Jack Marriott and theOxford Team junior Kouji Urata swam a powerful butterfly race to smash the tabs into third and fourth place and give Oxford a 41-38 lead at the interval.

The next race was the 400m freestyle, a new event for the women in this year’s Varsity match, and saw an impressive swim from captain Kane to post a new Oxford record time of 4.41.14, just behind the Cambridge swimmer. Varsity veteran Louisa Jurkiewicz came from behind at the half way mark however, finishing third to secure some vital points for Oxford. The men’s 400m followed with two very impressive Cambridge swims taking first and second and seeing Andy Corley smash the Cambridge University record in 4.01.54, with the second place time of teammate Rootsey also inside the winning time of four of the last five Varsity matches.

The next event was the 100m breaststroke, traditionally dominated by Cambridge and saw no upsets with them taking first and third in the women’s and first and fourth in the men’s. The women’s 100m freestyle saw another very impressive swim from ex-Wales international Alex Holderness to take first place, with the tabs in second and third. The men’s however saw ex-Cambridge swimming captain, now Oxford PhD student Tom Close swim 52.18, obliterating both the Oxford and Cambridge records, with Will Allen-Mersh taking second for the dark blues. With the individual races finished the overall score was 70-69 to Oxford, meaning two out of four relay wins would seal them victory.

The first relay was the women’s 4x50m medley for which Cambridge were strong favourites and managed to put clear water between them and the Oxford team, much to the delight of the home crowd. The men’s 4x100m medley relay however was set to be much closer with Oxford having won the butterfly and freestyle individuals but Cambridge the backstroke and breaststroke. The backstroke leg saw Rootsey take a strong lead for the light blues, however ex-blues rower James Soane swam a powerful breaststroke leg to claw back Cambridge captain Ho-on To despite being pipped by him in the individual.

At the half way point Oxford were down by two seconds when fresher Jack Marriott dived in. He motored down the first 50m to undo the Cambridge lead and just gave Oxford 1st place as current 50m freestyle record holder Varun Divgikar began his leg. He swam a rapid first 50m as was expected to maintain the lead however, unfortunately for the dark blues, the endurance of Corley came through for the tabs on the last 25m to take the race. Oxford however posted a time of 3.58.98, shattering the old record by over 3 seconds and inside the previous Cambridge record. Losing the two medley relays meant

Oxford had to win both of the remaining two races to take the trophy.
Although the crowd may have doubted the visitors, the Oxford swimmers clearly had the self belief required. The women’s 4x50m freestyle relay saw Rozz Bray dive in and swim a fast leg just behind the opposition, allowing Ann Hyams to overhaul her opponent in the second leg. After taking the lead, they never looked back. With the whole team pushing her on, Jurkiewicz maintained the lead before Holderness put clear water between herself and her opponent to win the race.

With their hopes still alive, the Oxford men showed their class in their freestyle relay, with four emphatic swims destroying the Cambridge team by over 8 seconds and finishing inside the Cambridge record. Ironically it was ex-tab Close who touched the pad at the end of the gala, signifying the transfer of power in Varsity swimming. The final score was 90-89 to Oxford, with the dark blues also winning the men’s trophy 46-43 and Cambridge taking the women’s 46-44. Being the first Oxford team to win in Cambridge in over 10 years clearly meant a lot to the team, and the celebrations started in earnest. Looking at the depth of talent in this team, the future looks promising for Oxford’s swimmers.

OUSU Gaza motion defeated

Mark Dayan
-
0
OUSU Gaza motion defeated

After four and half hours of heated debate, OUSU Council has voted against the motion to condemn the conflict in Gaza.

The motion was beaten decisively, with 21 colleges in favour, 39 against and 15 abstentions, but only after 41 different votes on moves to vote and changes to standing orders and discussion of eight amendments.

The motion, in its original form, would have mandated the Student Union President to condemn Israel’s attack on Gaza and to write to Tzipi Livni, Israeli Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs and to David Miliband, UK Foreign Secretary, demanding the maintenance of the ceasefire and to ensure that all borders are opened.

