Page 486 – Cherwell

What does it mean for fashion to be political in the 21st Century?

Culture

Timea Iliffe

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5th October 2020

What does it mean for fashion to be political in the 21st Century?

If Miranda Priestley has taught us anything, it is that there is no such thing as neutrality in fashion. Even the decision not to care about what you put on your body is a decision. And as long as fashion has existed, its wearers have been readily embracing the extent to which it can be used as politics as well as aesthetics. Dr Jonathan Michael of Harvard University has called fashion “one of the most readily available political tools” given the free access everyone has to their own bodies – now even more readily available in a time when communication is more and more visible, with citizens absorbing pictures and videos more readily than words.

What this has meant in the 21^st century has been near-constant headlines about fashion, particularly on celebrities, being used to make a statement. This can range from the overt – Stormzy’s Union Jack stab vest at Glastonbury, NBA players wearing “I Can’t Breathe” shirts following the death of Eric Garner – to the subtle, like Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez wearing red lipstick and hoop earrings during her confirmation hearings so that girls “from the Bronx” could see themselves reflected in a congresswoman.

Particularly for people who already have access to the spotlight, there is often more of a struggle to make what they wear non-partisan. With more and more women entering political or public arenas comes increased scrutiny of how they choose to dress, from Hillary Clinton’s classic pantsuit uniform, to the media’s obsession with figures like Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle. The power of the male suit is that it is the closest thing to apolitical you can get, a uniform that puts the subject first, rather than their outfit. This is an option women have never had access to.

Fashion, particularly in the last century, has been a consistent tool of those wanting to make a statement, political or otherwise. The story of recent decades, however, has also been one of individuals being forced to confront the extent to which there is no such thing as neutrality in what you wear, particularly in your role as a consumer. A PrettyLittleThing haul is a declaration of apathy about the devastating impact of fast fashion on the planet and scavenging or worse, reselling from charity shops is a potential act of micro-gentrification, hiking up prices for those who genuinely need them. Brands are also under increasing pressure to place themselves on the right side of history, not just in public commitments or donations, but in the products, they make – see ASOS’s gender-neutral COLLUSION pieces, or the H&M “Conscious” range.

But even with good intentions, we should be realistic about the capacity of fashion to be a valuable political statement or engender real political change. Political fashion, particularly the mass-produced kind, often serves to make a political movement an aesthetic aspect of an individual’s identity, rather than a force for institutional change. No matter how public, or how positive its stated political intentions, brands will always have a bottom line at heart; whether that’s “This is What a Feminist Looks Like” t-shirts being manufactured by women in sweatshops in Bangladesh or Gucci making a #BlackLivesMatter post months after recalling knitwear reminiscent of blackface. Global capitalism has every motivation to incentivise consumers to express their beliefs with commodities as well as their voices. If they’re going to make a statement, why not make it a statement you can buy?

This isn’t to say that it is inherently harmful, or that there haven’t been incredibly moving examples of fashion used as a tool of speech and solidarity. But if style is going to remain a valuable tool of expression, it should be by making fashion political, rather than making politics fashion. And this means remaining wary about the extent to which what we can do with our bodies meaningfully challenges structures of oppression – or whether it is just funding them.

Four Children

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5th October 2020

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And I sat with my back to the skies

as I mouthed out a prayer to the winds

and imagined them ghosts; for where I sat, half-anaesthetised,

four children had used to sit, themselves unafraid (although as I speak each sings as he falls,

down, down; and is indifferently bruised) –

and the willows trembled just the same,

and my fucking lungs gave way.

The stream and moss and road and tree –

not less but more romantic now, for now all soft with their silk scars –

fell and fall flat. I cursed at God;

Half sick are we of vulgar printed smiles,

the shadows of long-faded grace,

Not youth, but an ornament,

not an image but an exile, as the face

of a dozen tragedies stares apologetically out. Still

I’m in love with pictures; beauty frozen, curling smoke, all caught on film –

here, where beneath my feet, miles of ruins break; until

daisies, like orphans, are born.

A stain against the sky,

I mourn and haunt this wreck; I recall

a time when we feared words but not death, as we scaled what remained of a century.

You are dust; and gentle you fall, over years of stark fucking wounds,

laments, which are ours to bury.

But home, whenever you are,

yours are the spectral innocents,

and all we are is strangers.

What TikTok tells us about our toxic relationship with celebrities

Opinion

Poppy Atkinson Gibson

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4th October 2020

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What TikTok tells us about our toxic relationship with celebrities

Child stars have always been a feature of the modern celebrity world. This status, held by the likes of Shirley Temple, Lindsey Lohan, and more recently by Millie Bobby Brown and Finn Wolfhard, is a heavier burden than one might think. In addition to these traditional silver screen stars, notable TikTok influencers such as Charli D’Amelio and Addison Rae have also been welcomed into the fold of early fame which includes its sexualisation of their lives, primarily through their highly-publicised relationships. Whilst the child stars of the early 20^th century certainly faced immense pressure and difficulties, social media now adds a perverse layer to the intense scrutiny these children and young adults face. Stars can now make successful careers out of being watched 24/7 – in fact, Addison Rae is reported to have made $5 million this year, making her the current highest earning Tik Tok-er. The job of such celebrities is in no way a 9-5. They are expected to always be on show. And as these individuals dance, joke and show us round their homes and lives, weaving through their friends and relationships, their every move is picked over by vultures, eventually harming these stars.

