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Oxfordshire constituencies redrawn

By
Daniel Thomas
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Image Credit: Ordnance Survey

The electoral map of Oxfordshire is set to be redrawn, with big implications for the next general election, as the four-month deadline for the Government to approve new constituency boundaries fast approaches.

Covering all 650 seats in the Commons, final proposals by the 2023 Periodic Review of Westminster Constituencies were laid before Parliament this June, following an extensive consultation by the four national boundary commissions. The commissioners decided against cutting the number of parliamentary seats down to 600; nonetheless, they made a number of significant changes in Oxford and beyond.

In particular, two wards in central Oxford, Carfax and Holywell – covering the vast majority of the University of Oxford’s colleges and a large population of students & academics – have been transferred to Layla Moran’s seat of Oxford West & Abingdon. This constituency will also receive the rural Marcham ward, while losing the outlying Kidlington and Yarnton communities.

With an early general election looking more and more likely, this mixture of urban and rural voters is likely to shake up the constituency’s political dynamics, opening new opportunities for student campaigners to find their voices, and potentially turning the contest into a three-way race between the Conservatives, Labour, and the incumbent Liberal Democrats.

These parties, whatever their national platforms, will be forced to take into account the sizeable student vote in the new boundaries when running their campaigns, and to rely on student political societies for campaign fieldwork.

Indeed, it’s possible that the focus of student political activism may shift westwards, from the safe seat of Oxford East – represented by Labour Party Chair & Shadow Cabinet member Anneliese Dodds M.P – in the face of a projected landslide for the Opposition.

Plans to split Banbury constituency in two, with Chipping Norton folded into Banbury and a new Bicester & Woodstock seat formed from wards in the District of West Oxfordshire, are also going ahead, though some responses to the consultation sought – unsuccessfully – to recognise Kidlington in the constituency’s name. 

There is little demographic variation in the new Oxfordshire constituencies, with each one sporting an electorate between 69,943 and 74,356.

Representatives of Oxford’s political parties seem entirely satisfied with the changes. Layla Moran M.P., speaking to Cherwell, described the review as “very positive for the Liberal Democrats”, expressing regret for the transfer of Kidlington and Yarnton but optimism for the party’s future prospects in the county.

“The new Bicester & Woodstock, Didcot & Wantage, Henley & Thame and Witney constituencies are all very solid prospects for the Lib Dems.”

Ms. Moran M.P. further praised the Boundary Commission for carrying out the 2023 Periodic Review “fairly and effectively”, though expressed the Liberal Democrats’ preference for a “fairer and more proportionate” electoral system.

The Oxford University Conservative Association, meanwhile, told Cherwell they were “excited for the new challenges” the updated electoral map poses, suggesting that the city “could become a genuinely competitive area for our party”.

All that remains is for the Government to submit an Order in Council to put the recommendations into effect.

The Oxford University Labour Club has been reached out to for comment.

“We should have done more”: Vice Chancellor addresses University’s handling of Stock controversy

By
William Fitzgerald
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Image Credit: Coco Cottam

Oxford University “should have done more” to protect trans members in the past year, Professor Irene Tracey has said. 

In her first oration to the university as vice-chancellor, Professor Tracey, Vice Chancellor of Oxford University, said that she is “disturbed” by the “ amplification of discourteous, intolerant and hateful rhetoric” faced by transgender students and staff over the past year. 

This comes after Kathleen Stock’s controversial address at the Oxford Union earlier this year — a decision that sparked substantial protest from students and staff across the university. 

While several student groups called for Stock’s invitation to be rescinded, Prof Tracey told the Times last May that Stock had “a right to come and speak. It’s as simple as that.”  At the Oration, however, Professor Tracey expressed regret at her handling of the controversy.

Tracey began by re-stating the University’s commitment to free speech, describing the issue as having been “centre stage” during the year. She continued: “I have been clear about our role in the university sector to protect free speech: it is core to how we teach subjects and expose students to different views”, adding that “this also goes hand in hand with our commitment to equality, diversity and inclusion.”

Tracey said she felt “deeply saddened” by the “abusive and threatening language and behaviours that our trans community suffered this year” which she described as being made “under the guise of free speech”.