The result of the divisive motion has produced mixed reactions among students.

Some students have said that it was wrong for OUSU to take a political stance. But Lewis Owen, a first-year Jesus student, expressed disappointment at the defeat of the motion. He said, “I think it’s a real shame that nobody in Oxford has the guts to make bold political statements any more. We’re all apathetic drones, which is sickening.”

He commented on OUSU’s handling of the motion, stating, “I suppose that they attempted to make the process more democratic by allowing each college their own views, but ultimately it just muddled it up. At our meeting, we were told that we’d have a chance to vote on an amended version of the motion, before being told that it wasn’t going to be amended at all.”

Sanjay Nanwani, JCR President of St Peter’s, who voted against the motion, agreed that the phrasing of the original motion had been a problem in bringing about a consensus on the matter. He said, “I do believe the original motion was regrettably very poorly phrased and was therefore not conducive in forging a consensus on the issue.”

Despite the lengthy meeting devoted to the motion, some also argued that the timing denied a fair debate, as observant Jews had to leave the marathon OUSU council early in order to observe the Sabbath.

Lewis Iwu, OUSU President responded to the criticism, saying, “I made sure I spoke to as many people from different groups as possible when setting the time for council, hence why I moved the traditional starting time forward.”

The Gaza motion was also placed top of the agenda in both meetings. Furthermore I believed that over the course of two OUSU councils people had ample chance to contribute to this motion.”

Iwu commended on the way OUSU had handled the motion, “I think OUSU, and indeed its membership in common rooms across Oxford, dealt with this complicated issue in an adult and sensible manner. The chairing during council was excellent.”

The motion had been hotly debated in JCRs across Oxford since it was originally brought in response to the protesters who barricaded themselves inside the Bodleian Library three weeks ago.

At St John’s College, students even petitioned for an emergency JCR meeting in order to reconsider their vote. At Sunday’s JCR meeting they had voted to support the motion at Friday’s Council, condemning Israel’s offensive in Gaza.

But the petitioners demanded a secret vote, arguing that this was an issue of conscience.

Their petition failed, however, as JCR meetings must have 48 hours notice according to their constitution.

As students raised the matter on Tuesday night, the meeting would have been held in the early hours of Friday morning, ahead of the Council at 1:30pm. But college administrators refused to allow the JCR to book a room at that time of night.

Karl Eastman, a St John’s student involved in pro-Palestinian campaigning, said, “a referendum which began at 2am on Friday morning and closed at around 12 noon would not allow people to express their views anywhere nearly as effectively as they would at a JCR meeting.

Union attacked in charity profits scandal

Marta Szczerba
-
0
Union attacked in charity profits scandal

The Oxford Union Society has come under fire for misleading members about the profits received from charity events held on the premises.

“Charities and Cocktails” was held on Tuesday in the Oxford Union, in connection with Oxford Hub. The advertisement for the event in the Union term-card told members to “add a dash of fellow-feeling and a pinch of generosity” and to “top up with Charity.”

But none of the money from this term’s event, held on Tuesday, went to charity. The proceeds instead merely covered the costs incurred by the cheap drinks deals and aimed to raise awareness for charities represented.

The Union have also claimed that any profits that had been made would have gone to the Oxford Hub, an organisation that facilitates charity work in Oxford, who organised the event in collaboration with the Union. Union Secretary Anna Williams said, “the profit of the event goes to OxHub, the society we are doing the event in collaboration with.” The Union’s costs were estimated at £20-30.

However, a budget for the event shows instead a 50/50 split in the income, estimated at £260, between the Union and the Oxford Hub.

Union President Charlie Holt said, “the Union’s half will go towards covering costs… We can only ever guess how much we need to take out. In this case, 50% seemed reasonable. What you are basing the £130 on is the budget which was presented, not the account which gives an accurate reflection of how much we took – this will be published on Monday.”

He denied that advertising had been misleading, “the whole point of the event was to raise awareness of the charities that OxHub support – it was never implied that we would give money from ticket sales to charity.”