For TikTok stars, fame means that their lives are laid bare for all to see. No part of their lives is too insignificant for their audiences to unpick. For example, Charlie D’Amelio recently documented her nose operation (reportedly to help with some breathing difficulties) and in true influencer style condensed the whole procedure into a 16 minute documentary-style clip. This highlights how TikTok-ers feel that they must give their fans an insight into their private lives. Even personal facets of their lives like their dating history are widely reported on by major media outlets including the Daily Mail. Such outlets prey on the average teenage foray into adult relationships and blow it up in size, splashing it across front pages. Whilst this is not overt sexualisation per se, it is nonetheless a sinister force. Such journalism seeks to make these stars adults before their time, treating their personal lives as they would treat hardened celebrities’. These child stars are denied a support system which allows them to flourish as adolescents first and celebrities second. It forces them into the lion’s den, attaching sexual and adult themes to their lives.

The issue is that these TikTok-ers, many under 18, are exposed to the full force of the idea of the internet celebrity. They are, possibly without realising it, expected to fulfil a set of behavioural conditions to qualify them as a ‘celebrity’. They are, without consent, adultified by mainstream media; the expectation of these stars to conform to adult behaviours stunts their development as children and young people and will ultimately detrimentally affect their development and mental health. The problem is that sex sells and the media knows it. So the media sexualises one and all and enables them to rise to celebrity status through notoriety. Young stars see this, and are unable to object to it, instead playing to the media. Stories published by papers such as The Sun detail activities of stars including Addison Rae and Bryce Hall, chronicling the “PDA-filled clip of the couple kissing over the weekend” whilst describing Rae as “flaunt[ing] her toned stomach in a red crop top and distressed denim jeans”. Not only do the tabloids sexualise these young adults’ relationships but sexualise their images and bodies too.

Amongst the elite of the TikTok community there have been public Twitter spats, relationships bust ups, and accusations of cheating from individuals ranging from 14 to 18. Such behaviour is not the norm for most teenagers, but is encouraged by mainstream media and its audience as a way to remain ‘relevant’. These stars play at relationships and adult scenarios in the highly stressful and intense world of social media where they are constantly asked to live up to unrealistic expectations. We, the audience, also play into this cycle despite being aware at some level that sex is a powerful tool used by the media.

I am not suggesting these stars should hide themselves away at all. They are perfectly entitled to showcase as much of their lives as they want, but it is important to consider why they do it. It seems that what starts out as the extra-curricular use of a social media platforms is manipulated to view these teenagers through an adult lens without their permission. How much autonomy do these young stars really have in a celebrity culture where paths have already been carved out and there already exist moulds to fit?

One could very well ask why the parents or management (they are so often one and the same) do not do more to protect these stars. But these people are operating in a fully formed system, where the roads to stardom are firmly established. There are only two choices: follow the rules and get rich, or refuse and fade out of fame. And we support these unspoken laws. As we sit at the dentist, we pick up the gossip magazine and flick though to find out who is having an affair with whom. We feed off that information and in our own small ways perpetuate the narrative that monetary success should be based on sex and conforming to adult behavioural codes that are simply unsuitable for child stars. Articles run stories recounting the timeline of high profile relationships such as Cosmopolitan’s “Official Timeline” of Charli D’Amelio and Chase Hudson’s relationship, which includes statements made by D’Amelio’s mother asking the media to stop commenting on her daughter’s teenage relationship. The problem with such media coverage lies in our idea of celebrity and its connection with the media.

We expect actors, singers, influencers etc to make a contract with us, the audience, when they enter into the spotlight. Their privacy is no longer valid, their lives are our lives. We hold them, so often, to a higher moral standard whilst simultaneously gorging on their failures and insecurities. Ultimately, we make them our role models whilst never telling them quite what we want from them. TikTok stars are attempting to fit into this traditional celebrity institution. They strive to give their followers what they think they want based on that model. And so, the content they produce covers their relationships, insecurities, and cosmetic procedures in an attempt to remain relevant. Social media accounts are filled with loved-up videos and posts honouring their ex-partners who “will always hold a special place in my heart for the rest of my life”. Such hyperbolic language and public testimony is expected of adult celebrities, and similar statements can be found on social media and in tabloids following their divorces. It seems odd that that same expectation is applied to teenagers’ short lived, experimental high school relationships. This is a prime example of teenagers feeling pressured to behave publicly like adults, simply because there are no other apparent alternatives.

Problematically, this means they try to force themselves into a mould not created for them as essentially child stars. As an audience, we have not provided them with a different mould to fit into or a space to inhabit. Instead we have presented them with the same pervasive and lecherous identity as we have for adult celebrities. But these younger stars are not equipped to manage it – everything is magnified and so we are left with the ‘child star burnouts’ all too familiar to us. It appears that Tik Tok stars themselves have begun recognising this burn-out, with Griffin Johnson recently commenting that “[o]ur [his and Dixie D’Amelio’s] relationship was put out into the public out of our control and I have been taking heat ever since.” Johnson’s experience shows us that such teenage forays into relationships and other milestones should not be splashed across tabloids which enable the public to relive every gory detail.

Yet, when we see this burn-out play out, we shake our heads at the headlines and sigh “what a shame, they had so much potential,” before scrolling on in search for the next up-and-coming star to devour. These TikTok stars are what we have made them through our gluttonous appetite for celebrity. Their crash back down to earth will be a product of that same greed, but instead of fixing it we continue condemning future generations to the thrall of social media stardom and the mental and emotional toil it takes. I fear for the exploitation of young adults, and children who in their desire for fame play into a role not built and not fit for them. Ultimately the behaviour of TikTok stars is a symptom of our broken relationship with fame, celebrity, and the media.