On the University’s response to such issues, she reflected: “we should have done more to support them; rest assured lessons were learned. 

“In this university, I expect more and we will continue to strive to create a culture of tolerance and respectful disagreement on key issues of the day. That is how we learn together and evolve.”

Responding to the oration on X, formerly Twitter, President of Oxford’s LGBTQ+ Society Amiad Haran Diman wrote: “I was delighted to see a real tone shift and change of minds among the senior leadership, in stark contrast from their rhetoric in Trinity term.

“My meetings with university officials over the summer made me, for the first time, cautiously optimistic. And I very much hope that I won’t be proven wrong.”

Why is the care leaver population so low at Oxford?

By
Matt Taylor
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alt= 'Window'
Image credit: Pexels via Freerange.


Last year, there were double the number of people in space than care leavers studying for an undergraduate degree at the University of Oxford. Out of the 9,000 care leavers who applied to universities across the board, only five were considered talented enough to get into the top university in the world. What is behind this seismic underrepresentation at Oxford? Is it that those from the care system are thick, or is it the admissions process? 

This subject is an angry tenant in both my head and heart, as I am a care leaver studying at Oxford. I’m a graduate student, so I don’t fall within these figures. Regardless, the barriers are the same. It probably doesn’t surprise anybody that our most significant hurdle is financial. For instance, we don’t have parents to go back home to between term times, so we require accommodation all year round. Oxford does provide some financial assistance to help with this. £3,000 per year and a scholarship for undergraduates. But this is only up to the age of 25, yet 69% of applicants from the care system tend to be mature students. For graduates, there is now the Academic Futures Programme. However, these things aren’t always as accessible as they seem. 

When I started in 2022, I found no support for graduate care leavers. Of course, there are the usual scholarships open to everyone if they apply before the January deadline, and I did. But, I was placed on a waiting list to be considered after the March deadline, so I was no longer eligible. 

These arbitrary cut-off points in the admissions process fail people from the care system. 

It’s hard to be what you cannot see. When I left the care system at eighteen, I could hardly read or construct a sentence, let alone write a whole argument. Somehow, the dream of studying at Oxford got into my head. I believe when you have a dream, you have a responsibility to yourself to make it happen. For ten years, I prayed at the altar of hard work, grit, determination, and resilience to realise it. But being told ‘we think you’re good, but we want to see if anyone better applies’ almost broke that ambition. 

Getting the offer to study at Oxford was one of the proudest moments of my life. It should be. But when it came through (the financial declaration) the elation quickly subsided, as it made one condition on my offer. Along with all the other challenges of being a care leaver here, would I now be able to afford it? The process makes no concession for background or circumstance. 

I’m not saying the process needs to be watered down to let more people in. Far from it. I would hate for that sense of achievement to be devalued just to be seen to ‘do the right thing’. It should be hard. But the barriers need be the same for everyone, no matter their background. Not a Takeshi’s Castle of obstacles littered through the admissions process, eliminating many of the care leavers until there are only a handful of us. I believe this institution is better than that. 

You have to be the change you want to make. Is the University of Oxford ready to change the admissions process to be more inclusive to those like me from the care system? After all, studying at Oxford shouldn’t be as tough as entering space.

Image credit: Pexels via Freerange.

The rise of the old money aesthetic

By
Liz Lane
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Image Source: Eric Longden/CC BY 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Grab your linen shirts and Ralph Lauren loafers. Old Money is back with a vengeance. Amassing a hefty 54.3 million views on TikTok alone, the Old Money Aesthetic is dominating social media at the moment. But with some videos recommending outfits upwards of thousands of pounds, should we really be glamorising a trend that excludes so many wealth groups?

The Old Money aesthetic found its roots on TikTok in the summer of 2023. It’s a hashtag associated with “quiet luxury”, quality garments and the lifestyle to match. Popular videos see montages of champagne flutes, signet rings and – you guessed it – plenty of Oxbridge content too. The aesthetic is best embodied in an upper-class twentieth-century style found in the likes of the Kennedys, Princess Diana and even fictional characters like Blair Waldorf of Gossip Girl. Many have credited the TV show Succession with this revitalised fascination with inherited wealth, but the rise of “nepo baby” influencers like Sofia Richie and Hailey Bieber has also had a huge part to play. 

