Friday 18th July 2025
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Sensitive data stolen from exclusive Oxbridge club

Fred Dimbleby
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Sensitive data stolen from exclusive Oxbridge club

An exclusive Oxbridge club has warned its members about a data breach, after private information was stolen from the society’s headquarters in London on 16 November.

The Oxford and Cambridge Club wrote to its 5000 members this week, cautioning them about “suspicious activity” on bank accounts after the theft.

The stolen data reportedly contains the names of members, their phone numbers, and home addresses. In some cases, bank details are also reported to have been stolen.

The stolen data includes private information from the actor Stephen Fry, and Lord Rees, the Astronomer Royal. 100 staff members are also reportedly included in the data.

The Prince of Wales and the Duke of Edinburgh are also members of the select society. It is currently understood that their data was not compromised in the breach.

The Sunday Telegraph reported that the theft had been noticed on 16 November but was only reported in recent days. The large data drive was allegedly stolen from a locked room within the club’s headquarters.

In a letter obtained by The Times, the club secretary wrote: “We have been advised that we should write to confirm that there may have been a data breach at the Club which could possibly result in disclosure of your personal data held on the Club computer system.

“This situation has arisen as a result of the theft of a storage disk, and not as a breach of the cyber security system, and although the data contained on the disk is protected by multiple layers of security and heavy password protection, we have been advised by data specialists that there is a very remote chance that information could be obtained.

“As this could potentially enable identity theft, the management felt that members should be informed as a duty of care.”

The club was established in 1830 and provides facilities for Oxbridge graduates. Membership is limited to those who have received degrees, honorary degrees, or MAs from Oxford or Cambridge, and those who have been members of a college or hall.

Membership of the club comes through election and costs up to £1,250 per year. Youth membership, for those 24 or under, costs up to £312.50 per year depending on where the member lives.

The Metropolitan Police have been informed of the theft, and the club has reportedly employed private investigators to aid the recovery of the drive.

 

Corpus votes to rename room named after alleged sex offender

Akshay Bilolikar
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Corpus votes to rename room named after alleged sex offender

Corpus Christi JCR voted to rename its ‘Fraenkel room’ yesterday evening, in response to allegations of sexual harassment made against the benefactor who the space was named after.

In a meeting on Sunday night, a majority JCR members mandated the president and Equal Opportunities officer to “lobby the college to change the name of the Fraenkel room” and remove Eduard Fraenkel’s portrait from the room.

The JCR also approved a boycott of the existing name, ruling that JCR committee members should now refer to it officially by a “neutral name” until negotiations with college were concluded. Some members suggested the use of the name “Corridor Room.”

The motion passed with 35 votes in favour, one vote in opposition, and a single abstention.

Baroness Mary Warnock, a prominent philosopher, accused classical scholar Eduard Fraenkel of sexual misconduct toward female students whilst he was Professor of Classics at Corpus. The allegations were made in her memoirs, published after Fraenkel’s death. Despite her allegations against him, Warnock continued to praise Fraenkel as a great scholar.

Freya Chambers, who proposed the motion, told Cherwell: “The Fraenkel room is used frequently by female students — it is even used to host Women’s Welfare tea. In light of this we thought it was vital to change the name of the room and to remove the photo of Frankel from the wall. The allegations of sexual harassment against Fraenkel are not a secret and should not be ignored.”

Shahryar Iravani, the Equal Opportunities officer and seconder of the motion, said: “The JCR’s decision to condemn Fraenkel will be taken by the JCR president and Equal Opportunities officer to the college’s president and welfare staff, to lobby them to change the room’s name officially within equalities meetings in Hilary term.”

One member said in the meeting: “The priority has to be the feelings of current members.”

The allegations about Professor Fraenkel, who died in 1970, have previously caused controversy. In 2006, Cambridge professor Mary Beard claimed that “any academic woman older than her mid forties” was likely to have an ambivalent reaction.

She continued: “It is impossible not to feel sisterly outrage at what would now be deemed… abuse of power. On the other hand, it is also hard to repress certain wistful nostalgia.”

Ten years on, Burial’s ‘Untrue’ is still dripping with raw emotion

Joe Baverstock-Poppy
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Ten years on, Burial’s ‘Untrue’ is still dripping with raw emotion

Ten years ago this month, Burial’s Untrue album was released. At the time, nothing was known about its producer. This element of secrecy piqued the interests of the national media. However, what makes Untrue so incredible is how much can be understood about its artist just through listening.

