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Day: 26 October 2016

Live: Nickelback

19th October at Manchester Arena

7/10

Nickelback: the only band I know who have had research dedicated to investigating why people hate them (yes, really). Yet, speaking as one of the many sardines packed into Manchester Arena, Nickelback are a far cry from whimpering their swan song. With an endearing level of sincerity, Nickelback were a flurry of strutting prowess, jagged-edged rock and euphoric ballads.

Following the flames conjured by the demonic rock angels in Monster Truck, Nickelback took to the stage with the rallying cry of ‘Edge Of A Revolution’. If fans were not suitably warmed up by Monster Truck’s support set, the baying of the hounds had truly begun now. Nickelback’s setlist soon dived into stripper pole raunch with crowd pleasers ‘Something In Your Mouth’ and ‘Animals’. Under the impressively commanding demeanour of frontman Chad Kroeger, Nickelback thereafter submerged the crowd into a deep pool of ballads like ‘Far Away’ and ‘Lullaby’.

Whilst this midsection of slushy rock was played to the point of saturation, it succeeded in punctuating the eventual return of their hard liquor rock riffs with an almighty crunch. Nickelback’s performance was far from jaded, and it was a genuine pleasure to witness their pearly whites lighting up the stage as they bathed in the voltage coursing through the arena.

Sadly, Nickleback wavered in integrity with their encore addition of Foo Fighters’ ‘Everlong’. Question marks levitated over gig-goers’ heads as they tried to comprehend the unsettling U-turn in momentum. The band’s onstage chemistry was also perplexing: a band of brothers between songs, yet during songs they were four pieces of different puzzles. Nevertheless, whilst often dismissed for flailing authenticity, Nickelback were refreshingly free of smoke and mirrors in a world currently drowning in them. Go, listen to them. I dare you.

Album: Two Door Cinema Club – Gameshow

Released 14th October via Parlophone

3/10

Two Door Cinema Club’s newly released album Gameshow has hit the now-metaphorical shelves and it certainly does disappoint. My memory of the unknown tracks being played at Reading Festival this year appeared to be well received by the audience—although, I will admit, I had been drinking. The fun and catchy indie pop/rock of Tourist History and Beacon has long gone.  Instead Gameshow is an album of electronic-indie pop tracks that sound like a teenager’s first attempt at mixing a record. Of course evolution as a band is important, and Two Door Cinema Club have definitely evolved, but today I am in mourning for the classics that I will never stop listening to.

Whilst the level of production has clearly increased, the quality has not. The opening of ‘Lavender’ could be a child’s electric drum kit that was set to loop, reminiscent of the joke band ‘The Jerk Offs’ in Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist. Meanwhile, listening to the album as a stream is quite an event as the songs fade across into one another, illuminating how cohesive, streamlined, and stylised the album and the band now are.

This triumph is then undermined by the disappearance of Alex Trimble’s fun and characteristic Northern Irish accent that has been replaced with a bland-sounding overmixed voice. His monosyllabic singing is then attached to looped tracks of single drum beats and little reverb. One song, however, that has some memory of their prior glory is the title track, ‘Gameshow’. Trimble’s natural voice can be heard for the most part with the instruments having a much more natural indie feel. However even this track begins to feel uncomfortably simplistic with screeched lyrics towards the crescendo.

I will concede that Two Door Cinema Club are definitely trying something new, and if modernised electronic indie pop/rock is your bread and butter of the music world, then this album could be heaven sent; the album itself peaked at number two on the official album charts and has been mostly well-received. But for me, I’ll just say I’m no longer sad that their Manchester show sold out.

Crash, Bang, Wallop

Continuing my kick on the 1980s that started last week with the British home computer, and how influential it was in not only British video games, but the computing industry, I’d like to cross the pond and talk about North America’s adventures with video games. In the 1970s, the first generation of video game consoles in the USA weren’t much to write about. There were a handful of consoles available, none of them for sale over here, most of them costing over $300 USD and they all only had one game: ‘Pong’.