Students have attacked the way that the event was marketed, stating that advertisements and publicity circulated mislead members into thinking profit from their purchases would go to charity.

One member said, “I’m shocked to learn that the ticket money isn’t going to charity. I didn’t attend the event but saw the advert in the term card… I’d be really angry if I’d bought a ticket to the event.”

Another first year student said, “this just makes the Union look really bad. It really annoys me that they’ve managed to get away with doing this.

“Fair enough if OxHub staged the event to publicise the work they do but members need to know that this is the point of the event. Normally if you pay to attend a charity event, it’s taken as given that your money will go to the charity.”

Union press officer Rebecca Molyneux defended this term’s event, saying, “I don’t think it was misleading at all. In a way it was giving to charity. Raising awareness could be considered giving to charity.”

She confirmed that last term’s event did not donate any money to charity either. She said, “it was purely an awareness-raising event. The money went towards the unlimited punch.”

Union President Charlie Holt said, “the main point was to raise awareness and I think that was made quite clear.” Union Secretary Anna Williams said that “the point of the evening is to not only make money for charity but also to engage students with the member organisations of OxHub such as Jacari and KEEN in order that they may give up some of their time to help them.”

The events coordinator for OxHub, Laura Higgins, stated that OxHub would not be receiving any profit from the event, claiming that the event was not “a profit-making venture, but merely concerned with cost-recovery.”

She said the aim of the event had been simply to “raise awareness of our member charities…to encourage more students to become involved in charitable activities during their time at university.”

She explained that the Union would take a proportion of the ticket price to cover “costs they have incurred publicizing and organizing the event from their end,” and that the “Oxford Hub portion equally goes to cover the costs incurred in running a sustainable events programme.”

She confirmed that profits from the bar would go to Thirst Lodge who provided the drinks at a discounted price.

England clutching at straws

Jessica Kenny
-
0
England clutching at straws

A stuttering England performance gave Martin Johnson his first win in this year’s Six Nations campaign. On an icy cold afternoon at Twickenham, England were fortunate that former Oxford Blue, Nick Mallet, now the Italian coach, made arguably the worst decision in his coaching career to date. The attempted reinvention of a world class flanker, Mauro Bergamasco, to scrum half, contributed hugely in giving England their first half lead. A hat-trick of horrors from Bergamasco at 9, gave England a 19-0 lead after thirty minutes. In the first minute he joined in a ruck, forgetting his scrum half role. The subsequent lack of an Italian scrum half led to the ball being kicked ahead by England for a line-out, from which the opening try was taken over by Goode with barely 60 seconds gone. Goode is currently the top scorer in French rugby but, despite a positive start, he produced a less than effective performance at fly-half. His opening kick and early try briefly silenced his doubters; over the remaining 78 minutes he kicked poorly and lacked authority.

As the first half progressed England exploited Italian errors with Harry Ellis scoring in the seventeenth minute and Wasps’ Ricky Fluety following suit shortly after to record his first international try. The Fluety try came on the back of another dreadful Bergamasco mistake; a horrendous loose pass which sailed over the head of team-mate Garcia, allowing England to push on and score. After 30 minutes of rugby the writing was on the wall for Italy. Both teams exchanged penalties, with Mclean kicking well, and as half time approached the score was 22-3. James Haskell received a deserved yellow card for a mindless trip (when will he learn?) and Mclean sent another sailing between the uprights to bring the score to 22-6 at the interval.

The second half started positively and more fluently for Italy. With the substitution of Bergamasco for Toniolatti, an actual scrum half, the Italians demonstrated more structure and looked to attack, something not seen in the first half. With injuries hurting both sides, the number nine position was without a doubt the defining issue of the match for Italy. Following the game pundits described Bergamasco’s play as ‘the worst we have ever seen by a professional rugby player at international level’.