Untrue develops an emotional language – through woozing ambience, wailing vocals and overwhelming reverb – that produces a uniformly unsettling atmosphere. Even at its most hopeful, there is an air of isolation and melancholy that pervades the fifty minutes.

Alongside its emotional power, Untrue manages to depict an affecting geographical picture of autumnal South London – vinyl crackles like distant fireworks, pitch shifted vocals boom out of passing cars, and drums echo as if played inside a concrete leviathan. This landscape of a city at its most desolate reminds you of those lonely walks home from a night out everyone experiences, evoking all the emotions that come with that.

Despite its vividness, there is much more in Untrue that remains oblique. Burial’s use of vocals, stretched into androgyny, chopped into new sentences and melodies, obscure the identities and sources of his muses. Burial’s R&B influence is clear – sampling D’Angelo, Beyoncé, Erykah Badu, and Ray J – but these vocals are obfuscated to create a total loss of identities, reflecting the broader sense of isolation and existential tension.

Untrue lacks a central sense of identity in terms of genre too. In the mid-2000s, dance music was strongly distinguished along these lines: dubstep, jungle, garage, grime, and house all had incredibly unique sounds and few crossovers. Today, from Hessle Audio’s exodus from dubstep to jungle crossovers like ‘Hackney Parrot’, much of dance music’s genres has melded together, but Untrue could be seen as one of the first. While some purists try to claim this album as the holy grail of “true dubstep”, it is reality so much more.

Like walking through a neighbourhood of loud but distant radios, Untrue comes into contact with a number of styles and absorbs them all. Clattering drums capture both the speed of garage and the sparseness of dubstep, buzzing basslines throw us back to jungle days. ‘Raver’ even offers a turn into more continental genres with a driving beat straight out of tech house. A third of the tracks elude beats altogether taking shape as ambient mood pieces instead. Untrue eludes genre as a whole just as it eludes any identity, by morphing and merging identities beyond any recognition.

Burial’s Untrue was deeply influential, helping spur a new generation of British experimental electronic artists who placed emotion ahead of technicality in contrast to cold IDM from the 90s. Untrue’s genre hopping encouraged greater exploration from his contemporaries, engendering post-dubstep and the unclearly defined sound of contemporary UK dance music.

However, in a way, Untrue’s sound has never been replicated since. The process that produced such a masterpiece remains a mystery leaving its remarkable atmosphere truly one in a million.

Somerville votes against gender neutral toilets

Felix Pope
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Somerville votes against gender neutral toilets

Somerville JCR has narrowly voted against the introduction of gender neutral toilets, in part over concerns that women might feel uncomfortable using mixed facilities.

This comes despite LGBTQ+ officers making clear to students that college administration backed the change, and merely required a display of support from JCR members.

Reportedly, an LGBT Entz rep has now been “pressured” into cancelling the planned introduction of gender neutral toilets at an upcoming bop, allegedly under the threat of disciplinary action brought by other students.

The motion was originally proposed by Eilidh Wilson, college LGBTQ+ Officer. She told the meeting it was “important that this college shows recognition of non-binary people and think this should be reflected in buildings and facilities available to people”.

Currently the college bar has no gender neutral toilet, but merely one labelled ‘male’ and one ‘women’.

This is also the case in Flora Anderson Hall and Vaughan building, as well as for the toilets serving the dining hall. Toilets in some college accommodation blocks are already gender neutral.

Were the proposals adopted one toilet would be renamed ‘gender neutral toilet’ while the other would be named ‘gender neutral toilet with urinals’. Other toilets throughout the college would remain gendered.

Several JCR members raised the point that women would feel uncomfortable sharing a public toilet with men, with one stating that this was particularly important to consider as “many women have had experiences of harassment”.

One member’s point was branded potentially “heteronormative” after they claimed that some men would “feel awkward” using the toilet knowing that women could enter at any time.

Others suggested that a gender neutral private room, as opposed to a public toilet, would be preferable. However this reportedly would not be possible as it would necessitate “large scale construction”.

In order to prevent social pressure from influencing the outcome of the vote, a secret ballot was held, despite the concerns of some that such a measure could allow “transphobic” opinion to be voiced.

31 voted against the motion, with 29 in favour, and 7 abstaining.

Cherwell understands that students in support of the introduction of gender neutral toilets are set to reintroduce the motion next term, in the hope that it will then succeed.