The trend for looking quietly (but obviously) expensive has found a new muse for the internet age. Sofia Richie, described by Business Insider as being the “epitome of Old Money,” is a social media influencer and daughter of singer Lionel Richie. Well known for adopting Vintage Chanel, tailored Ralph Lauren and “clean girl” aesthetics, Richie has become an aspirational figure on Instagram and TikTok. This natural progression of trends from one generation to the next is to be expected, but our desire to imitate someone who has inherited such enormous wealth in a society so crippled by inequality is also undeniably strange. With Rishi Sunak reportedly considering cutting the inheritance tax and recent studies predicting a rise in premature deaths following the cost of living crisis, it might be time for us to reconsider our casual idealisation of the wealthy online. 

Amidst a torrent of content advising lifestyles possible only to the top 1%, there are an equal number of posts recommending cheaper fashion duplicates that can help you “cheat” the Old Money look. Old Money isn’t as unattainable as it was in the mid-20th century, and yet the internet is abuzz with articles dedicated to uncovering the “subtle differences” between someone from “old” and “new money”. Old money “imposters” are being simultaneously encouraged to exist and exposed online in a move so egregiously classist it’s hard to believe we won’t look back on it with horror. 

In a post-pandemic world of economic instability and cost-of-living crises, we have to wonder why we’re choosing Old Money and expensive-looking clothes now. Naturally, fashion, and how much people are willing to spend on it, has always been influenced by the rise and fall of economies. Following the bedazzled OTT-ness of the early 2000s, for instance, the 2008 recession saw a spiked trend for minimalism. Such minimalism is also a clear feature of the Old Money aesthetic but luxury items (another key Old Money staple) saw a notable downturn in popularity after the 2008 financial crisis. 

Another possible reason for the popularity of Old Money is that it offers escapism at a time when many countries have been plagued by cost-of-living crises. Fashion, in some way, has always been able to offer a break from reality. Following the 1929 Wall Street Crash, a desire for fashion escapism manifested in cinema. The 1930s was a period that saw the chief wardrobe or costume consultant credited for the first time on screen. Clothes were important, expensive and exuberant, as actresses offered something most movie-goers could only dream of. Today, microtrends like #Europecore and resort fashion have provided Americans with a rest bite from the turmoil of US politics. Many people, clearly, are seeking some kind of distraction online and in what they choose to wear.

But it’s what these trends are distracting us from that proves most important of all. The Old Money aesthetic may just be playful escapism for some, a desire to forget the economic bleakness that surrounds them. But the hashtag is a powerful symbol and one with a damaging and problematic history. The Old Money lifestyle, for all its glamour, is a product of centuries of wealth inequality. It’s built on the fantasy of belonging to a certain class that has excluded those of lesser means and prospered whilst others struggled. It’s not the dressing up to look expensive that’s the problem here but the mindset behind it: one that, intentionally or not, romanticises classist and elitist ideals and perpetrates the notion that inherited money is somehow worthy of our adoration. 

Image Source: Eric Longden/CC BY 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Glittering Girls

By
Lilian Trickey
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alt= a scrapbook of Lilian Trickey and friends
Image courtesy of Lilian Trickey

Giggling, high heels caught in cobblestone as you collapse
In my arms as you’re wrecked with another fit of laughter-
You shriek in delight, stumble over air in rose-tinted time lapse
Head thrown back, eyes scrunched, clutching your sore belly after.

My darling girl, how you shine in the night,
The brightest star in the sky in your sequinned Zara mini dress.
My sugar and spice, in your alcoholic delight
You spin the world in your rendition of Dancing Queen, a mess

That only you can pull off. You strut in the age-old tradition of the young
In your painful, gorgeous shoes down the Highstreet, on the prowl.
After your day in the library, crying, as the world is ending, high-strung,
You let loose in a tale as old as time, divine feminine tradition, you growl

The lyrics to S&M, glittering gyration, my everything nice, you’re always game
As we chant the same words our ancestors chanted before us for the drink:
Those pinkish, fizzing potions: lick the salt, down it, bite the lime. All the same.
We connect with generations of carefree girls, unsteadily balancing on the brink