Mallet himself would have substituted him earlier had he not had such respect for the player with 69 caps, none unsurprisingly at scrum-half. Though Toniolatti holds just 2 caps to his name he played with more conviction and might have been able to pull Italy back into what could have been an even game. Whilst Italy were mired in their own selection dilemma, England’s scrum-half, Ellis, was demonstrating his pace, cantering over for his second try of the match. He was eventually handed the ‘RBS Man of the Match’ award, after a reasonable performance in an otherwise uninspiring contest.

Italy soon had a real chance of putting some points of their own on the board though, when Delon Armitage‘s ill-timed kick was charged down. Unfortunately for the Azurri, they were unable to control the bouncing ball, agonizingly knocking on. With increasingly limited service to the backs a new approach was needed. Martin Johnson used the 29-6 points cushion to experiment with substitutions by bringing Shane Geraghty and the uncapped Ben Foden into play.

The ill discipline of both sides, but particularly of England, marred play. After being on the pitch a mere three minutes Shane Geraghty made the same walk of shame that James Haskell had taken in the first half after a brainless and dangerous tackle. England need to cut out this kind of thoughtless play if they want to regain their status as one of the top sides. Italy, meanwhile, used the advantage of the extra man to put the English defence under real pressure for the first time during the game. It resulted in a try, bulldozed over the line by Mirco Bergamasco, brother of Mauro. At 29-11, England had the last say with the experienced Cueto dancing for the line; the try was converted and victory was England’s at 36-11.

This five try performance flattered an inexperienced England. With five defeats in their prior six tests it was essential for Martin Johnson’s side to get the victory- albeit in an unconvincing fashion. The lack of discipline was put down to ‘enthusiasm’ by Jonno, yet the giving away of penalties against a side such as Ireland, and against kickers like Ronan O’Gara, would be severely punished. The penalty count during the calamitous Autumn series hurt England badly and has clearly not been stamped out yet. Where does this performance leave England and Martin Johnson’s camp? Clutching at straws perhaps? The team has very little time to improve before Cardiff next weekend. Wales are no Italy, and this match will surely be a hugely tougher and more physical test against the Championship defenders. England supporters must hope that Tindall makes a swift recovery and that the team conduct affairs with more authority, control and discipline.

One of the key question marks over this England team is that of the all important number 10 shirt. Cipriani, in his current form, will surely not be thrown into the deep end against Wales-yet it is widely believed that Andy was unfortunately not Goode enough and never has been, ‘If Goode were an international player he’d have 50 caps to his name by now’ argued one senior ex England player.

The fly-half conundrum remains a mystery and will leave us guessing until the team announcements are made as to who is to face Wales. Ian Robertson, BBC radio commentator, said after the match that he believes Wales to be serious contenders to win back-to-back Grand Slams. The compelling Welsh win over a hearty Scotland at Murrayfield this weekend confirms this opinion. Despite falling asleep for the last twenty minutes, Wales won 13-26 with an outstanding performance from the Cardiff Blue, Jamie Roberts, who was awarded man of the match. The game of the weekend was Ireland against France- an exciting 30-21 win for the home-side against a spirited France. Brian O’Driscoll proved he still has what it takes, contributing a try to the great Irish performance. Sadly the quality of these two sides also augurs badly for England’s Six Nations hopes. France will also be out for revenge in the next few weeks.

After this weekend’s match, Matt Dawson was less than impressed at the standard of rugby on display at Twickenham. When asked his opinion of England’s performance he replied, ‘Rubbish, we are not going to threaten anyone playing like that’. The crowd seemed to agree; when the England players returned to the pitch to celebrate their victory they were met by a virtually empty stadium.
With the competition spanning from now until the end of term be sure to expect full JCR’s, as conflicting nations compete in what is undeniably one of the greatest competitions in rugby. However, for England supporters there remains the worry of an inexperienced manager leading an inexperienced team.

Self-righteous Selfishness

Cherwell Editorial
-
0
Self-righteous Selfishness

That OUSU should not take political positions is a terrible excuse to justify opposing the motion to condemn Israel’s actions in Gaza. The idea that a Student Union should represent all its students by avoiding controversial issues does not make sense. It is never possible to truly represent all students, all the time.