Were the college to have instated gender neutral toilets it would have brought it in line with other colleges including Mansfield, St. Catherine’s, Nuffield, St. Hilda’s, Wadham, LMH, St. Peters, Balliol, St. Johns, St. Benet’s, and St. Hugh’s.

It is unclear whether Somerville College will attempt to implement gender neutral toilets irrespective of the outcome of the JCR vote.

It’s time for us to recognise the ongoing tragedies on our streets

Jeevan Ravindran
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It’s time for us to recognise the ongoing tragedies on our streets

I walk into a surgery and see a man with a swollen leg sitting near the reception desk. I recognise him – I’ve seen him sleeping on the streets a few times. After a while, I hear him talking to the nurses and the doctor about his leg. “I need to get it checked out,” he says. The staff try to be patient at first but quickly become curt, criticising him for being half asleep and telling him to go to his own GP, saying that they can’t help. I hear him mention that he needs £20 to get into the backpacker’s hostel, where someone can come to examine his leg.

When he’s alone, I go over to him and slip him the money. As I turn to walk back to my seat, he clutches my hand and says, “Please do something for me. Don’t let anybody corrupt that heart of yours. Please keep being kind.” I promise I will, and as I return to my seat I hear him crying, and I can’t help but cry a little too.

A week later, I’m walking down the street with my friend – we’ve just been shoe shopping at the Westgate Centre. Suddenly, I hear a shout from the man begging outside St John’s – I recognise him as Simeon, a rough sleeper who I’ve often spoken to and the husband of Vikki, a street poet. “Vikki died!” he yells. For a second I’m not sure if I’ve heard him right. “I just wanted to let you know because I know you did a lot for her.”

I can’t believe what I’m hearing. Vikki, the incredibly talented, sarcastic and sweet woman who beamed at me whenever I ran into her, who wrote a poem about homelessness for the On Your Doorstep Campaign – dead. “She had a heart bypass,” he says. “And then she got pneumonia because we were on the streets, and then she died.” I don’t know what to say. “Thank you for telling me. I’m so sorry – take care.” I walk away, still shell-shocked about Vikki. I’m concerned about Simeon, but optimistic that he’ll be okay – he seems okay, at least.

On Sunday, I get a Facebook message from my friend, telling me that she wants to get involved in homelessness because a homeless man died that day. For a second, I stop breathing. I’m at a complete loss. People shouldn’t be losing their lives due to homelessness, – let alone in one of the richest cities in the country, surrounded by one of the wealthiest institutions in the world. Let’s continue to challenge a culture of accepted homelessness. Let’s make Vikki proud.

Refugees – welcome here?

Selma Stearns
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Refugees – welcome here?

When I attended a rally last year to support asylum seekers and to fight xenophobia in the UK, I chanted along with everyone else: “Refugees are welcome here.”

Many students can talk the talk about helping refugees, but they are not just a group of people in the Calais Jungle. Indeed, there is a supportive and well-established community people who have been granted asylum right here in Oxford. There are well-established charities who work to help make living in the UK easier, as well as student-driven groups and associations led by former asylum seekers themselves.

Oxford is home to thousands of former asylum seekers. Whilst there are no official statistics on the size of the refugee and asylum seeking community in Oxford, the charity Refugee Resource believes the population to be over 4,000. The community is a diverse one, with Refugee Resource supporting 250 clients of 29 different nationalities in 2016/17.

I spoke to the trustees of the Oxford Kurdish and Syrian Association (Oksa) before their committee meeting last week. One of the three trustees and founding members of the society is Mustafa Barcho, who was given asylum in the UK in 2001.Roushin Bagdash is another trustee of Oksa who did not come to the UK as a refugee, but moved from Syria because of her husband’s employment.

Barcho and Bagdash said that the Oxford refugee community is close, and members support each other frequently. However, the support given by the government is very low, according to Barcho. Oxford is not a dispersal area: accommodation is not provided here by the Home Office as it is in some parts of the UK. Many refugees are assigned to Northern England when they first arrive. Many of the refugees who do come directly to Oxford pass through the Vulnerable Persons Resettlement Programme (VPRS). Bagdash, who works with Oxford Connection Support which helps facilitate the VPRS, said that there are around 26 families coming to Oxford as part of the scheme.The people that come through schemes such as this are not necessarily Syrian, but can be Sudanese, Iraqi, or from other countries with conflict, said Bagdash.