Say Bye Bye to Billionaires

Opinion

Cherwell Comment

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4th October 2020

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“We should certainly know by now that it is one thing to overthrow a dictator or repel an invader and quite another thing to really achieve a revolution.” – James Baldwin, 1963.

The accumulation of capital and stunningly opulent lifestyles lived by today’s billionaires is beyond the bounds of human imagination. Keeping in mind the levels of abject poverty that still define people’s lives across the world, one must practice a sort of cognitive dissonance to resolve the two lived experiences into one vision of humanity. Yet the status of ‘billionaire’ is the ultimate sign of accomplishment in the age of global capitalism. Depressingly, with the UN coming out recently and warning that the 2020s may be a ‘lost decade’ economically, such divides are set to widen. This is not some accident of fortune either. With the advent of global capitalism and the worldwide influence thus granted to those who hold massed capital, those at the top of the food chain – billionaire elites – are able to maintain their positions by directly or indirectly keeping those below them in destitution. All this may sound a bit dialectical, but such is the state of the world’s current wealth disparities.

Jeff Bezos, as of August 26, has a net worth of USD204.6 billion; debates can be had over the liquidity of this figure but it still stands as the sum of his capital assets. The median yearly wage for those working full-time in the UK is approximately USD 38,770. It would thus take around six million and seven hundred thousand years for someone on that (pretty substantial) salary to build up a net worth equal to Jeff Bezos’. However, given the currently buoyant state of global stock markets he will likely have gotten a fair few billion richer by the time this article is published. We can surmise, then, that if one could get into a time machine and grant immortality, a decently paying desk job, and an understanding of currency to one of humankind’s Ardipithecus ancestors they may by now be laughing (or possibly grunting) with delight all the way to the bank as the wealthiest being on earth. Sadly, taxation on salaried income may slow our prehistoric friend’s progress – not something Bezos or his billionaire buddies have to worry about.

The existence of absurdly wealthy individuals is of course nothing new, but globalisation has boosted their power immensely. Mansa Musa of Mali or Charles V of Spain had monopolies on capital beyond today’s billionaires’ wildest dreams. However, they lacked the worldwide financial frameworks through which the super-rich can now spread their influence across all seven continents. Europe and North America together have populations comprising 20% of the global total, but hold around 67% of the world’s total wealth. This wealth gap is reflected in those regions’ share of the world’s billionaires, with the number of European and North American billionaires almost doubling the number of billionaires in the vastly more populous Asian region. As global capitalism’s agents of change, western billionaires and the companies through which they operate uphold systems of western dominance aided by the legacy of colonial exploitation the world over – Amazon’s incursions into the Indian market are a prime example.

In 2018, Amazon overtook Flipkart (a domestic rival) as the largest ecommerce retailer in India. In that same year, to the horror of Indian smalltraders, a controlling stake in Flipkart was acquired by the Walmart corporation (controlled by the Walton family – a billionaire dynasty to rival the Habsburgs or Von Hohenzollerns) and Ebay relaunched operations in the country. Foreign capital has thus come to dominate a crucial emerging sector in a country with 1.35 billion potential domestic entrepreneurs. Africa faces a similar loss of its crucial infrastructure to foreign capital; much is made of China’s massive investment in the continent’s physical infrastructure, but Google’s dominance of its web infrastructure stands only to be challenged by another Western player – Facebook as headed by Mark Zuckerberg. The West’s relative capital advantage, built on the foundations of colonialism, thus stands to allow the dominance of western capital for decades to come. The extravagant lives lived by billionaires may be sickening when compared to the plight of the world’s poorest, but the exploitative financial systems from which they benefit and through which they exercise their wealth are even worse. A Mark Zuckerberg or Jeff Bezos born in the Democratic Republic of the Congo would have nowhere near the level of opportunity afforded to their western counterparts. In fact, they may end up mining for cobalt aged six aiding in the production of smartphones on which we lucky few can poke our pals or shop for Chilly’s bottles. Billionaires, and western billionaires in particular, thus stand as wretched totems of global capitalism; if you can put aside all humanity, wrestle the other hogs away from the trough, and get your snout deep enough into the swill, you too could be a billionaire living high to the detriment of millions.

As I write this, I can already hear screams of protest from apologists for this absurd state of affairs. Philanthropic efforts on the part of billionaires get a lot of media attention and can aid in the achievement of great things; The Gates Foundation’s part in the battle to eradicate polio in Africa has seen a lot of success, and the exceptional case of Chuck Feeney – who recently finished giving away his entire USD 8 billion fortune – suggests his being an extremely generous soul. But why is the ability to achieve positive change being left to the whims of individuals? Someone with access to the unrivalled resources of a billionaire could just as easily pursue ego projects like Elon Musk’s SpaceX as solve global hunger. Additionally, altruism isn’t the only motivation for a billionaire to set up a charitable foundation. It can also act as a useful extra element of their tax dodging arrangements, and provide positive PR to those seeking to add themselves to the ranks of our new plutocratic overlords. Why is Bill Gates, a man who made his money off selling computers, now a key player in the global response to COVID-19? The payrolls of charitable foundations are often packed with billionaires’ offspring on massive pay packets with ample travel opportunities (25% of privately chartered flights are by philanthropic organisations). Altruism in fact stands as anathema to the systems which put billionaires on their perches. It is continued consumption on the scale that has taken our planet’s ecosystem to the brink of disaster and helped keep millions in poverty that allows for the induction of businesspeople worldwide into the billionaire classes.