Oxford students are a diverse body with internal differences and disagreements, and this isn’t a bad thing. Only the most banal and pointless policies will find total acceptance: someone can always be found to disagree with a policy, even on issues integral to student welfare like counselling, student loans and discipline.

To do nothing at all is unrepresentative of those students who supported the motion in the same sense that doing something would be unrepresentative of those who opposed it. A Student Union that tries to please everybody will please nobody. This is why we have a democracy based on majorities.

The idea that OUSU should restrict itself to student welfare is a kind of self-righteous selfishness. Oxford students are far from being needy. That we should ignore the world beyond the ring-road would be equivalent to an individual refusing to pay taxes that will be spent on other people’s children, or a nation refusing to intervene in another’s natural disasters. This is not how society should work. If we can do anything as a student body to help those in need elsewhere, we should do it. If the argument is that our actions will be ineffective, that suggests that those in opposition are over-reacting just as much as those in favour.

Turl Street Shame

Cherwell Editorial
-
0
Turl Street Shame

If you’d visited Turl street last Friday, you’d have been caught up amongst brawling students, throwing punches and screaming at each other. You would be forgiven for thinking you’d just stepped into the middle of a football crowd in the 80s, at the height of the violent era.

What started as a seemingly innocent event, the ‘Turl Street dash,’ was fuelled by alcohol and quickly descended into something altogether more sinister.
Students drank twelve or fifteen pints, depending on which year they were in—a ridiculous quantity of alcohol, surely enough to turn anyone into a drunken, incoherent mess. But it was not just the drink that was to blame for the turn of events, it was that dangerous combination of too much drink and a ‘crowd mentality’ that the students adopted. Things were taken just that bit too far.

There were only a few students involved in the actual fighting but, worse, hundreds of students stood around, jeering, shouting, and encouraging the fighting. These students’ actions were as bad as actually throwing the punches; they too are responsible for the escalation of the violence. The only difference is that there will be no ramifications for them.

The colleges will punish those few students who urinated on the colleges and attacked other students, and shamefully ignore the mass who stood there encouraging.
Many students are indignant about the interest surrounding their Turl Street brawl; they feel that the facts have been distorted, and that their Friday night exertions were ‘not that bad.’ This may be the opinion of someone in the crowd who instigated the chanting and, in any case, was likely too drunk to remember the evening in too much detail. But this was not the case for many students, and it was not the case for those passers-by unlucky enough to stumble upon this event.

‘Friendly rivalry’ is all very well. But this event was not just ‘banter’ as students are fond of suggesting of even the most offensive and dangerous events. There is no wonder there is so much interest in this event, both Oxford, and international. Students at Oxford are in an incredibly privileged position, urinating on colleges and breaking bikes is not acceptable behaviour.

See no evil, hear no evil

Rees Arnott-Davies
-
0
See no evil, hear no evil

Eyup takes the blame for his politician boss, Servet, after a hit and run accident. In return he accepts a pay-off from his boss, believing it will make life for his wife, Hacer, and teenage son, Ismail, more secure.

Ismail falls into bad company, becoming uninterested in the life he once led. Hacer, wanting to help her son, asks Servet for an advance, but soon gets more involved in him than she had anticipated. Eyup’s return from prison is the catalyst that works to bring all these storylines to a climactic finale.

Three Monkeys, Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s most recent cinematic venture, is imbued with a mesmeric brilliance from start to finish. Though strikingly frugal in its execution—this is a man whose cast list rarely exceeds the bounds of his immediate family—it is neither deficient in spectacle nor in energy. One gets the real sense that this is Ceylan’s natural environment, affording him the ability to manoeuvre seamlessly through images and ideas that would have tripped up many an otherwise talented director.

Three Monkeys shares a deep likeness with the novellas of Alberto Moravia. Here in Ceylan’s film, as in Moravia’s Two Adolescents, the family emerges as a site of philosophical contention, a place into which all adjacent conflict is pointedly focused, with each character shocked into a desperate awareness of themselves and those around them.