The Atari 2600, released in 1977, was an instant hit because it could play more than one game! It had these things called “cartridges” that had different games on them! It also had colours and sound! To a market that had just spent the better part of a decade playing ‘Pong’ on a black screen, literally anything other than ‘Pong’ was a warm welcome. The Atari 2600 sold like hotcakes. By the beginning of the 80s, Atari was grossing billions of dollars a year. The only real competitor at the time was the Fairchild Channel F, which packed it in very early on. Atari was the uncontested king.
The Atari 2600 was the reigning champ, so of course a lot of pretenders came out of the woodwork. In 1982 alone, five new consoles hit the market, including the Intellivision and Colecovision. Each console had its own library of games. Having five consoles worth of video games in a store takes up valuable real estate and very quickly the market became saturated. What do you buy?

There was a trend at the time among video game companies of not crediting the programmers that worked on games, and Atari was no exception. Annoyed by the lack of recognition for their hard work, many of Atari’s workers quit and formed independent video games publishers. The most successful of which was a little company called Activision. Atari attempted to sue Activision in order to block sales of their games, but as soon as this failed the floodgates were open for anyone to develop third party games. The number of games on the market swelled. Stores didn’t have enough space to carry all of these games, and few of them were any good. Console manufacturers had lost control of what was on their systems and their consoles suffered for it.

There was an expectation from Atari themselves that the appetite for video games was so ravenous that the public would buy almost anything regardless of quality. A prime example of this was ‘E.T. The Extra Terrestrial Game’. A six-week mess of a game thrown together in time for the holiday season. So sure it would be a hit, 5 million copies were made. It tanked and is regarded as one of the worst games ever. Thousands of copies were buried in New Mexico because they just couldn’t shift them. Another notable game was the 2600 version of ‘Pac-Man’. Atari made 12 million cartridges, when only 10 million people owned an Atari 2600. They were anticipating people buying a console just for this game. This attitude was commonplace in the industry at the time. Stores had shelves upon shelves of games that they couldn’t sell as fast as they were getting them.

While video game consoles were fighting it out and flooding the market with derivative tat, home computers were slowly on the rise. Home computers like the Apple II and the Commodore 64 had nicer graphics, better sound chips than the consoles of the time and could do much more than just play games. In 1982, Commodore and Texas Instruments were in the middle of a vicious price war. Commodore cut the price of their flagship model, the Commodore 64 to $300, not much more than the price of the Atari 2600 at the time. Suddenly people were asking “Why would I pay more for something that could only play video games that looked worse?” The home computers at the time could run bigger games that looked and sounded better, while the Atari 2600 could barely run ‘Pitfall’.

So you have lots of consoles on the market, all with lots of sub-par games that no one is buying, and home computers are slowly encroaching on the market. What happens? The market crashes.

The surge of low quality games that flooded shops left the public feeling discontent, and consequently they stopped buying video games. Lots of games were sitting on shelves unsold, which hurt retailers, who sent the games back to the publisher for refunds, which hurt publishers. Smaller publishers quickly went under from the demands for refunds that they couldn’t pay. Stores reduced the space reserved for video games and shoved new games that were normally $30 into bargain bins for quick sales. By June 1983, confidence in video games was at an all time low. The sales from video games plummeted and the Magnavox, Intellivision and Colecovision were all discontinued by 1984. The Atari 2600 clung on, but it was not the titan it once was, with its next consoles nowhere near as successful. This was the video game crash of 1983. The console market remained relatively dormant until the release of the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1987.

Home computers managed to weather the crash fairly well, continued to sell, opened up a new generation to computer gaming and gave birth to a new breed of coders. The freedom allowed to third party developers that was so prevalent here was quickly nipped in the bud, with future companies like Nintendo and Sony tightening control on third party games. Nintendo even imposed a limit on the number of games a company could publish a year. Thanks to this, no one ever made a bad video game again, and instead put love and effort into their games.