Despite my whining, billionaires are not at the heart of the sickness; rather, they are surface tumours. It is the global capitalistic system that has taken us to this surreal epoch in which 10.7% of humans are malnourished while less than 0.0001% hold the resources to live a thousand lifetimes. In which around 2100 individuals have more capital than the poorest 60% of the world’s population. If the system doesn’t go, we will. Our patterns of consumption – upheld by those at the top to the detriment of those at the bottom – are set to destroy us. Of course, once the super-rich are bored of their slowly melting playground, they will doubtless have the funds to make it up to Elon Musk’s shiny new Mars colony. To utilise James Baldwin’s idea, until we apprehend the danger we are in, nothing can be done about it. The sooner that happens the better.

Author wishes to remain anonymous.

Image by Steve Jurvetson

Monza & Mugello: Great TV, Depressing Sport

Sport

William McCathie

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2nd October 2020

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Monza & Mugello: Great TV, Depressing Sport

The past couple weeks have played host to some excellent television spectacle in motorsport, as this season’s two back-to-back F1 Grand Prix in Italy saw anything but conventional racing. At Monza, a poor start from Bottas and an illegal pit stop from Hamilton, which saw him get a stop-and-go penalty, opened the field up for the unlikely narrow victory of Pierre Gasly in the Alpha Tauri over Carlos Sainz and Lance Stroll. At Mugello, a twice-red-flagged race, only 12 cars finished following an enormous pileup. Despite this chaos, the dominance of Hamilton in the driver’s championship and Mercedes in the constructors only solidified.

The records keep stacking up for Hamilton – his victory in the inaugural Tuscan GP at Mugello sees him both tie Schumacher’s record of most race wins (90) and exceed Nick Heidfeld’s record of most consecutive F1 points places finishes (42), a record he valiantly equalled at Monza with a charge up the field into 7^th from the back of the pack following his stop-and-go penalty. Whilst he has arguably been heavily helped with the former record through having the fastest car on the grid since 2014, his impressive consistency, exemplified by the surpassing of this latter record, and enduring pace that have continually allowed him to overshadow teammates prove he is well worthy of being strongly considered the greatest British racing driver of all time. Moreover, with his inevitable victory in this season’s driver’s championship and equalling of Schumacher’s record seven world championship titles, quite possibly the greatest the greatest racing driver to have ever lived. After all, Schumacher’s Ferrari was arguably just as dominant of a car in the early 2000s, and it is easy to forget that whilst Mercedes appear unbeatable in 2020, Hamilton on more than one occasion overturned a points deficit to a highly competitive Vettel in the Ferrari in the mid-2010s to win the championship.

Something that can be in no doubt, however, is the entertainment presented for viewers in these two races in Italy. Following a procession-like race at Spa, we should be glad of seeing two races with enough action to warrant three red flags and a healthy amount of excitement and overtaking. Indeed, the spectacle of seeing Hamilton charge back up the pack in Monza prompted optimism about the ‘reverse grid’ system that some have proposed for F1 in the future in an attempt to improve the viewer experience. The unexpected victory of Gasly at Monza and his last-minute tussle with Sainz prompted edge-of-your-seat entertainment and delight in seeing Gasly attain his first ever race win. Mugello also saw a first, with Alex Albon achieving his first ever podium in what has proven a troubled season for him. Sadly, however, George Russell was again denied his first points finish as the two restarts bunched up the pack and pushed him down into eleventh place. Nobody, though, will have likely been quite as entertained as the Finnish man who placed a 20 cent bet on a Gasly-Sainz-Stroll podium at odds of over 1-160,000.

It is concerning, however, that either of these were firsts. In fact, not only was this Gasly’s first win, but this was the first victory in a Grand Prix for a non-Ferrari/Red Bull/Mercedes team since the start of the Turbo-Hybrid engine era in 2014, a statistic that lays bare the wild unbalance in the sport. Even the Premier League has a higher proportion of teams capable of winning contesting championship titles. The FIA, and most F1 fans, will surely be hoping that the new regulations coming in in 2022 and financial fair play rules will tighten the group.

Out of all these unlikely events, however, the greatest shock must be the horrendous performance of Ferrari at both their ‘Home’ Italian GP at Monza and at Mugello, a track they own. At Monza neither Ferrari car even managed to finish, and at Mugello they scored a combined dismal 5 points (Mercedes scored 44 with their 1-2 finish). They remain in the bottom half of the constructors’ table, behind Renault, an embarrassing place for a team whose contract with the FIA sees them receive more money for competing that any other manufacturer, including Mercedes. One wonders how long Ferrari leadership will be willing to maintain faith in Matteo Binotto, the team principal.

This McLaren fan, though, will not exactly be losing any sleep over Ferrari’s misfortune.

As the wins continue to stack up for Mercedes, who now enjoy an over-150 point lead on Red Bull, their victory this season seems completely inevitable, especially when the aforementioned Red Bull fail to take victory, or even a podium, when Mercedes eventually dropped the ball at Monza. And after failing to properly capitalize on Hamilton’s penalty at Monza and having the lead taken back from him after the restart at Mugello, Bottas will feel his chances at a driver’s championship slip ever farther away as Hamilton takes an even more commanding lead. There might yet be an interesting battle brewing for taking the title of ‘King of the Midfield’ in the constructor’s championship, and second place in the drivers’, but even racing as chaotic as that seen in the last couple weeks seems unable to shake the might of Toto Wolff, Lewis Hamilton and the Mercedes team.