Between something new and something old. In the haze of neon glow, we are incandescent
And glorious, beautiful in our peacocking as we put on a show for the lucky few who watch.
The poltergeists of those before us, our mothers relive youth through our eyes, effervescent,
Heady perfume intoxicating as anything, shaped like a high-heeled shoe, turn it up a notch

As you put your graceful, swan’s arms around my neck, your nails my pendant, bejewel
Easily with your sparkling presence: your golden laugh, your silvery hair. I will treasure
These moments for years to come, as we dance as one. You sway, effortlessly cool.
How I used to wish I was you- but no, then I’d have to lose you, my sweetest pleasure.

And the fire in our hearts is kindled as tequila burns down our throats. You take a stance
On things I know you don’t care about as you pick fights with men for the sake of it: bliss
Must describe this moment: short and sweet sibilance, let me romanticise this dance,
Our final one of the night, one last silly prance, your face aghast when we finally leave this

Garden of Eden- sipping that J2O apple you took away from the bar, cough on the bubbles
As we walk back past the Radcam, the way we came, and I look you up and down, laugh
At your humanity, at your vulnerability, knowing tomorrow will come that crumbling rubble
Of the remains of last night’s Pompey, as we bask hungover in snowing, volcanic aftermath.

A Summer as a Volunteer at the National Portrait Gallery

By
Rachael Cummings-Naylor
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alt= national portrait gallery
Illustration by Rachael Cummings-Naylor

The ‘Long Vac’ is called ‘long’ for a reason and I did not want to waste a second of it. When I saw the National Portrait Gallery had set up a new volunteering scheme, I knew I had to jump at the chance. Not only was this an opportunity to get out of the house during the summer and do something, but it was an exciting opportunity to meet new people, gain new skills, and learn new things in a different environment to what I was accustomed to. I eagerly applied and waited to hear back from the Visitor Experience team, only to be shortly offered an interview afterwards and then a place as a volunteer.

By the time I went for my induction in Trinity Term, the gallery had undergone a significant transformation since closing its doors in March 2023. It boasted a more cohesive layout, designed to take you on both a physical and an intellectual through art history—it was clear that a lot of careful thought and consideration had gone into its reorganisation, with the addition of a new floor dedicated to contemporary art (the Weston Wing, Floor 1) serving to reaffirm this. You cannot begin to imagine my excitement as I stood at the centre of the gallery, surrounded by centuries worth of art, and realised how lucky I was to be there.

My job as a volunteer for the Visitor Experience team was to act as a source of information and help for visitors. We worked on a rota which directed us around the gallery to various spots where we were needed most; I moved to a new location every half an hour, allowing me exposure to the different floors and all the artworks they had to offer.

My first shift began at 10 a.m. and it was only a week or so after the big reopening: armed with a handful of maps and pamphlets, I stood by the doors of the Ondaatje Main Hall and watched the gallery come alive as people from all walks of life flooded in. By the end of my shift, I had met several wonderful people, learnt about two new pieces of art, and had already radioed someone despite being terrified to touch the walkie-talkie.

Most shifts followed a similar pattern, but each offered a new opportunity to get involved with gallery life. My favourite experience was when we worked with the Learning Volunteers. Their job was primarily to deal with schools and families, so when we were assigned to help them during the Summer Family Festival it was a nice change from our usual routine. Not only was it great getting to engage with a younger audience, but it made me hopeful to watch a future generation of young artists walk out with smiles plastered on their faces, proudly waving their artwork around in the air as they went to show their friends and families.

Volunteering at the National Portrait Gallery this summer was one of the best choices I made. It gave me a true insight into the other side of galleries and museums you rarely get to see. Although, the experience would not have been the same had it not been for all the people I met along the way. Each shared their nuggets of experience and wisdom with me, but there is one person who sticks out in my mind.

“L,” as I will call them, was working a shift with me following an earlier shift we had worked together. We properly introduced ourselves and began making small talk in between directing visitors and answering questions about the art. The conversation quickly turned into a discussion about our beliefs having moved from a more sobering topic of death to one of life, energy, and spirituality. The candid nature of our conversation combined with their overwhelming passion and energy had such an effect on me that it made me rethink everything. From that moment forward a series of serendipitous events happened to coincide and I could not help but feel our conversation had something to do with it.