The triggering: safe spaces are eroding our freedoms

In university campuses across Canada, the United States and Britain is an evil that is triumphing against our freedom. It has led to the erosion of freedoms for many students—not just of speech but also the freedom of expression. But you may well ask me, “Colm, what is this evil you speak of? Is it fascists? Is it radical communism? Have Cobra succeeded in defeating GI Joe and established a new world order where you cannot say what you believe or think?” No, it is none of these things. It is in fact the work of the movement that has championed the need for safe spaces and trigger warnings.

This evil, and it is an evil, has permeated our society to deplorable levels. Students now act like they come to university to be sheltered from opposing opinions and not have their beliefs challenged through free and open debate. For example, all one needs do to violate the safe space policy at the University of Edinburgh is to shake ones head in disagreement. One will then be ejected from whatever function these thought police happen to be at. Why do they impose such a rule? Apparently, it is not appropriate to have negative or dissenting opinions about a speaker. This ridiculous rule is something that these groups have used to shut down people who disagree with their world view. Such was the situation at our very own university last year when the Students’ Union banned Julie Bindel and Milo Yiannopoulos from speaking. Milo, who once attended The University of Manchester, is an outspoken critic of the safe space culture and of the group which online has been termed Social Justice Warriors (SJW’s). Milo has said some pretty odd things, including his unequivocal support for Donald Trump whom he affectionately calls ‘Daddy.’ But the idea that he should have been banned because he would apparently have violated the university’s safe space culture is absurd; who was he going to threaten or make feel unsafe? He is just one man that many people disagree with. He holds no elected office and has no power (other than his job as tech editor for Breitbart News). So why fear him? What are his detractors so scared of? Are they afraid that they might be triggered by his dissenting opinion?

This triggering is part of the wider campaign against free thought and speech. Even this country’s greatest educational institution, University of Oxford, has been infiltrated by these cry-babies. They have begun putting trigger warnings before law lectures in case some of the students find the content distressing. What will these students do when they leave university to become a practicing lawyer? Will they refuse to work a case prosecuting a criminal because they were burgled once and therefore no longer able to face the harsh realities of the world? Next thing you know, archaeology lectures will come with trigger warnings saying “warning: this lecture may contain images of bones.” Perhaps next, medical lectures will start warning about the possible presence of nasty looking body parts.

This poisonous ideology has even lead to racial segregation at California State University as it now offers accommodation for black students only. This was a response to apparently feeling unsafe at the university; despite the fact California is one of the most multi-ethnic of all US states. It saddens me to see segregation make a return in America after all that was done to combat prejudice. My own mother faced abuse when she was in Florida in the early 70s because she dared to befriend a black janitor who worked at her school. Why, with the already tense racial situation in America at the moment, would anyone possibly think that segregation is the answer?

But we have a long way to go to defeat this divisive dogma. At last year’s Mancunion Live event, the issue of safe spaces was brought up. One speaker said that they were proud to have upheld the Students’ Union’s policy on safe spaces. I think all this banning of people stems from one very simple thing: that those who would shut people down and not let other voices be heard are either not very good at debating or are afraid that upon scrutiny, their ideas and philosophy will crumble like a dry flapjack. It is not the preserve of free and democratic societies to limit what someone can say just because it might offend or trigger. As J. K. Rowling once said, “If you seek the removal of freedoms from an opponent, simply on the grounds that they have offended you, you have crossed a line to stand alongside tyrants.”

Our Internet window to the world is shrinking

We have all known or still know a friend on Facebook who shares articles and infographics that make our blood boil. Perhaps they are posting far-left feminist safe space policy articles or pushing the grievances of the oppressed white man. You probably unsubscribe to their updates or delete them altogether. Or if you’re like me, you crack your knuckles, do some fact-checking over a cup of tea, and then settle in for a frustrating debate, which ends in pinning the other party’s profile picture to a dartboard.

In short, we tend not to deal well with opinions which contrast our own. Luckily for us, the Internet provides a place to find like-minded individuals whose content we can ‘like’ and in return feel affirmed when people comment favourably on our own shares. It emerged recently that Facebook had updated its newsfeed algorithm, meaning that you’ll see less of people you have little interaction with, and less publishing content. This also means more posts and shares which you enjoy and agree with.