“Be good citizens”: University responds to objections about “patronising” Responsibility Agreement

Cherwell News

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30th September 2020

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“Be good citizens”: University responds to objections about “patronising” Responsibility Agreement

Queen’s College has labelled the COVID-19 Student Responsibility Agreement as “patronising” and opposes it “in principle”. Speaking to Cherwell, the University has responded to concerns about the Agreement, saying: “What we’re asking people to do is to be good citizens. Nothing more, nothing less.”

Oxford University’s COVID-19 Responsibility Agreement, which all students have been asked to sign, requires that individuals abide by both government regulations and University guidance throughout the term. The Agreement supplements students’ existing responsibilities under University and college student contracts.

The email to Queen’s College students wrote: “The College’s Governing Body strongly opposed key aspects of an earlier (but still quite similar) draft of this document, in principle (it’s not the university’s place to create rules for what happens in College) and with its patronising tone and degree of minutiae. In the end, Governing Body agreed […] because there was a real risk [students] would be denied access to university teaching and spaces if we did not go along with it.”

In response to this objection, Karen O’Brien, co-chair of the Michaelmas Coordination Group, said to Cherwell: “It wasn’t an agreement that was imposed from above. It was an iterative process, and there were discussions amongst all colleges about the topics that should be included, the tone, and the information that the agreement was going to provide.”

She further emphasized: “What we’re asking people to do is to be good citizens. Nothing more, nothing less.”

In addition to Queen’s objections, an open letter by students which has received 190 signatures states that “we do not […] consider it to be a necessary or reasonable requirement for students to sign the responsibility agreement in its present form.”

The letter, sent to the Vice-Chancellor on Monday, argues that “asking the students to adhere unconditionally to policies not yet known to them gives the university far-reaching powers over the private and social lives of students. […] Combined with the university’s decision to reintroduce the residency requirement, this gives students no choice but to sign the agreement. If signatories are held to ransom, an agreement cannot be a true and honest affirmation of shared values.”

The letter calls on the Vice Chancellor to “lift the requirement to sign this agreement and to establish a framework through which the concerns and feedback of students can be expressed and integrated into the university’s COVID-19 response and policies”.

Speaking to Cherwell, O’Brien stated, “The Student Union was involved throughout, and we came up with this responsibility agreement after a long process.”

Students who sign the agreement commit to “abiding by all national public health regulations brought in to stop the spread of COVID-19,” as well as “the University and/or colleges’ specific guidance on health measures, together with local public health guidance as relevant.” It requires students to isolate and request a test upon presenting symptoms, participate in contact tracing, and practice good hygiene.

The University’s website states: “The purpose of the Agreement is not to prescribe an additional code of discipline; it is to support community safety and well-being. It is an affirmation of shared values – community, consideration for others, patience and tolerance, and inclusion.”

Image credit: Kaofenlio/ Wikimedia Commons

Have I heard that somewhere before?: i’m thinking of ending things and a crisis of originality

Culture
Film

Ben Jureidini

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30th September 2020

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Have I heard that somewhere before?: i’m thinking of ending things and a crisis of originality

“Most people are other people”, according to Oscar Wilde. It is, of course, highly cliché to begin a piece of writing with an Oscar Wilde quotation, “quotation”, of course, according to Oscar Wilde, being a “serviceable substitution for wit.” It is apt, therefore, that Wilde himself is here referencing Emerson, so when Jessie Buckley’s character in Charlie Kaufman’s i’m thinking of ending things quotes Wilde, she is actually quoting Wilde quoting Emerson.

Confused? When Jessie Buckley’s character in Charlie Kaufman’s i’m thinking of ending things quotes Wilde quoting Emerson, she is actually a construction of a school janitor’s subconscious mind quoting Wilde quoting Emerson as she looks at pictures she painted, except she didn’t actually paint them, the janitor painted them, except the janitor didn’t paint them, Ralph Albert Blakelock painted them, and the janitor has imagined Jessie Buckley’s character realising the paintings she thought she painted weren’t actually painted by her at all but by her boyfriend Jake, who is actually the school janitor, who has actually copied the paintings from Ralph Albert Blakelock in a film by Charlie Kaufman based on a book by Iain Reed because most people are other people. This is a good film, I promise.

i’m thinking of ending things is a crisis of originality put into film form. Except also put into ballet, musical, and cartoon form. Except it was a book before that. “This idea is new”, the Young Woman states at the beginning of the film, “[b]ut it feels old at the same time. […] What if this thought wasn’t conceived by me but planted in my mind, predeveloped.” On the surface, this line is merely Jessie Buckley’s not-quite-named character considering ending things with her boyfriend. By the end of the film, as we learn that this woman is actually a construction of a lonely, elderly janitor’s fractured psyche, the line takes on a more sinister note: all of her thoughts are predeveloped, because they are someone else’s thoughts. The thing she is thinking of ending is her life, and her life is actually the janitor’s. Most people are other people. The entirety of the film is a fiction created by the janitor as he comes to terms with his suicidal thoughts. He uses the memory of a girl he saw at a bar to construct a fantasy where he is young and in love, not old and lonely.

Even the plot of his fantasy is based on a film he watched: at one point, i’m thinking of ending things becomes the final scene of a fictional film, Order Up! (credits included), and from then on Jessie Buckley’s face, and the name of her character, shifts between her own and that of the lead actress in Order Up, as does the story of how she and Jake met. Her name starts off as Lucy, then shifts to Louisa, and to Yvonne as the janitor’s mind flicks from Wordsworth’s Lucy poems to Order Up. Her interest in conveying light and depicting interiority in her art is copied and pasted from the janitor’s interest in Blakelock’s ‘interiority and light’ collection. The poem she wrote is actually a word for word copy of one Jake/The Janitor had in his childhood bedroom.