I went into this experience expecting to learn a little about art and do something interesting over the summer, yet I left with a changed perspective on life. Now, I’m not saying that is the standard for all future volunteering experiences, but I would like to emphasise the importance of trying new things and going out of your comfort zone since you never know what experiences and opportunities might come your way. I would recommend volunteering at the National Portrait Gallery to anyone and I can only hope it is a lasting opportunity for the future to come.

“A Must-See”: Colour Revolution at the Ashmolean

By
Rachael Cummings-Naylor
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alt= colour revolution
Ramon de Casas' 'Joven Decadente', oil on canvas. Public domain image.

I did not know what to expect when I arrived at the Ashmolean to preview their newest exhibition, Colour Revolution: Victorian Art, Fashion & Design. When I think of the Victorian era, I think of darkness, depression, and disease–so you can imagine my shock when I left with a new perception of the Victorians, unlike anything I had thought before.

The curators play on the traditional image of the Victorian era that most of us have today when you enter the first room. The walls are grey; the lights are gloomy. The sparsity forces you to focus on the single piece in the room, Queen Victoria’s iconic black silk mourning dress. You cannot help but feel the weight of the period epitomised in this one item recognisable to most, if not all.

As you turn the corner, you are met with an array of light and colour. Your first introduction is to a series of artworks by John Ruskin, who helped pioneer changes in attitude towards colour during this period along with artists like J. M. W. Turner–whose ‘Venice, from the Porch of Madonna della Salute’ (c. 1835) is placed among Ruskin’s paintings in a vibrant celebration of colour in art.

The following room juxtaposes art, science, and religion to reflect the growing tension between them as colour came to symbolise progression and modernity. Collections of pre-Raphaelite art sit across the room from images of scientific discovery and a bizarre, but relevant, glass case of hummingbirds. The pre-Raphaelite movement attempted to redefine the use of colour as a medium for
glorifying God, yet received a mixed reaction from contemporary audiences due to the conflation of colour in art with Roman Catholicism and idolatry. Whilst breakthroughs in physics and biology served to cause even greater confusion: Sir Isaac Newton’s work on rainbows and the spectrum of colour came to symbolise the covenant between God and man, reaffirming pre-Raphaelite use of colour, but Charles Darwin’s theories on sexual selection de-sacralised colour as seductive and impure.

The next room offers a brief intervention with the history of dyes, providing relief from the artwork to briefly showcase some fashion. However, the central room is emphasised by the curators as the most important. They have reunited multiple pieces of art for the first time since being showcased at the International Exhibition of 1862. This room is impressive in terms of its historical significance but less in its artistic meaning compared to other rooms.

The room on Orientalist art is undeniably beautiful, with the portrait of ‘Scheherazade’ by Sophie Anderson (1870-1880) standing apart from the rest. It is a shame they did not do more with it, but it certainly strikes a chord regardless of its brevity.

The final room combines a series of artistic mediums in a final push to display the changing attitude towards colour in the wake of modernity. Your attention shifts to a series of artworks that signal a shift away from the pre-Raphaelite movements of the earlier nineteenth century towards the Aestheticism of the later years. Here you can enjoy pieces such as Ramon Casas’ ‘Jove Decadent, Despres del ball’ (1899) and Duchess Louise’s Queen Zenobia fancy dress (1897) in a display of decadence and decay reflecting the moral corruption caused by modernity but making for some fantastic works of art.

This exhibition challenged my understanding of the Victorian era by placing it in the context of a ‘colour revolution.’ I was charmed by its theatrical nature and the journey it took me on from start to finish despite my initial uncertainty that I would enjoy what I was going to see. It is a must-see for anyone living in or visiting Oxford over the next few months.

“A Gripping Memoir”: ‘Stay True’ by Hua Hsu Review

By
Adam Saxon
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alt= an illustration of books, memoirs.
Image by the Rijksmuseum, via. RawPixel.