Despite the vastness of the internet, and its spectrum of political and social views, we find ourselves in ever narrower sections of the web. Rather than expanding our view, the internet is increasingly tailored to individual preferences “that make us happy and keep us clicking,” as Wired Magazine notes. “That content is seldom anything that challenges our viewpoint, and there’s a risk that this distorts our view of the wider world.”

Part of this is to do with the nature of the Internet. Advertising revenue allows much of the Internet to remain free, and as we browse, the adverts and content that we see become ever more specific to our interests. I would recommend (with permission) having a look at a friend’s YouTube browser or Amazon recommendations or scrolling through their Facebook; the Internet appears very different through somebody else’s browser.

However, we cannot blame conspiring multinationals and the structure of the Internet entirely for skewing our world view; we do plenty of that ourselves. The people we befriend on Facebook and follow on Twitter, indeed those in our wider social circles, are likely to hold similar views to our own. It’s difficult to get on with someone when you have a wildly divergent take on political issues, and certainly makes going to the pub a minefield.

There is even a psychological basis for the selection of media we consume, namely our confirmation bias. We have a tendency to accept information which supports the conclusions we already have, while denying facts and viewpoints which contradict the views we hold. This means that we may believe we are “drawing on all the facts.” In a sense, we are, it’s just that the available information has already been subconsciously reduced.

The result of all this is the ‘echo chamber’ of the internet. The theory goes that the internet creates ‘enclaves’ of opinion, where the repetition of ideas leads to their being reinforced and pushed to the ends of the spectrum. When “people find themselves in enclaves in which they exclusively hear from others who think as they do… their confidence typically grows, and they become more extreme in their beliefs,” as legal academic Cass Sunstein observes. “Corroboration, in short, reduces tentativeness, and an increase in confidence produces extremism.” When Internet users from opposing enclaves do eventually meet over the latest incendiary hashtag, we witness the keyboard savagery with which we are so familiar.

While confidence in one’s beliefs should not be equated with extremism, anonymity and the ease of finding similarly-minded users means that the internet is particularly well-suited to the “enclave extremism” which Sunstein discusses. Indeed, it is no bad thing that we are able to connect with communities based on our shared interests. We have access to immeasurable amounts of data, and information can be disseminated like never before. The internet platform is of huge benefit.

It seems that the algorithms of the internet are stacked against us, the advertisers are going after our browser history, and our own minds attempt to block out information which challenges us. It is not, however, inconceivable that we might widen the scope of our media. Gone are the days of receiving all news and opinion from a single broadside publication; it’s easy enough to follow political parties, politicians, websites, news outlets. This is not a suggestion to give credibility to extremist views, rather that we might consider facing sources with which we would normally disagree.

The real question is this: do we care about the narrowness of the media we consume? If not, then we have to accept the stubbornly entrenched extremism of the Internet. On the other hand, we have the opportunity to understand the people with whom we disagree and to engage them meaningfully, instead of smashing our keyboards, deleting them from Facebook, and running away.

Stress: let’s talk about it

So here you are, you’re a student at the University of Manchester and I’m sure you’ve heard all the clichés before you came here—“University will be the best years of your life!”, “University is where you meet your lifelong friends!”, “At university is where you find yourself!”, etc. However, for many students these sayings simply haven’t proven to be correct. Many new and returning students are simply struggling to keep up with assignments, make new friends, and deal with homesickness and all this can dangerously build up to an unhealthy amount of stress. Stress can critically affect your health, happiness, and relationships—it can also lead to depression. So let’s look at ways to deal with it head on….

1. Buy a daily planner
First things first—get yourself organised! It may sound very basic, but so many students ignore this, and failing to plan out your work schedule will inevitably lead to you feeling like things are getting on top of you.  Use your planner to schedule out your revision, seminar prep, and readings for each week. Look at your MyManchester timetable and then align your planner along with it. Simple stuff but trust me, it’s the easiest and most effective method to prevent stress.