Nothing here is original: the film is a palimpsest of one man’s subconscious. Iain Reid writes that “getting to know someone is like putting a never-ending puzzle together […] we get to know ourselves in the process”, and as the Janitor ‘gets to know’ the young woman, and Jake, and pretty much the entire film, by ‘putting them together’ based on books, memories, films, and musicals, he is getting to know himself, is coming to terms with ‘ending things’.

In a scene cut in the transition from book to screen, Jake – the Janitor’s self-insert into his own fantasy world – tells his girlfriend to ‘Just tell your story. Pretty much all memory is fiction and heavily edited. So just keep going.’ Kaufman’s adaptation takes this idea of our thoughts, our memories, being reconstructions, being predeveloped, and warps it into a disturbing film about the impossibility of originality. During a discussion on their way back from Jake’s house (read: ‘Jake’s’ ‘house’ – pretty much any noun in this film is deserving of scare quotes) the young woman and Jake discuss two theorists whose work can be read as central to the film.

In what I hope is a self-parodic reference to David Foster Wallace (both Kaufman’s and Foster Wallace’s work attract a certain type of dude-bro humanities student fan – “you have to read Infinite Jest/Synecdoche, New York, man.”), Kaufman alludes to an author concerned with the exhaustive nature of entertainment as simulacra, copies of copies of other people’s thoughts, so far removed from originality as to be completely meaningless: “it’s like we don’t know how to be human anymore.” The real key here, as far as this never-ending puzzle can ever really be unlocked, is in the discussion of Guy Debord’s Society of the Spectacle:“[we] watch the world through this glass, pre-interpreted for us. And it infects our brains. We become it. […] Like a virus.”

Everything in this film is a quotation of something else, a Frankenstein’s monster made up of popular culture: Wilde; Wallace; A Beautiful Mind; the song ‘Baby it’s Cold Outside’; Order Up; Ralph Albert Blakelocke; the film critic Pauline Kael, who at one point is quoted word for word by the young woman, her words being directly pulled from the book of Kael’s criticism found in Jake’s bedroom. “People all over the world spend countless hours of their lives every week being fed entertainment,” Kaufman states in his BAFTA screenwriters lecture, “it’s ludicrous to believe that this stuff doesn’t alter our brains.” i’m thinking of ending things turns this mediation of our life through the entertainment we consume, a kind of pop-cultural determinism, into something horrific.

The film is set in the landscape of the Janitor’s subconscious mind – “a landscape would attempt to express how I feel at that time”, the young woman says as the Janitor’s thoughts bubble up through her – where everything, every person and setting, is copied and pasted from something he’d seen before. The parents take a while to appear after being called downstairs, as if the Janitor’s subconscious has to load them in. The dog, an extraneous accessory to the fiction, only appears when mentioned, when absolutely necessary. The camera often moves before the characters, as if they are following a pre-determined pathway.

Casting Toni Collette, now practically synonymous with uncannily disturbing mothers, seems like the filtering of Hereditary into the film. She often repeats herself in exactly the same tone, and often freezes in place, like a glitch in a game. The girls at the milkshake shop are transposed from girls the Janitor saw rehearsing Oklahoma! at school. The kids put on Oklahoma! every year, Jake tells us; he begins to see them everywhere. Even the plot of the film mimics that of the musical: the janitor who paints this landscape is clearly a fan, Jake can reel off 19 musicals on the drive to his house. Two men, one dreamy, one creepy, are in love with the same girl. In the musical, Laurey chooses the dashing Curley over the creepy Judd. Real life is not, however, a musical: The Janitor’s version of events, depicted (of course) via dance, shows Judd/The Janitor murder Curley/Jake, then killing himself. The world the janitor has created is one constructed from the building blocks of mass media; Oklahoma! and Order Up! have infected his brain, his world has become spectacle, reality is heavily edited fiction, predeveloped thought.

The audience, too, is implicated here. We, too, are watching through a screen of pre-interpreted thoughts, the screen of the car window becomes the screen of our televisions at home. The janitor may be living a fantasy world woven together from pre-published fiction, but we are watching him, a character in a film woven together from a pre-published novel. We are watching a film in which the characters are unable to form an original thought, the dialogue a composite of various theorists, movie quotes, song lyrics, overused clichés about ageing, and lines from earlier on in the film itself. i’m thinking of ending things is mediated completely through the mind of the janitor, and his thoughts are literally media-ted, constructed through the media he has consumed. The square aspect ratio, a relic of antiquated filmmaking, suggests sampling of old footage, scenes recorded through the gaze of a pensioner raised on black and white film. It is possible to equate Kaufman with the Janitor, men attempting to create whilst being confronted with the impossibility of forming a new idea in a world where everything has been thought before, by someone else, where everyone is mostly someone else.

It’s difficult, as an English student whose life is spent thinking about the thoughts of others, writing essays about other people’s novels, articles about other people’s films, not to empathise with this exhaustion. The film we write in our head when we sit on the bus, as private or original as it may seem to us, has been written before. Even this article contains nothing original, and by now even this level of reflexivity is cliched, just another dude-bro that hasn’t even read Infinite Jest using French Marxist theory to pretentiously explain how film should “speak to us all, man”. The horror of i’m thinking of ending things is that, like a virus, it infects our thoughts, or rather reminds us that all of our thoughts have probably been thought before, even the thought that all of our thoughts have probably been thought before has been thought before, by Kaufman, before him Reid, before him Wilde, before him Emerson, ad infinitum. So, how do we trust our thoughts in this culturally mediated horrorscape? Just tell your story, the Janitor tells himself through Jake, just keep going, piece together a puzzle and get to know yourself in the process. Personally, I’m not very reassured.