The family, in Three Monkeys, serves as a stage, a plane upon which drama can be produced. This is borne out in what the director himself has to say about the film—’Since the beginning of my adolescence, what has most intrigued, perplexed and at the same time scared me, has been the realisation of the incredibly wide scope of what goes on in the human psyche. I have always been astonished to see in the human soul the co-existence of the power to rule and the potential to forgive, the interest in the most holy and in that of the lowest banality, love and hate.’

But to imply that this is nothing more than a philosophical treatise would be to do the film a grave disservice. To return to Ceylan’s affinity with the environment in which Three Monkeys is set, it could be said that he never misses a shot. Every image serves as an unflinching record of Ceylan’s eye for the piercing and the beautiful, with the final shot arguably as traumatic as the final revelation it serves to illustrate.

 

Five stars.

Free: Evangelical Instrusion?

Graham Thornton And Richard Thompson
-
0
Free: Evangelical Instrusion?

Graham Thornton

President-Elect
Christian Union

Free is an outreach mission that has been organised over the last week by the Christian Union. It wants to offer people the chance to find out for themselves what the Christian faith is about and examine the claims of Jesus, hopefully clearing some of the many misconceptions around today.

The talks, discussions and copies of Mark’s gospel (the story of Jesus’ life) handed out around the University all provide people with this opportunity. We have not forced anyone to take the copy of Mark’s gospel, nor forced anyone to attend any of the talks, and we certainly don’t want to put pressure on people to agree with what is being said. We want people to be free to come to their own conclusions regarding Jesus based on the evidence that we can show them and that is put before them.

Our aim has been to provide the platform for discussing the truth of Jesus, his death and his resurrection  because we believe it to be the greatest news in the world. Jesus says ‘For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life’. Would it not be immensely selfish for us not tell other people about this when we believe it? Immensely unloving of us to deny them the opportunity to know God and enjoy eternal life?

Jesus claimed to be God on Earth, dying on the Cross, that we might know Him. If this is wrong, then neither he nor Christianity are of importance. But if it is true, his claims are of infinite importance and so is the Christian faith. These statements are often seen as intrusive because they tear apart the worlds that we have created for ourselves. They suggest that there is more to life than the success that we make for ourselves in this world. Jesus tells us only He can help us know God – claims which may understandably strike discord with many. They were offensive to my pride when I first heard them.

However, with investigation, these claims are found to be true and liberating. Jesus himself said ‘Then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free’. Jesus is inviting us to have the freedom of knowing God’s forgiveness and love. This is, then, what Free is trying to do, and what we at the Christian Union will continue to try to do. We want to present this invitation to you  so that you have the chance to know God and know his love for yourself.

 

Richard Thompson
Co-President
Oxford Atheist Society

The fact that the point of the recent Free event was to convert people to evangelical Christianity is indisputable. Just look at their website for all the evidence you need: ‘Our hope is that many will choose to follow Jesus.’ Then look at all the merchandise they offered, the free gospels they gave out, all the posters – and so on.
As an atheist I do not see how the event can be portrayed as having brought forward an unbiased discussion, one that will help people ‘come to an informed decision’ as the website suggested. From the point of view of non-Christians, then, this discussion was not welcome. In fact, it simply served as an evangelical intrusion in to the lives of us who are perfectly happy without following Christianity.

I suppose that the organisers of Free would argue that the discussion does not need to be unbiased, as Christianity is right and everything else is wrong. Hence, for them, the idea of ‘coming to an informed decision’ should equate nicely with ‘coming to a decision with only the Christian side having been presented’. But – refraining here from going in to the big details and arguments – I would argue that Christianity is not right, it is in fact wrong. Therefore, the organisers made a logical slipup at the first possibility. Oops! And so, it seems to me to be quite clear, although with some slight generalisation, that the event brought forward a welcome discussion from the point of view of Christians. From the point of view of everyone else, it was an evangelical intrusion.

