This week, Comment Editor Yasna Hawksley, is in conversation with Sarah (S), Emma (E), Abu (A), Greta (G), Andrew (AS), Elly (ES) and Dani (D) discussing LGBT week:
“This latest mutation of ‘trendy teaching’ is hugely detrimental to helping a child recognise and fulfil their true potential and thus to social mobility, which has stagnated over recent decades.”
Was Martin Amis worth the money? As a marketing strategy, yes.
Matt Hirschler discusses the implications of the Browne review for the coalition
Using only ‘science’ to argue for the transformation in the way we use energy , even by the good guys, takes climate change out of its proper political and economic context and allows our imaginations to be influenced because of its unquestionable authority.
What’s remarkable, is that this has all occurred just two years after America’s Liberals were heralding a new age of progressive government.
There are a section of people present at most universities in Britain who probably accumulate more dislike from the rest of the student body than any other. They are the only group cliquey enough to organise their own ski trip, whilst being the only sports team more unbearably annoying than the organisers of the normal ski trip. I’m referring to the single most ‘banterific’ group of students that has ever walked the Earth, the Medic Rugby Boys.
It is a well-worn path to criticise the hypocrisy of many Liberal Democrat voters. While in the run up to the general election many were brazenly calling for “new politics” (a phrase that dated as fast as it was coined) and making a plea for an end to the tribalism of the two party system, these people (many of whom are students) are now reeling and seething at the Lib-Con marriage that is the coalition Government.
Wednesday 20th October saw the first successful UMSU General Meeting in 18 months, with six motions being passed. Yet whilst I was in the meeting I began to understand why it rarely reaches quorum. The whole process is wrapped in bureaucratic red tape, making it dull and boring; for every motion at least four speeches are made, with room for questions in which the speakers just tended to repeat themselves. If someone wants a motion to go straight to vote, then another two speeches are made.Most people that come to General Meetings come to support or to block a particular motion. These people come with their minds already made up. Case in point: this reporter believes that Manchester Labour Students (MLS) and J-Soc (Jewish society) came to the General Meeting in order to block the Peace Through Education motion, by leaving the meeting at a crucial point, in what appears to have been an attempt to break quorum. If that is the case, then they had just come to the meeting with their minds already made up, so what was the purpose of all the speeches anyway?
Alex Lynham discusses the importance and relevance of the letters page.
MTV has been a bastion of music television for years, why does Jonathan Ridge feel that it needs to readdress its priorities?
Jess Bradley discusses the implications of the Browne review for the student movement
George Robinson, Boarding master and head of house reviews David Cameron’s half term progress
Why Co-operation for Co-operation’s sake will lead us down the wrong path
“I am who I am because of everyone” was the tag phrase of the old advertising campaign of a certain mobile phone company, and a tag phrase that also I took personal disagreement with, despite it being a very arguable, if pretentious, slogan.
Twitter was busy this week with Manchester students moaning about the cold whilst protesting against cuts outside the Tory conference in Birmingham. Black and red posters appeared hastily pasted up in their usual fashion around the campus, “Stuff your cuts, we won’t pay!” read the slogans. But it’s not just the Commies who are upset; there is an atmosphere on campus from many students and staff that they are on a collision course with the Conservative-Liberal government.
Young women in today’s society are often said to have it all – the power to have what we want when we want. Unlike our parent’s generation we have fewer issues with women’s rights (though not completely eradicated) and are largely free to live in a society where men and women have equal privileges. For the large part, as women our autonomy remains largely uncompromised – we can go to university, study a subject we like, get a job we want – without our sex compromising it – or so it would seem. There is however one part of our lives that remain uncontrolled and an unfathomable force of Mother Nature, not understood by men and women alike – our breasts.
Joe Sandler-Clarke discusses Cameron’s big society.