2. Set small tasks
Don’t set yourself tasks that you know full well you will not be able to achieve. This will end up with you not completing the work you planned for yourself, which will lead to an unhealthy feeling of failure and stress. It will also mean that work you didn’t complete will have to be pushed back onto another day, which will also just mess up your planner. If you know you’re a procrastinator, don’t set yourself 10 tasks to do. Be smart about the workload you give yourself.

3. Make use of the university Counselling Service & your Academic Advisor
You’re paying £9,000 a year, use the resources that you are paying for! The University of Manchester offer a fantastic counselling service, where you book an appointment and can discuss with a professional one-to-one about the stresses you may be going through. They offer guided relaxation, workshops, specific advice on how to avoid procrastination and many other services. Furthermore, your Academic Advisor is of great use to you as they can really tailor subject-specific advice on how to deal with any struggles you have with studying.

4. Join a society
It’s important that at least some of your week is spent doing something enjoyable in order to avoid stress—joining a society is a perfect way to do this. Many people are too shy to join a society after they’ve missed the welcome events—DON’T BE! Committees are keen for their societies to grow so sign up! Joining a society means you’re guaranteed to meet like-minded people, bulk up your CV and push yourself out of your comfort zone.

5. Don’t neglect your longstanding relationships
Our family, school friends and boyfriend/girlfriend are some of the most important people to us. However, when many of us get to university, we can sometimes neglect these people and the calls, texts, and visits become all too infrequent. When we are stressed out, anxious, and depressed reaching out to these people is often the quickest way to change your mood. Don’t fear appearing needy or fear reaching out to friends you’ve haven’t spoken to in a while, life is too short and all it takes is a quick chat with a loved one to perk you up.

6. Limit use of social media                                                                                                                                                                         Constantly scrolling through Facebook and Instagram and seeing the constructed photos of everyone else’s seemingly perfect life will only get you down. If you are struggling to make new friends and you’re dealing with loneliness, going on social media is guaranteed to make you feel worse. People only post what they want others to see, therefore you won’t see images of them crying in their room or understand they might be struggling with uni life just as much as you. Going through social media in your most stressful times will only wrongly make you feel like you’re struggling all alone. If you’re really bored pop on a new Netflix series but leave Facebook alone for a while!

Review: Kate Plays Christine

Director Robert Greene returns with the enthrallingly complex docudrama Kate Plays Christine, which follows actress indie darling Kate Lyn Sheil (best known for her role as Lisa Williams in House of Cards) as she prepares for the challenging and emotionally charged role of Christine Chubbuck, an American news reporter of the seventies who committed suicide during a live television broadcast. The documentary explores our morbid desire to see death and destruction, something that can be best summed up by the closing scene as Kate looks directly into the camera and bitterly says “you’re all sadists”. I readily admit that I am one of these sadists, having had the initial motive to watch the tragic death of this woman. Greene manages to address this need as the tension subtly builds up, our eyes never leaving the screen, our thoughts never wandering off. This is achieved by having the enigmatic tape of the suicide constantly being mentioned throughout the film, and yet it is never shown because it is never obtained.

The film first premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, taking home the Special Jury Prize. It’s not hard to see why. The most distinguishing element of the documentary was the fantastic cinematography, particularly the camerawork. Greene shoots the film in a way that gives off the impression that we are watching a fictional movie rather than a non-fiction thriller, which I found made Kate Plays Christine more absorbing to watch. Greene switches effortlessly between the movie scenes that they’re shooting, which is reminiscent to a seventies soap opera, and the research aspect of the plot. This subsequently creates an almost seamless flow of dialogue between the actors that carries an awkward undertone.

Kate Sheil is an ambiguous presence on the screen, and it’s this quality that allows the film to progress and culminate in the death. Her elusiveness, coupled with Greene’s camerawork forces us to question what’s real and what’s not. Fact and fiction become intertwined, perplexingly creating a more honest and raw portrayal of Christine. To be able to watch Sheil develop as an actress so closely and intimately was a disconcerting experience yet simultaneously it gave Kate Plays Christine a razor sharp edge to it. Sheil almost parallels Chubbuck’s steady decline into a dark pit of depression, although she doesn’t quite manage to reach it. This paints a convoluted picture, as Kate struggles to unearth Christine’s driving motivation to end her life. The ethics of this struggle, of trying to figure out how to depict this woman’s fragile life on the screen is what makes the story such a troubling and difficult puzzle to watch. It uncomfortably exposes our curious attraction to tragedy, and our inexplicable fascination with blood and guts, as Christine (and therefore Kate) emphasised before she shot herself.