Barcho, who is Kurdish, left Syria at 13, and moved between Turkey, Greece, Italy, and other countries in Europe before reaching his final destination in the UK at the age of 21. “I was displaced, I didn’t have an identity for all of those years. I didn’t have anything to carry in my hands to say ‘this is me’,” he said.

When he arrived in the UK, the Home Office sent him to Doncaster to wait for his paperwork to be done, which took five years, before he was granted residency. Barcho was refused refugee status three or four times before being accepted, going through a court case with the Home Office. He said that after many years of running and not having an identity, the Home Office still demanded more information and did not make the process easy.

“If [the Home Office] accepts everyone, then there would be more people coming to England, so the Home Office will always reject applications, even if they know you need to have an identity,” said Barcho.

Barcho said that things have changed for Syrian refugees since he arrived as a result of the Syrian civil war. According to Barcho, as the war rages on it becomes harder for the UK government to refuse to grant asylum. “They don’t really have a choice; it’s not because of the understanding because the UK should take more refugees, but they don’t,” said Barcho.
He noted that Germany has outperformed the UK in terms of refugee support. In 2015, Germany expected to take at least 800,000 asylum seekers, according to the Guardian. Barcho said in reality Germany took far more than that figure. In contrast, the UK Home Office said that between 2011 and 2015, almost 5,000 Syrians were given asylum, but this figure included many Syrians who were already living in the UK, the Guardian reported. “We need to push the government to take more [refugees] because of their involvement in the Syrian war,” said Barcho. “The UK plays a huge role in Syria and the Middle East.”

In 2016, David Cameron said that the UK would accept 20,000 Syrian refugees under the VPRS, according to the BBC. However, John said that very few qualify for the scheme – the Gov.uk information document states that the scheme is intended for people at highest risk, such as those seeking medical treatment or survivors of violence and torture. “We thought the UK would do much much better than they did, but unfortunately the Conservative government… have eliminated some support and aid for people who need it, especially in Syria and Iraq,” said Barcho.

Carolynn Low, Partnership Development Manager of Refugee Resource, said that a lack of political will on the part of European governments represents a huge obstacle to resolving the refugee crisis. For example, Low said, the move towards processing asylum claims offshore, is dangerous and unethical. “Returning people to inhumane, exploitative and abusive conditions, such as in Libya where slavery and extreme abuse is widely documented, is unacceptable,” she said. “As signatories to the 1951 Refugee Convention, we should be upholding our obligations, including the principle of non-refoulement.”
Low urged that there need to be more legal routes into Europe for asylum seekers and refugees, so that people are not forced to make dangerous journeys.

I came to Oxford from the US, and even I found the transition to a new country overwhelming at times. The process would be infinitely more stressful if someone were fleeing violence, and entering a completely different culture. I asked the Oksa trustees what the main barrier facing refugees in Oxford is, and the short answer is that there is no singular response. However, Bagdash and Barcho both said that language is one of the biggest. “It is the first step to integrate and the first step to move on, to be honest,” said Bagdash. “Especially, there are some people who come here illiterate… if they don’t know their own language it is hard to move on.”

In order to address language and cultural barriers, Student Action for Refugees (Star) is trialling a new project with Jacari, so Syrian families who arrive through the UN resettlement scheme are assigned a student to give them some extra language support. Bagdash helps coordinate these home visits and other schemes to help children and families with schoolwork and English. Barcho said that the Oksa seeks to help people integrate in the UK, and assist with education, housing, and navigating the free English courses they are provided as a refugee.

Bagdash said Oksa also have two women volunteers who used to be teachers helping people, especially older individuals, learn English. Bagdash said that she has been amazed with how quickly people progress, and how strong their sense of determination is. It is much easier for young people to integrate, as it is not just language difficulties that older people struggle with, but integrating into a new society. “It is very difficult, after all those years, to go and stay in the classroom to learn English,” said Barcho. “They face a lot of issues, like mental health issues.”

Organisations in Oxford seek to address these issues. For example, Refugee Resource provides counselling and psychotherapy, especially trauma therapy and cross-cultural support.

A new student-run refugee support service is Star. Lizzy Thompson, a Pembroke undergraduate, has recently Started the Oxford branch of this national charity up again to fill the gap between the university and the community.