Recently I picked up a book that had been on my to-read list for a while. Stay True by Hua Hsu came out last year to critical acclaim, winning this year’s Pulitzer prize for best memoir. I had heard good things about it and decided to take the plunge but could not have predicted the force with which this book would hit me. 

Hua Hsu is the son of Taiwanese immigrants, growing up at a time when the internet is emerging. The book primarily focuses on his experiences at college and during his early 20s. It explores his friendship with Ken, a Japanese American who he initially dislikes but grows to love. It is a book that explores almost every emotion imaginable. Through Hsu we experience happiness, loneliness, grief, anger, love and more, all within the span of less than 200 pages.

I think the reason why this book resonated with me so much is because I read it at the right time in my life. University, arguably especially at Oxford, is a time filled with instability and change, and it is often easy to feel lost in the whirlwind. In this whirlwind, it is also easy to question our own place in the world; where we fit in, or if we will ever fit in at all. Many of us take our youth for granted, and Stay True is a reminder that it can be ripped away from us at any moment. Throughout the first half of the book there is a sense of time running out, an unnerving feeling that proves to be well founded. At the same time, however, it is a reminder that the best way to stop ourselves from taking youth for granted is to live, and live well. 

At different points throughout the book Hsu sees the world through music. Music has an unrivalled power to spark emotion. It can bring us nostalgia, reminding us of years gone by or specific experiences. Sad songs make us blue, happy songs lift our moods. Songs mean things to us because of who it reminds us of, or because of where we were when we first listened to them. The artists who write our favourite songs influence our personalities, our senses of style, and who we choose to become friends with. I believe few things influence us more than the different forms of media we choose to consume, whether that be music, film, books, or others. 

No more is the changing power of music illustrated in the book than through the song “God Only Knows” by the Beach Boys:

“God only knows what I’d be without you
If you should ever leave me
Though life would still go on believe me
The world could show nothing to me
So what good would living do me

God only knows what I’d be without you” 

These are lyrics that we can experience so differently depending on where we are in life: who we are close to, who we are with, who we have lost, who we are yet to meet. When we are with those we love, this passage could show them how much we care and value them. If we lose those we love, it is a heart wrenching dismissal of the futility of life without that person. The upbeat major key of the song becomes almost irrelevant to the emotions we feel.

Of course there are also parts of this book I cannot directly relate to. Hsu was growing up as the son of immigrants, and faced certain racial prejudices that sometimes made him feel an outsider, Albert Camus would agree. However, it is through reading the experiences of others that we can empathise and understand each other. Reading the experiences of Hsu’s parents as well as the ways in which he himself felt like an outsider at times were, therefore, parts of the book where I felt I learnt the most. 

All in all, Stay True is a gripping memoir filled with a mix of well-known and obscure pop culture references, philosophical reading recommendations, and anecdotes of growing up in the early internet era. It reminds us of our mortality, and for us students, it is a reminder that things will not be as they are now forever. Time is relentless, and regardless of what we go through it continues its inevitable march. At the same time, there is a beauty in this. We should not be lost in the past because if we do we isolate ourselves and miss the continuation of our stories in the present. 

This is a book that I cannot recommend highly enough, and one that I myself will no doubt return to plunge in and out of in the coming months and years.

Can our individual habits solve the fast fashion problem?

By
Ciara Beale
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alt= discount red sign in a store
Image via. Flickr (CC 1.0)

​​It is no mystery that fast fashion is a Bad Thing. I’ve spent a lot of time in recent years thinking about fast fashion, its not-so-nice impacts, and ways to circumnavigate it as someone interested in clothes. As a tween, paying a visit to Topshop or New Look on a shopping trip (remember when we used to do this?) made for a pretty unbeatable weekend. I’d trawl through racks of cheap polyester crop tops on  the sales racks trying to find the perfect look for non-uniform day because I naturally wouldn’t want to be seen in the same outfit as last time. The situation I find myself in now is a dramatically altered one. I pretty much avoid buying anything new: Topshop has been swapped for charity shops, and I scroll through Vinted like it’s the hottest new social media platform rather than spending hours on ASOS as religiously as before. For my own purposes, almost anything can be sourced second-hand, and almost always for a decent price. 