I went into this movie expecting an excitingly dramatic tragedy but came out of that cinema with much more than that. This isn’t just a docudrama, it’s a gritty movie from the start, possessing many darker and deeper levels than expected, which can be a challenge to keep up with. With the recent spike in interest in documentaries, this is definitely not one to be missed.

4/5

Review: The Greasy Strangler

A father-son duo who make their living taking gullible tourists on a fictitious walking tour of historical disco landmarks have their already strained relationship pushed to breaking point by the arrival of a woman who attracts the interest of both generations. That probably sounds like your typical quirky Sundance fare, but in addition to all that Dad may or may not be (he is) moonlighting as a lethal monstrosity-the eponymous “Greasy Strangler” whose design recalls The Toxic Avenger crossed with a stick of lard. Before it descends into an exhausting parade of nauseating imagery, The Greasy Strangler is actually pretty good, the jokes all land and the cast give enjoyably unselfconscious performances. One or two scenes, including one involving a character struggling with his pronunciation are genuinely hysterical and suggest that The Greasy Strangler might be more effective if director, Jim Hosking, reigned in his enthusiasm for provocation. Some of the gross-out humour, including the best prosthetic c**k since last year’s The Overnight, succeeds, but the third act massively over-relies on shocking imagery and plot contrivances that strain credulity even in Hosking’s funhouse version of our world.

Anyone familiar with the comedic stylings popularised by Tim and Eric on AdultSwim will probably be more familiar with the aesthetic employed by The Greasy Strangler. However, as Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim learned in Billion Dollar Movie, this approach is probably best kept to the sketch format. Even ‘The Eric Andre Show’, without a doubt the best of the shows made in this style, breaks up the minuscule 11 minute talk-show format with fast-paced non-sequitors and unscripted man-on-the-street segments that help keep things unpredictable and engaging. All this is simply a long way of saying that those interested in The Greasy Strangler might be better served elsewhere, in more easily digestible episodes available online.

Hosking does however, show real visual flair at times. Some shots have a kind of painterly composition that make it hard to look away and at times there’s a strange, eerie beauty in the ugliness on screen. Some reviews of the film have interpreted The Greasy Strangler as an allegory for the relationship between the ego and the super-ego. Maybe its just a case of Hosking pitching this film way over my head but its difficult to apply any sort of attentive analysis to a film that has you planning the easiest way to hop over the couple in front of you so you can vomit without ruining anyone’s evening.

2/5

Free speech crusaders harm debate

Last week, I went on Fuse FM to discuss the recent decision by the SU to stop the sale of The Daily Star on campus—a decision that was justified by its objectification of women. The controversy surrounding the decision began in this paper, as it was deemed a violation of free speech. In discussing the Senate’s decision, I had only one real question: was it selling? It was not.

The SU could have stopped selling it for that reason alone. They had no reason to make the decision political. No private business has an obligation to do anything which does not add to its profits on claims of “free speech”. It would be similarly naïve to want to ban something that was making a profit on the belief that it was sending a political signal. The lack of sales of The Daily Star was a market signal that its presence was not of enough value to students on campus.

The dispute over this decision, however, is entirely around the politicisation of these matters—which is completely unnecessary, in my opinion. Not many things in life are political, but in recent years the politicisation of all activity is ramping up. This creates ideological tension and drives division.

Politics is a necessary evil, but too much politics leads to unnecessary conflict. I believe I was asked to discuss the issue due to my criticism the no-platforming of famous speakers last year, but even then it was a pragmatic criticism, and not one of free speech. As someone who still is vehemently opposed to no-platforming, the safe space policy, and political correctness more generally, I think I would do the cause some justice by disowning those who believe it to be a free speech issue.