The organisation helps and supports charities run by locals, including Refugee Resource and Asylum Welcome. Thompson said that being active in communities is key for Star.
But despite the different organisations offering support, Barcho and Bagdash highlight that there are a wide range of obstacles facing refugees, which completely differ based on individual characteristics of the families and people.

As Kate Smart, the director of Asylum Welcome, said the idea of the ‘refugee crisis’ is a bit misleading, as it suggests one single problem to be solved. “Refugee experiences have been a sad feature of societies ever since records began,” she said. “Refugees are created when human rights are threatened within states – so international activity to strengthen respect for human rights is significant.”

The media can sometimes be hostile and there is a lot of misunderstanding about the ‘refugee crisis’, and what terms like ‘refugee’, ‘asylum seeker’, and ‘migrant’ even mean. If there is one thing Thompson said that Oxford students should know, it is that there is no such thing as an ‘illegal’ refugee or asylum seeker.
“Terms like these are invented to project angst,” she said. “We’re all human and everyone has the right to protection and safety, basic human rights…are being neglected and we can very easily do our bit to change that.”

“Personally, I worry about the lack of empathy and humanity in Europe in general currently, and seemingly, a process of ‘othering’ of migrants and refugees,” said Low. “Having said that there are some extremely supportive and active communities and individuals who are doing all they can show to show ‘Refugees are Welcome.’”
University students have historically been drivers of change, but students can sometimes be unaware of issues that are happening right under their nose. “There aren’t self-made camps under train stations in Oxford, with people who have fled one heart wrenching situation to find themselves helpless in a limbo of political, legal, and cultural battles,” said Thompson. “So, it’s understandable for British attitudes to lack the same sense of urgency as elsewhere on the continent”

“I’m hoping that Star makes some steps in the right direction to make the refugee crisis seem less of an awkward taboo,” said Thompson. “We pick all our raising-awareness events carefully – we don’t want to depress people, the idea is just to get them talking and thinking.”

Barcho said that before Thompson began Oxford Star, there were many other student groups and individuals who were involved with refugee support. “We work with many groups and many individual people who like to support refugees…but there is a lack of proper support and funding to put them all under one umbrella,” said Barcho.
Barcho worked with Arabic speaking students at Pembroke and Queens to do online tutoring and teaching for children in Syria. “There should be more of an awareness of the difficulties that refugees are facing here,” said Barcho. “I think students can contribute a lot.”

We as students cannot let ourselves believe that there is nothing we can do to help. Student involvement in organisations such as Asylum Welcome has had a significant impact. Furthermore, Star has led a successful campaign for equal access that means there is no longer a legal three-year wait for refugees to be allowed to attend university.

“The most valuable thing students can do is to make a promise to yourself that wherever life takes you after university you will always be a tolerant, welcoming, empathetic person,” said Smart. “The more people who have that attitude, the safer the world will be.”

But we should remember the root of the problem. Assad is still the President of Syria and he has been implicated by the UN as being involved in war crimes. When Bashar al-Assad came to Downing Street to visit prime minister Tony Blair, Barcho led a protest against the dictatorial regime and was arrested for throwing eggs at Assad and Blair. Barcho was angry that after all of the deaths that Assad has caused, he was welcomed to a democratic country by the Queen and the PM. The UK granted Barcho asylum from a dictatorial country, and then hosted the leader of that very country.

“The jury said ‘did you know it is against the law to hit somebody with eggs?” and I said “it is against the law for you to host a dictator who killed hundreds of thousands of people,’” Barcho said.

Clearly, the refugee crisis in the world today has many components. There is a lot of work that students can get involved with, but it should not be done with the attitude of helping those who are helpless. The refugee community in Oxford is a supportive group who have been through struggles, not least at the hands of the UK government, but many of them are settled and well established in Oxford. There are day-to-day issues we as students can try to help alleviate, but we should also be conscious that we live in a country that makes the process very difficult for refugees to settle here.

“The need for safety from persecution is real, but otherwise [refugees] are ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances, who come with bags of talent,” said Smart.

For students who want to get more involved, there is information on the Star Facebook page, or email the team directly at star.oxforduni@gmail. com. Information about Refugee Resource (refugeeresource.org.uk) and Asylum Welcome (asylum-welcome. org) is also available online.