Almost. Therein lies the rub: sustainable shopping is not currently feasible for every person, nor for every part of the average wardrobe. Every now and then I have to buy new underwear, for example, and although I could fork out a bit more money to buy from a sustainable company, frankly, when it comes down to it, I’m lazy, and don’t invest enough  time into finding the best options. It’s significantly easier to just pop to M&S (I have aged well before my time) or even Primark, which takes the punches in a lot of fast fashion discussions when it’s certainly not the only culprit, and buy something for a low price. I’m actually interested in sustainable fashion, yet I am still very far from perfect in my practice of it – so, for someone for whom fashion is trivial, the choice will always be a no-brainer.

What’s more, my experience of sustainable clothes shopping is not the universal one. I’m pretty much bang-average-sized for a woman in this country so I can usually find a lot of pieces  that fit from second-hand sources. I’ve also been sewing since I was eleven, soI can pick up almost anything I vaguely like the look of in a charity shop and turn it into something wearable. For shoppers outside of the ‘average’ sizing range (if there is such a thing), sustainable fashion is a real feat given the limited breadth of sizes in second-hand stocks, whilst if you’re looking for something particularly specific, the sustainable choice is likely to be heaps more expensive than something grabbed off the shelf. For anyone who has attempted to source costumes for a production, beyond borrowing clothes from friends there is little to be done to avoid fuelling fast fashion in order to keep under budget.

More to the point: should any of this even be left up to us? In the face of ethical and environmental catastrophe, it often feels hopeless to take any responsibility ourselves at all because there are much bigger players determining the wreckage our earth is becoming, running industries that exploit the most vulnerable across the world for their own monstrous profit margins. Is the consumer to blame at all? Should we continue to shop as we wish until the fast fashion giants make some changes that lie out of our control?

From my point of view, this question cannot be answered straightforwardly. Allocating blame for the fast fashion industry purely to the consumer is clearly a misstep. But that doesn’t mean we are totally powerless. Particularly, when it comes to the task of climate action, every item not left in landfill, every item not left to rot in its packaging at the back of a wardrobe, every extra effort to find a second-hand alternative, makes a difference. As with everything related to being kinder to the earth, it isn’t about doing it perfectly – it’s about the whole lot of us giving it a go. And those of us for whom sustainable fashion is a feasible option sort of have no excuse not to at least try.

So, what can we do? It’s time to start sharing and swapping (check out the Oxford Facebook swap group if you haven’t already!), shopping in our own wardrobes and restyling old garments to make them feel new again, rather than grasping for the gratification of a new purchase (an understandable temptation), and typing in ‘Ebay’ or ‘Vinted’ as a reflex action instead of Urban Outfitters. Until the fast fashion industry slows down, our individual habits are all we have in our control. 

IDF spokesperson gives briefing to Oxford Israel Society

By
Cherwell News
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Image credit: Tim Wildsmith via Unsplash

The Oxford Israel Society virtually hosted Lieutenant Colonel John Conricus and the Israeli Embassy on Thursday to provide Oxford students with a briefing and Q&A for the society’s first in-person event. This was a members-only access event, with information being delivered cautiously, taking into account security considerations. Members were told not to forward information about the event “without approval.”

Lt. Col. John Conricus is an International Spokesperson of the IDF, with over 20 years of military service. He has been responsible for IDF’s social media operations, public affairs, and public diplomacy. 

The event began with a briefing about the current hostile situation between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The on-going conflict, which began earlier this month, has led to thousands of deaths on both sides. There have been numerous protests across the world, including two recent Pro-Palestine rallies in Oxford.

Oxford Israel Society told Cherwell that Lt. Col. Conricus stated that “Israel is going to tremendous efforts to strike military targets only”, and emphasised “the commitment of the military and the government to rescue the hostages and protect civilian lives.” The Israeli embassy continued the Q&A with discussion on casualty numbers, and their belief that what is often reported should not always be trusted.

Lt. Col. Conricus previously told CNN that Israel’s war with Hamas “will not be short.”

Oxford Israel Society told Cherwell that they “look forward to hosting more events, and giving a space and voice for students who wish to support Israel, and celebrate Israeli cultural and social life.”

The Palestine Society has been reached out to for comment.

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