Some philosophical background on the nature of free speech is useful in defending this decision. Free speech is a prima facie right (albeit one of the more important ones), meaning that there are certain rights that take precedent over it—namely, life and property. The right to free speech is not the ability to say whatever one likes, wherever one likes, but rather a civic obligation to criticise prevailing power structures, in the hope of affecting positive change. For this reason nobody objects to the fact that you cannot incite violence in your speech, or say insulting things to someone in their home despite their requests for you to stop.

True free speech concerns the public domain and related spaces. Since the Students’ Union is private property, and the Senate has been given a mandate (although it is one that I find questionable) to ensure its democratic functioning, they do have the right to decide what is, and is not, exhibited on their grounds. This is why free speech is not the appropriate grounds on which to contest these decisions.

The problems with political correctness, and the subsequent rise of safe spaces and no platforming, is that they stifle debate and insulate students from social issues. Students have historically been at the forefront of positive progress in society. When you try to block certain issues being heard, it does not aid in combatting them. Rather, these decisions lead to a false sense of security and satisfaction; it creates a culture in which students begin to believe that all educated people think like them—which is simply not the case.

A prime example of this is the Brexit debate on campuses across the country, where those who voted for Leave were classified as ignorant, since students were generally exposed only to other pro-Remain students and academics. This is bad practice for an academic environment, and harmful to students whose opinions should be constantly challenged as to make them more well-rounded critical thinkers. What it is not, however, is a violation of your right to free speech.

By turning the debate into something of political philosophy, those who campaign for free speech create a dogmatic environment. Instead of explaining the reasons why it is beneficial to allow for controversial speakers, their pitch that the Senate is some tyrannical, rights-violating entity is simply too extreme for the vast majority of students who likely do not feel strongly either way. This dogmatic attitude has turned many who would have otherwise been against no-platforming and safe spaces into supporters—out of sheer dislike for the style of ‘free speech’ arguments.

This is not to say that the safe-spacers themselves are presenting pragmatic arguments. Drawing ideological battlegrounds leads to apathy amongst the majority, and disgust from otherwise favourable students. In calling the removal of The Daily Star a violation of free speech, I suspect a few thoughts go through readers’ minds. Either that one finds the third-grade smut that is The Daily Star a valuable intellectual contribution, or that the free speech campaigners find no battle too small.

Not everything is political, and to cease the sale of something is not the equivalent of banning it. Picking battles and being pragmatic go a long way in gaining student support and shifting the Overton window of opportunity for change. This sort of humility would help the debate on both sides.

An NUS Women’s Officer is unnecessary

The recently elected NUS Women’s Officer, Hareem Ghani, was previously the Women’s Officer for her Students’ Union at King’s College London (KCL). She was part of an anti-sexual harassment campaign called “It Stops Here” as well as being a prominent member of the Intersectional Feminist Society at KCL.

You would think she would care a lot about female empowerment, right? Well, I have taken a look at her manifesto when she was standing for Women’s Officer at KCL specifically and she proposed a range of pledges she was willing to fulfil. Surprisingly she did fulfil one of them: free sanitary products for women across KCL. Please don’t pretend that having free sanitary products for three or four years does a great deal of good for women’s rights when there are homeless women on the street who have no access to these products. A true female activist would set up a campaign to give sanitary products to those women, not to students funded by government loans. In fact, there are campaigns around other universities that do just this. Evidently, Ms Ghani is doing a sub-standard job. Other individuals are getting on with things just fine without her leadership.

Female students in the UK are privileged. Women are equal to men here in this country, under the eyes of the law and within wider British society. It is interesting how she cares a lot about promoting more women (and specifically BME women) into STEM. I have not heard of any initiatives that she has tried to implement at KCL for this. Then again, it is not like it would have made much difference anyway. Women, irrespective of whether they are BME are not, are not disadvantaged when seeking employment in the scientific and industrial sectors. Companies want the best of people irrespective of their gender and race.