Quad Goals

William Hosie
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Quad Goals

The fashion scene in Oxford doesn’t attract much public attention. We don’t have the established legacy of a fashion show like Cambridge, or any haute couture shops – for obvious reasons. And yet, when we think of Oxonians through the fashion lens, we see three vibrant categories emerge. Through this typology, understanding the strange place that is Oxford, and its even stranger inhabitants, has never been easier.

First category: those who don’t know what looks good or bad and don’t care. They’ll probably be wearing a pink shirt under a dark green tweed jacket just like that girl you met at interview who didn’t get in. Second category: your ‘person-next-door’, those who look like they dressed up as Bob the Builder one day for school when they were five, thought it was cute and haven’t really changed style since. You’ll typically see them wearing a white Zara top under a green Zara shirt. They probably spent their summer holidays across Europe going from one friend’s house to another, networking their way through Goldman Sachs-employed parents. Their style is as bland as their personalities – although they don’t really care because they’re the kind of people who would argue that their bright career prospects are a definite alternative to a personality like yours: flamboyant and anticipating perpetual unemployment as optimistically as you can because, let’s face it, you study English.

Then you have the ones who care, enticingly enigmatic until you realise they’re really quite shallow. These people are conscious of the faux pas which those in the first category are unknowingly guilty of but rather than avoiding these no nos, they reclaim them. It’s sad to think that by competing to see who can look most edgy, they all end up looking the same. It comes to the point where the naked eye can no longer dissociate their pink socks from their yellow tops (which, let’s be honest, could as much have come from Urban Outfitters as from Octavia Foundation): it’s just one huge blob of colour, bum bags and the odd fishnet socking, like a cobweb in an abundant garden. These people go to Cellar every Thursday without exception. They live and die by Bullingdon. They have never been to a single Bridge Thursday.

Still, at the end of the day, we’re all quite jealous of these people. They may all look and sound the same, tied up in a co-dependent network of edginess which culminates in emotionally stunted debauchery at Notting Hill Carnival every year, but deep down we envy their ability to back themselves on even the most headache-inducing outfits and managing to come across as in control. As the icing on the cake the attention their clothes draw means they’re rich in a currency more valuable than the happiness, blissful fashion ignorance and career prospects of others: they get Oxloves.

Attacking Kezia Dugdale for going on I’m A Celeb is simple snobbery

Honor Brocklebank-Fowler
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Attacking Kezia Dugdale for going on I’m A Celeb is simple snobbery

It was revealed last week that former Scottish Labour party leader Kezia Dugdale would be joining the line-up of so-called “celebrities” to take part in this year’s series of ‘I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here!’ The Sun reported that the politician would head to Australia immediately, during a particularly tumultuous time for her party, which in the last week alone has seen her stand-in replacement Alex Rowley forced to quit, and Corbyn ally Richard Leonard announced as the party’s new leader.

It has since emerged that Dugdale sought permission from party chiefs, with MSP Neil Findlay denouncing her decision to enter the jungle as “ludicrous”, adding that: “I think it demeans politics when people get involved in that. I think we’ve a very serious job to do…” But this is categorically unfair. One would presume she will have implemented a stand-in to fulfil her responsibilities within the Scottish Parliament, in the manner many MPs do when, for example, they’re ill or taking annual leave. Neil Findlay’s draconian shaming of Dugdale’s decision to appear on the show – and raise money for charity in the process – seems to me to be a thinly-veiled act of snobbery.

Findlay chose in his interview on Sunday to pick up on the perceived low-brow nature of the show, noting that the show involves “[jetting] off around the world and [sitting] around a campfire eating a kangaroo’s appendage.” This flippant remark, although possibly rooted in concern for the adequate representation of Dugdale’s regional constituents, fails to recognise the potential value of the MSP’s appearance on the show, which in its last series averaged a staggering 10.5 million viewers. Such appearances humanise politicians, who often seem removed from the preoccupations and interests of their electorate.

Former Conservative MP Edwina Currie’s decision to star on the show in 2014 was lauded by viewers and parliamentarians alike as a step towards personifying the representatives of a political system seen by many as archaic and inaccessible. Boris Johnson’s father Stanley, a prominent Conservative MEP in the 1980s, and co-chairman of pro-EU environmentalist group Environmentalists for Europe, is among the contestants appearing on the show.

Singling Dugdale out as the sole political figure on this year’s series is clearly an act of outrageous finger-pointing on the part of her colleagues. As Nicola Sturgeon said, Scottish Labour has shown itself this week to be a toxic “nest of vipers” by not applauding Dugdale’s attempt to demystify politicians. If the Duchess of Cambridge can be a relative-in-law of ‘Made in Chelsea’ bad-boy Spencer Matthews, surely Dugdale can eat a few wombat testicles for charity.