Right, now that I’ve argued the very wrong premise of the initiative, I’d like to go on a bit of a rant about the name. Free. I understand what the Universities and Colleges Christian Fellowship were referring to when they chose to call the event Free- Jesus freed us from sin and thereby offered us salvation and the promise of eternal life, etc etc. But… oh, the irony! I’ve got a friend on the executive of Oxford Intercollegiate Christian Union, and he has had less free time this past week than ever before. Though I suppose it was inevitable that he’d waste the Free week on his fictional God – seeing as this character is simply a product of his nature and his nurture, both of which are completely beyond his control…

American prospects?

Louis Goddard
-
0
American prospects?

I read your piece on theory in The American Prospect (‘Life After Theory’, 16th July, 2004) and agreed with the conclusion regarding the necessity of mediation between the academy and the public sphere. Do you see n+1 as successfully fulfilling this role yet, or does more need to be done?

Thank you for reading that essay. I don’t think n+1 is filling this role yet. I’ve always wanted us to. I do think there’s still time for it. We’ve tried to do it with the material from the philosopher Nancy Bauer and from the critic Walter Benn Michaels, and the assessments of Agamben and others-and in a different way with a special kind of writing that Helen DeWitt and Elif Batuman and Ilya Klieger can do for us, which variously gets called ‘fiction’ and ‘non-fiction’ and is really something beyond each. But we’re still not doing a very good job.
Mediation between the two intellectual layers depends first on finding individuals who are committed to both the university and to the mass media. Those who have, for each sphere, the right degrees of respect and suspicion. Such people exist, in private; I feel like plenty of people know how to balance the claims of the two spheres of intellect when they’re just reading the paper. But this kind of mediation requires, too, a shared language of mediation, in which you can talk about both worlds and not make stupid distinctions; and not get caught up in the cult worship of the New York intellectuals or the defence of the disciplines; or filter all of intellectual life through the memoiristic, the reactions of the self, and similar garbage. Lord knows, we get caught in those refuse piles, like anybody else. The common language is the missing element. I think the reasons that some such language doesn’t exist are probably economic and defensive.
‘Public’ intellectuals can’t admit they’re really ‘market intellectuals’-that’s Michael Denning’s term-shaped by their uncertain economic fate at the hands of the same forces that promote pulp novels and movies and radio programs. University intellectuals can’t fess up to the dangers of their over-secure economic position, cosseted and paid for, and therefore unrealistic about their relation to the economic world exterior to the university. I don’t see a lot of progress beyond the increasing intelligence people have about what goes on in their own sphere-i.e., intellectual journalists’ sophistication about the funding (and current defunding) of newspapers, and academics’ analysis of what ten years ago they called the ‘corporate multiversity.’
In that American Prospect article I said I wished there were a layer of ‘linking intellectuals,’ between the two spheres. They’d be unafraid of academic thought and would interpret it for the public. But they’d also be committed enough to a public sphere to be able to call ‘bullshit’ on university intellectuals without rancour or the trace of sour grapes. Since that article was written, I’ve been looking for such people. I’ve been disappointed by how strongly professional training in either the academy or journalism ties writers down. The major intellectual development of the last 50 years was the universitisation of intellect, for better and worse, and I don’t see that either the public or academic stories of that process-I’m thinking of the cretinish discourses of the ‘lost public intellectual’ at every level-have found any new, original relation to it. I find the instincts to all these mistakes in myself. I’m the first to make them. But n+1 exists in part to try to tamp down the erroneous instincts of the editors, and improve things. So we’re working on that.

You mentioned Helen DeWitt-have you read Your Name Here yet? I’m about half-way through and am not sure what to think. On one hand, it’s very funny and well-observed, particularly the Oxford stuff. It was excerpted in the latest issue of Oxford Poetry (as well, of course, as n+1) and seems to work well in that format. As a 580-page novel, though, I’m less sure. She seems to admire David Foster Wallace, but I’m not sure that YNH quite measures up to the subtlety of, say, Infinite Jest or his later stories; it reads more like the gimmicky metafiction of The Broom of the System, or like some Barthian nightmare that just exploded. I know that’s partly the point, but it seems to invest too heavily in this sort of thing not to feel at least a little bit outdated. That, and Ilya Gridneff’s emails are just boring.