Furthermore, she mentioned how, at KCL, she wanted to make university societies more “gender-inclusive”. But which specific societies, by name, were not gender-inclusive when you said that? In my experience of university, I have not seen a society that restricted membership based on gender, and there are usually always both male and female versions of sports. I would love to know more about these gender-restricting societies at KCL. I will personally come down to gate-crash those societies myself.

She says “let’s dismantle the white-cis-hetero-patriarchy together!” This nonsense just does not exist and these made-up terms just distract from more important issues in the country. It does not take much effort to dismantle something that is invisible. Yet, apparently, “part-time activists like [her]self” suffer “burnout throughout the academic year”. Indeed, I am sure it must be tiring focusing so much wasted effort on such a futile endeavour. In whatever ways the NUS wish to label our society as being deficient, I am still happy to live here. It is certainly better than anything led by her and her fellow Officers on the NUS Executive.

This year, she intends to address “black mental health”—whatever that means. I hope she is aware that mental illnesses do not discriminate on your race, gender, social class etc. She also plans to combat violence against women. But how is she planning to do this? She supports the work in having the Zellick report to be reviewed. The Zellick report is a series of recommendations on how universities should deal with sexual assault and rape cases. Worryingly, there was a briefing paper published in 2015 by the NUS (which I presume that Hareem Ghani supports) suggesting that universities should invoke their own disciplinary procedures for those accused of sexual violence and assault, even if it has not been reported or investigated by the police. This opens the door for many false allegations and punishment.

She has not been vocal on other concerns of hers—including abortion rights and abolishing prisons, to name two. For the former, if I am not mistaken but abortions are available on the NHS, right? As for the latter, what has the abolition of prisons got to do with female empowerment in universities? Nothing. This self-serving individual is using her position for her own political agenda. Thankfully, she will never succeed in her aims.

Perhaps the silence on these issues is a blessing in disguise. At least we do not have to listen to the nonsense that would come out of her mouth—which is not dissimilar to the like of Laurie Penny, and all the Guardian Women contributors. Hareem Ghani needs to take off her period-tinted glasses and realise that the reason why universities are becoming more gender-divisive is because of figures like her perpetuating myths about women that simply aren’t true.

She will probably ask me to check my privilege. I have to say that I already have: Je suis Elrica, and I am very much privileged to have been born and brought up in this country. I shouldn’t need to say I feel safe and secure as a female in this country. This is obvious to anyone with common sense. I find her stance on speaking out for all women patronising. The need for a national Women’s Officer in our universities is redundant and unnecessary. She should resign immediately.

Celebs that scare

As it is nearing Halloween we focus on famous celebrities’ alter-egos that are designed to scare us, or at least gather our attention in a less than conventional manner.

Certain celebrities create a typically loud and scandalous persona, frequently under the name of an alter ego, a character that does not really exist but has an impact on popular culture nevertheless.

Lady Gaga, a prime example, brought us arguably the most repulsing outfit the VMA’s has ever seen in the form of the infamous 2010 ‘Meat Dress’—a full head to toe outfit constructed from raw beef which was later exhibited at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2011.

It caused outrage among the general public and was inevitably condemned by animal rights groups, but it certainly got the world’s attention. When we think of Lady Gaga unconventionally large fascinators, masks, spikes and even an entire outfit made out of Kermit the frog springs to mind.

One can only assume that her aim is not to set trends, but rather to appal and shock her way into our everyday conversations. It is a clever trick to ensure that you remain current and popular, whilst leaving the public guessing what your next monstrous publicity stunt will be.

Skipping a generation, described as a middle aged man who has not got over his Goth stage, Marylin Manson’s look stands out in the music industry as one with a ghostly edge.

Taking inspiration from Kiss, Manson’s trademark style sees him drenched in white makeup, heavy eyeliner and layers of black clothing laced together with an array of metallic accessories, Manson’s look is chilling.

In an interview, he once told the guardian “I created a fake world because I did not like the one I was living in”. Often this is the case with celebrities who fabricate an alternative personality as a form of escapism from their ordinary selves.

Although there are controversial views on these artists and what they do, I consider this as a positive aspect of pop culture. It demonstrates imagination in expressing ourselves through the way we dress and challenges the mainstream styles currently in play.