“You can’t deny that Spoons’ founder Tim Martin is one of the few true heroes of our generation.”

Alec Fullerton
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“You can’t deny that Spoons’ founder Tim Martin is one of the few true heroes of our generation.”

BrewDog is a fake. In a bid to continue their corporate expansion over the UK and Europe, the Scottish artisan beer company recently opened a new bar on Cowley Road. The interior inevitably resembles your textbook Islington gastro pub. You know what I’m talking about: the faux cheap and cheerful enamel tableware (think the fries mug at GBK), and the beers listed on old-fashioned cinema-style letter boards. I hope the wanky, millennial-suckering vibe is already riling you up.

Pride of place though is their flagship beer: the ‘Punk IPA’. Now we come to the main reason BrewDog stretches my loathing muscles. Every aspect of its brand is desperately aimed at cultivating an image of rebellious and antiestablishment bandits, leading the charge in the fabled ‘Craft Beer Revolution’. Just look at the cringe-worthy rhetoric that drips cynically from their marketing blurbs: “All we care about is brewing world class craft beer; extraordinary beers that blow people’s minds and kick start a revolution.” Ew.

Maybe this was slightly less disingenuous when they started back in 2007 as two brothers and a dog selling attractively branded homebrew out of a car boot in Scotland. Skip forward to today, and the brand couldn’t be any more mainstream. BrewDog is a constantly growing international corporation, opening new bars all the time, selling their beers in every major supermarket and charging through the teeth for pretentiously served goblets of piss.

Purists will cry: “at least they didn’t sell out to Diageo or ABInBev”, two behemoths of the drinks industry. Fair point, but the alternative is pretty dreadful: ‘Equity for punks’. An exceptionally ambitious effort to turn buying shares in a capitalist monolith into a cool, hipster activity.

This oxymoronic slogan perfectly sums up BrewDog – what sort of ‘punk’ buys shares in a business? Certainly not Sid Vicious and co., wearing bin bags and sporting homemade swastika tattoos on their foreheads. There’s no chance they’d fork out the best part of a tenner for two thirds of a pint of organic, responsibly-sourced, quadruple-hopped ale served in a brandy glass.

This marketing bullshit seeps into their kegs too. Just take a look at the names of some of their offerings: ‘Jet black heart’, ‘5 am saint’, ‘Elvis juice’ (which, I hate to say, is easily their best beer and the only characterful one), ‘Cocoa psycho’ and the laughably incongruous ‘Vagabond’, their gluten-free beer.

These names, coupled with the faux-edgy presentation, are nothing but a puerile effort to carve out a sexy and dangerous aura around the brand.

Even when it comes to the actual quality of the beer itself – surely the most important question in all of this – BrewDog is exceptionally mediocre. Practically everyone I’ve spoken to thinks that they’re over-hyped. The crucial issue links in with their branding – they’re trying too hard. BrewDog beers are simply over engineered, gratuitously hoppy and unpleasantly strong.

That’s enough about BrewDog. A far better example of an independent brewery doing something genuinely exciting is Flying Dog Brewery based in Frederick, Maryland. Back in May of this year, I was in the area and was lucky enough to go on a tour of the brewery. It turns out that George Stranahan, the brewery’s founder, was a close friend of maverick gonzo journalist, Hunter S. Thompson. The Brewery’s punchy and original style certainly reflects his influence, as well as the ‘Gonzo Imperial Porter’ produced in homage to the infamously wild writer.

The beers themselves are of a far superior quality, boasting a playful love of experimentation coupled with great taste. It would be impossible not to be impressed by the striking artwork on the bottles and cans, all produced by Thompson’s illustrative partner in crime, Ralph Steadman. His intensely unique and grotesque style lends each type of beer a distinctive character and helps achieve the image where BrewDog fails to do so.

After falling in love with Flying Dog, I brought a six pack back to the UK, imagining that I’d be hard pressed to get my hands on their beer back across the pond. So you can imagine my surprise when, like the prodigal son, I sidled back into my local Wetherspoons, and was able to sup triumphantly on a can of their ‘Raging Bitch’ – a cracking citrus IPA that doesn’t overdo the hop-factor.