Image – Flickr

Essay Crisis

The Source

Dania Kamal Aryf

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29th September 2020

0

The transient turning of pages when the words no longer start to make sense,
When the lights suddenly start feeling too bright,
yet your room still seems to be about as dark as these intangible thoughts that cloud your mind.

People often say that progress,
is not always linear.

and p r o g r e s s,

sometimes doesn’t always look like 2,000 words* (including citations) on a Microsoft Word document;
and that’s okay.

Stand-still water by the side of the table, held by a transparent glass so fragile you wonder what it would take for it to break and spill over

you start to think if the glass of water can sometimes be as a metaphor of your life: the vulnerability of your arguments in this essay being so…
see through,
so breakable,
so fragile.

Where everything might be a little bit. too much:

Bubbles of gas trapped underneath the surface of still,
coffee breath at 2 o’clock in the morning;

Time starts to feel so stagnant in this strange world of yours.

Your existence slips into in a limbo –
And these long nights always feel like a fever dream;
Blurring the boundaries between reality and obscurity,
it becomes hard to tell the difference.

Always feeling like a dead body can also sometimes mean
that it takes so much to do so little,
and progress sometimes feels nonexistent.

The clock in the corner of your room ticking like a time bomb,
its volume amplified as loud as your chaotic thoughts,
Loud,
Chaotic thoughts
Heartbeat racing, rapid drumming awaiting the moment it detonates
Especially when your soul has worn away after many hours of toil;

Time
Starts to feel so transient in this strange world of yours.

But p r o g r e s s ,
also means that I am still determined to do my 3am best
Even if my best may be equivalent to
my more intelligent and articulate and always-has-their-shit-together-unlike-me tute partner’s worst,

I am still making progress,

And that’s okay.

Brexit and breaking the law: ‘it’s only okay when we do it’

Opinion

Ruth Flame

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29th September 2020

0

Brexit and breaking the law: ‘it’s only okay when we do it’

When the UK formally left the EU on the 31 January 2020, it felt like the nation, whether pro-leave or pro-remain, breathed a sigh of relief. We had a Withdrawal Agreement that Parliament had voted for, and the European Parliament approved. The four-year-long saga that saw the rejection of the Chequers agreement and the unlawful prorogation of Parliament was finally coming to an end. Although trade deals still needed to be negotiated, it seemed as if we were out of the woods.

Except now, it appears that this saga is very much not over. Not even a year since the Withdrawal Agreement was ratified by the Council of the European Union, our government is attempting to pass a Bill allowing it to be disapplied, constituting a breach of international law. This Bill, the United Kingdom Internal Markets Bill, has just survived a first vote in the House of Commons.

Setting the terms of the UK’s withdrawal from the EU, the Withdrawal Agreement is enshrined in UK law in the EU (Withdrawal) Agreement Acts of 2018 and 2020. The specific part in contention recently is the Northern Ireland Protocol, designed to avoid a potentially peace-threatening hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic, with Northern Ireland following single market rules in some instances and administering EU’s customs code at its ports . The protocol assumes that a trade deal will eventually be negotiated between the UK and the EU regarding trade with Northern Ireland, but until such a deal can be finalised, the default EU position would apply to prevent a hard border.

The mutually sanctioned agreement is now threatened by the Internal Market Bill, seen as explicit authorisation for the UK to breach the international obligations set out under the Withdrawal Agreement. Clause 42 would allow exit procedures required under the Northern Ireland Protocol to be disapplied while clause 43 further allows provisions concerning state aid to be disregarded. Finally, if there was any doubt left about the potential of the Internal Market Bill to breach international law, clause 45 assures that clauses 42 and 43 will still be in effect even if they breach the Withdrawal Agreement, a clear sanction for the former legislation to override the latter.

You may be thinking ‘so what?’ or questioning why this particular breach of international law is so important. You’d be correct to think that international obligations have been broken before, and, indeed, some EU member states are particularly serious offenders. Sometimes our international obligations are breached when new circumstances come to light, with the UK’s introduction of the General Anti-Abuse Rule (GAAR) in 2013 to combat new forms of tax evasion being an example. GAAR serves to prevent the use of abusive tax-avoidance schemes that amount to more than responsible tax planning to minimise the amount of tax that one might pay. There was debate at the time on the passing of the Finance Act 2013, which included GAAR, about whether it may have broken international law. Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Brandon Lewis suggested that GAAR sets a precedent for further breaches of international obligations under the Internal Markets Bill, but there is strong evidence that GAAR wasn’t inconsistent with our continuing treaty obligations.

Even if international obligations are breached, enforcement is difficult and there is very little actually stopping France, for example, from deciding that they want to shut their borders because they are no longer supporters of free movement. International courts, such as the European Court of Human Rights or the European Court of Justice, can rule on issues concerning international law, but ensuring that the correct action is taken is where the problem of enforcement lies. Typically, the United Kingdom is willing to take heed of international court rulings, but this isn’t always the case. Though the European Court of Human Rights ruled that a blanket ban on convicted prisoners being able to vote was a violation of their rights, prisoners in the UK still do not have the right to vote.