Yes, we read it before we did the excerpt. I think it’s an excellent book. That was a big objection among the n+1 editors, that Gridneff’s emails are boring. But I think a good part of the book is the Pygmalion relationship (sexes reversed) of DeWitt to Gridneff, and Zozanian to Pechorin. You have to see that Gridneff is no Joyce to appreciate the manic creation of this young man as a hero, so that the genuine writer-DeWitt / Zozanian-can stay home and fantasise. Beyond that, I think DeWitt is brilliant in part because the underlying ideas are worth it-the fully lotteritized society, for example, as an extension of the current privatised and neoliberal order. Yet they’re rendered in the broadest strokes, for pleasure. She’s fundamentally not an elitist writer, but someone who reaches to a mass audience, more Vonnegut than Pynchon somehow. I really believe if that book were printed it would have a mass audience-a mass audience with aspirations to languages and high culture, which is part of what DeWitt’s book is devoted to making you love. She has a bit of a ‘spoonful of sugar makes the medicine go down’ approach altogether. She is so deliberately out of the mainstream that her democratic and anti-elitist tendencies come out alongside her real brilliance and attachment to erudition. I love Helen DeWitt.

I thought the best bits of Issue Seven were the interviews: the conversation with the Hedge Fund Manager seemed accessible to a ‘literary’ audience without being just another ‘economics for dummies’ type run-through, while David Harvey was admirably tentative with his political conclusions. Will n+1 be dealing with the ‘credit crunch’ again in Issue 8, or in future pieces for the website? Does the magazine have a particular stance towards it, in terms of political importance?

We hadn’t done interviews before. In fact we’re against them. They’re often a way to fill up space in a magazine without committing to the hard work or writing and editing an essay-and they’re so plentiful. They’re most plentiful in places where text is just a means for filling in pages between pictures-have you noticed the rich harvest of interviews in art magazines? Since part of the point of n+1 was to try not to run things that people could run elsewhere, interviews were really out of bounds. (What would be the point in that? They should just go elsewhere!) But HFM appeared, the anonymous Hedge Fund Manager, and one of my co-editors started talking with him, and those conversations happened.
This co-editor, I think, is a genius. He knew what he had, and he went with it-he kept interviewing. The funny thing is that the early interviews with HFM happened before the crisis emerged into public discourse. HFM knew things were unwinding, and he was watching what none of us knew to look at-like when, in the second interview, he talks about the possibility that AIG could fail, and the catastrophic consequences, and those of us in the office said, ‘AIwhat?’
I’d tend to think the financial meltdown is immensely important politically. The ambition of a significant part of the US conservative realignment of 1964 to the present had been to keep growing in ideological power until the generation that had experienced World War II and the Depression and the postwar era of growth in real wages would die off.
Then there would be no one left who remembered national solidarity in an economic framework, and the remains of the New Deal welfare state could be chopped up and thrown out once and for all. So a decent, serious, really heinous financial meltdown caused by deregulation and mass business irresponsibility, which can only be salved by massive governmental intervention-you know, it could be character-building for the US and maybe, you’ll have to tell me, for the UK, too. You have a stronger welfare state and, with Gordon Brown, a sane and confidence-inspiring Prime Minister, but it must be nice to be reminded that deregulation and privatisation isn’t the answer to everything.
David Harvey was tentative with his political conclusions, and it’s our inclination not to be tentative-but, also, not to be ‘responsible’ and realistic. The reality is that there are more than enough places which repeat the same sorts of realism.

 

1...2,1592,1602,161...2,515Page 2,160 of 2,515

Support Student Journalism

Cherwell is Oxford’s oldest independent newspaper, established in 1920. We are entirely student-run. By supporting us, you will contribute to keeping our paper in print and online. Every donation makes a difference.

Donate

Explore

Follow us

More

Oxford Student Publications Limited © 2025 - All Rights Reserved | Privacy Policy

Website by James Ashley