You might scoff in my face. But I’m sure you’d agree that, compared to BrewDog, Wetherspoon’s is a considerably more anti-establishment and cooler place to drink.

There’s no denying that ‘Spoons’ “Pint Man-in-Chief”’ (the official title), the mullet-sporting Tim Martin, is one of the few true heroes of our generation. They couldn’t have been more antiestablishment last year, when they actively supported the Brexit vote with Leave magazines and coasters. Don’t get me wrong, I voted Remain, but that was objectively hilarious.

It might be the unique carpeting in every chain of Spoons. It could be the new app that allows you to order ten portions of garden peas and a pint of milk to your friend’s table on the other side of the country. Or maybe it’s the fact that Spoons offers a lively atmosphere, unbeatable prices, and exceptionally consistent quality. But whatever the reason is, no-one has ever had a bad time at Wetherspoons. So, grab yourself a pint of guest ale and thank god you didn’t end up at BrewDog instead.

Blame for our University’s blatant inequality should lie with the education system, not with Oxford

Rachel Collett
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Blame for our University’s blatant inequality should lie with the education system, not with Oxford

It’s safe to say I don’t exactly fit in with the majority of Oxford students as the daughter of a postman, who attended a state comp in a northern industrial town near Liverpool.

This constant imposter syndrome and feeling of exteriority is apparent every day in every sphere, as I make my way through my Oxford degree.

Cherwell’s recent report, which gave statistics proving the Union, student journalism, and politics were dominated by the privately educated, shows that my anxieties are not imagined.

There is a huge class problem at Oxford that permeates through academic work as well as extra-curricular activities, and serves to exclude working class students from every area of Oxford life.

The same structural inequalities that makes access to Oxford almost impenetrable for people of my background are apparent within the university itself, making access to the ‘Oxford life’ a myth for those of us who are not trained debaters or mini-politicians at school.

The dominance of students with privileged educational or income backgrounds in the Union or student politics reflects the opportunities presented to them through school debating societies and young parliament initiatives. Accompanied with the obvious academic privilege that comes with independent schooling, these opportunities inevitably give students from such backgrounds a privilege in all spheres of Oxford life, as well as after graduation when entering careers.

Indeed, it is too simplistic to view the issue of private schooling simply through the lens of those who had access to better teaching: it is these societies and extra-curricular activities that give the privileged a real upper hand.

From my own perspective, as Women’s Officer of Oxford Uni- versity Labour Club and someone actively involved in Oxford’s political scene, the dominance of posh, white, public schoolboys is felt in every space.

OULC actually fared better in Cherwell‘s recent report than most other societies, especially compared to OUCA (although that is hardly a surprise), yet is still ruled by men.

Despite women being admitted around one hundred years ago, the atmosphere in such arenas is as though nothing has changed – liberation groups continue to be treated as exterior, and struggle to raise their voices above the noise of those taught their opinion is most valid in this space.

The class problems at Oxford are therefore simply indicative of a wider societal problem, in which such middle-upper class students attending the best grammar and private schools are set up from a young age to be the future leaders of the country, meaning every institution, not just Oxford and Cambridge, continues to also be dominated by the privately educated.

Half of both the BBC top earners list and the number of MPs sitting in the House of Commons are from privileged educational backgrounds, a hugely disappointing number considering only seven per cent of the population attend private schools.

For example, one in ten MPs attended one single public school – Eton.

Such figures reveal undeniable disproportionate inequality in a variety of institutions.

This shows that perhaps even attending university – especially the best in the world – as a working class or state comprehensive-educated student does not necessarily give you a leg up in such occupations and in a society which still remains to be dominated by a minority elite.

Things have to change so that working class students are represented at this university.

Otherwise, Oxford is simply going to die out as an out of touch, patriarchal, and elitist institution which contributes to a system built on class, gender, and racial inequalities.

Through the work of campaigns such as Class Act and Decolonise Oxford, we can promote greater representation in these spaces, as well as support to gain the confidence and skills to stand for positions in such societies.

Of course, it is up to the University itself to accept more state comprehensive students – which is indeed increasing every year – but it must be understood that the problems which exist here for working class students is more the fault of our country’s education system, which allows for unequal educational opportunities based on monetary income and class.

While private schools still exist, and while they continue to offer the best learning as well as preparation for Oxford life compared to state comps, there will continue to be a huge disparity in the life and opportunity of students here.

Something has to change.

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