However, the issue goes beyond any ‘punishment’ for breaching international law, and is more about upholding and respecting the rule of law. It seems pretty outlandish for the government, the makers and enforcers of law, to not accept their own legal duties, more so considering they currently expect people not to socialise in groups of more than 6. As the rule of law is a cornerstone of our constitution, it absolutely matters when anyone, not least the government, attempts to disregard it.

While the government response to the contentious bill has been mixed, there has mostly been an outrageous display of support for the breaking of international law or denial of any such attempt taking place. The level of misinformation permeating this discourse is concerning and, understandably, some members of the public are seriously misinformed.

Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Brandon Lewis acknowledged that the UK government was attempting to breach international law, but added an irrelevant and nonsensical caveat that the breach was only “specific and limited”. We could say that any breach of the law is “specific and limited”; if I steal a mere £20 from someone’s wallet, it is a crime that is limited in its severity, but we wouldn’t say that would make the crime any better. A breach of the law is a breach of the law. Recently, Lord Keen had jumped to the defence of Lewis, asserting that he “essentially answered the wrong question”. It should be noted that Lord Keen has since resigned as law officer for Scotland.

Home Secretary Priti Patel has also stated that “we are absolutely not doing that [breaking international law],” and that “Parliament is sovereign when it comes to how international treaties … are not just interpreted but actually applied through our Acts of Parliament.” She is plainly incorrect in her denial and horribly mistaken in her interpretation of parliamentary sovereignty. Yes, Parliament is sovereign and can legislate to the contrary of any of our international treaty obligations. However, this doesn’t mean that our treaty obligations cease to exist, and we are no longer bound by them.

Attorney General Suella Braverman set out her legal position along the same lines as Patel, defending the Internal Market Bill on the grounds of parliamentary sovereignty and a horribly confused interpretation of R (Miller) v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union. She spectacularly misses the point that our international obligations may not be enforceable in the UK courts (unless enshrined in domestic legislation) but are nevertheless binding for the government. There have been calls for Braverman to resign, as the head of the Government Legal Department Jonathan Jones has done, but this seems unlikely given her strong, but misguided, defence of the government’s position.

Lord Chancellor Robert Buckland QC told Andrew Marr that he will resign if the rule of law is broken in a way that he finds “unacceptable” . The Constitutional Reform Act 2005 only references that the Lord Chancellor must respect the rule of law, with no caveats about acceptable and unacceptable breaches, which begs the question of what offences the Lord Chancellor finds to be acceptable. Only going 5mph over the speed limit? Taking £10 from someone who had £30 in her purse? Buckland has gone on to say that if the law is broken in a way that cannot be “fudged” (I am not making this up), then he will resign.

Even more ridiculously, MP Desmond Swayne asserted that: “[t]here is a principle in international law that no country can be bound by an obligation when that obligation is interpreted in such a way as to undermine the very integrity of that country.” This principle, quite literally, does not exist.

I want to be clear that this is not, and should not, be a political issue. Any government breaking, or threatening to break, laws should be held accountable regardless of their political affiliations. We can all agree how damning the Chilcot Inquiry was for Tony Blair’s decision to invade Iraq, regardless of whether you vote Labour. One thing to highlight is that more people should care about such blatant breaches of fundamental principles like the rule of law. If we care about democracy in any meaningful sense, we cannot allow politicians to get away with such brazen lying and misleading of the public.

Police patrols and pub inspections: City prepares for students’ return

News

Imogen Duke and Maya Misra

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28th September 2020

0

Police patrols and pub inspections: City prepares for students’ return

At yesterday evening’s Virtual Town Hall, Oxford’s universities, students’ unions, the City and County Councils, and the police presented their COVID-safety plans for students’ return to Oxford.

Thames Valley Police have set aside a portion of the force to respond to breaches of coronavirus regulations, while balancing “normal policing duties”.

Along with neighbourhood police, they will be “proactively patrolling… hotspot areas” in the evening and through the night. They will respond to “spontaneous reports” of COVID regulation breaches.

The police’s focus is on large gatherings as “they present the greater risk to wider public health”. They have a “Four Es” strategy to deal with large gatherings: engage with members of the gathering, explain the regulations, encourage the gathering to disperse, and enforce the regulations with fines if necessary.

The City Council will also be ensuring coronavirus regulations are being followed. From 8pm to 1am, there will be “proactive inspections” of businesses to ensure they are complying with the Rule of Six. These will be focused on the pubs “primarily frequented by students”.

This ‘Out of Hours’ Service will also respond to complaints about student parties, carrying out early intervention alongside the police.

These measures come as Oxford Brookes has been under scrutiny for student parties since students returned on 14th September. There have been 30 recorded cases among Brookes students so far, stemming from off-campus student gatherings.

Pro Vice-Chancellor of Student and Staff Experience at Oxford Brookes, Professor Anne-Marie Kilday, told the Town Hall that the university has issued “150 fixed penalties” for breaches within halls of residence.

Professor Kilday states that the universities “do not have enforcement powers off-campus”, but that they had been working with Thames Valley Police and other partners to “disperse groups meeting outside of halls”. She encouraged residents to contact the police on 101 or report online if they believe students are breaching coronavirus laws.

Professor Kilday stressed that the majority of students are taking regulations seriously and the university has communicated extensively with the student body to ensure they are aware of their responsibilities.

Ahead of the start of term, Karen O’Brien, Co-Chair of Michaelmas Coordination Group at Oxford University, told residents the University would learn from Brookes and other universities across the UK, and apply those lessons upon students’ return.

Image credit: Dick Elbers/ Wikimedia Commons.

UrbanObserver

Oxford's oldest independent student newspaper, est. 1920