Rape and Julian Assange

The case: from http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-12005930

These are the charges: “Mr Assange is accused of having unprotected sex with a woman, identified only as Miss A, when she insisted he use a condom. He is also accused of having unprotected sex with another woman, Miss W, while she was asleep.”

So Julian Assange is accused of rape. But also, he is the founder of Wikileaks! An organisation which is disliked by many a government. Thus, many prominent people (Michael Moore, John Pilger, Naomi Wolf) have defended him and some have put up bail money to get him out of jail, because they believe he is the victim of a scheme by either the British/American/Swedish government, or possibly all of them working together, to prevent him from being able to carry on his work at Wkileaks.

From defenders of Assange:

Naomi Wolf: “Never in twenty-three years of reporting on and supporting victims of sexual assault around the world have I ever heard of a case of a man sought by two nations, and held in solitary confinement without bail in advance of being questioned — for any alleged rape, even the most brutal or easily proven.”

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/naomi-wolf/jaccuse-sweden-britain-an_b_795899.html

Michael Moore: “For those of you who think it’s wrong to support Julian Assange because of the sexual assault allegations he’s being held for, all I ask is that you not be naive about how the government works when it decides to go after its prey. Please — never, ever believe the “official story.”

http://michaelmoore.com/words/mike-friends-blog/why-im-posting-bail-money

I’m posting this here because I think everyone needs to know about this case, as an example of rape apology, rape culture, anda general confusion about what it is to be a rapist. (As if there was ever a lot of motivation to try and prosecute someone for a crime where there’s something like a 6% success rate, at least in the UK, and where your sexual habits, physical appearance, private past etc. will be examined in minute detail and wrung through the mill in questioning in court and in public for months on end. You’d have to pay me a lot of money to go through that.)

Just to clarify, the fact that these women have accused Assange of rape is one thing. The fact that the governments involved are taking such a hard line with him is another. That may well be politically motivated. That may well be a conspiracy of sorts to destroy Assange’s character.

And yet - this is not a good reason to bail Assange out and argue that he should not stand trial.

You know why? Because he still might be a rapist.

That’s right, the fact that he runs a good website doesn’t change that.

The fact that he has feminist supporters and famous supporters and public supporters on his side doesn’t change that. He might be a stand-up guy, he might be kind to kittens, he might be the world’s best boyfriend but that does not mean he is incapable of rape. No man can be categorically said to be incapable of rape, whoever he is.

(Please don’t get dumb now. I am not saying that every man is a rapist, or even that every man is capable of rape. What I’m saying is that a man’s ability to rape has NOTHING to do with public or personal opinion of him.)

As Wolf says, rape cases are very rarely treated with the same gravity as this. HOWEVER.

Does this mean the women concerned haven’t been raped? Ok, say the government is more likely to pursue the accused (for once). Say they have an interest in seeing him prosecuted.

DOES THE REACTION OF THE GOVERNMENT ON BEHALF OF THESE WOMEN HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH WHETHER THESE WOMEN ARE LYING ABOUT BEING RAPED?

Even with all the aspersions already being cast on the accusations, even with vocal supporters doing everything they can to suggest Assange has been wrongfully accused, they haven’t found shit to suggest that these women are being paid or coerced in any way to accuse him. Which, for any sane person, might lead to the question of why they are bothering to accuse him, what their incentive would be for lying, and whether they (not the government) are likely to benefit materially in any way from his conviction.

Which leads me to this.

http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/15/a-bayesian-take-on-julian-assange/

Wildly oversimplified, Bayesian analysis is a method for assessing whether an argument’s valid (true) or not. It goes like this:

If the evidence we gather increases the degree of belief in a hypothesis, then our hypothesis is confirmed (to some degree) by the evidence.

[Bayes' Rule/Theorem:[2]

Pr (A|e) = Pr(e|A)Pr(A)

Pr(e)

(A = hypothesis, e = evidence)

Probability of A (eg. degree of belief) is dependent on evidence gathered.]

- In English: we use the most relevant evidence available to confirm the truth of a statement.

This blog suggests that the most relevant piece of evidence (in assessing the truth of the statement ‘Assange raped two women’) we have is the fact that Assange is a political agitator.

Bollocks to that. That’s misdirection, that’s information that could confirm the statement ‘Assange is likely to be prosecuted for rape’, but it’s fuck all to do with whether he actually raped these two women or not. The truth of that will only emerge, if at all, after considering the testimonies of Assange and the two women involved.

Excuse the rant. Please let people know about this case, and join a real simple campaign on twitter if you have it:

http://tigerbeatdown.com/2010/12/15/mooreandme-on-dude-progressives-rape-apologism-and-the-little-guy/

^A much better summary of the issue.

Boycott M&S!

Marks & Spencers are holding a lecture on Leeds University campus this Friday (5th November) titled “M&S Lingerie: Supporting Women Since 1926″, however this claim to “support women” is far from true…

Recently M&S sub-let one of their properties in Bristol to Hooters, a company which freely describes itself as a ‘breastaurant’, and which promotes an unhealthy body image whilst exploiting women.
A guardian article describes how “before starting work, Hooters girls in the US have to sign a contract that reads: ‘I hereby acknowledge and affirm that the Hooters concept is based on female sex appeal and that the work environment is one in which joking and innuendo based on female sex appeal is commonplace.’ It continues: ‘I also expressly acknowledge and affirm I do not find my job duties, uniform requirements or work environment to be intimidating, hostile or unwelcome.’ Quite how it is possible to affirm this before you’ve started your job is anyone’s guess.”[1]

If you are not familiar with Hooters as a company, you can browse the website for their Nottingham branch here: http://www.hooters.to/nottingham/
A few things you might notice:
• The online gallery depicts exclusively white, young women of a slim build in their annual bikini contest.
• Work uniform for the “girls” only come in sizes ‘small’, ‘extra small’ and ‘extra extra small’ – the prescribed uniform “can not be changed or altered in any way.”
• The endorsement of their restaurants as “family friendly” environments, with promotions such as ‘kids eat free on Sundays’.
• Hooters’ refusal to employ men, women over a certain size or age, women who wear religious dress, gender queer women or women with a disability, as waiting staff.

Paradoxically, M&S recently joined forces with Mumsnet’s ‘Let girls be girls’ campaign and pledged not to sell clothes that sexualise young girls. M&S’s actions are therefore totally contradictory – whilst they promote a policy which aims to avoid the sexualisation of girls, they are more than happy to promoted the sexualisation of women (or, as they are referred to at Hooters, ‘girls’).

This is not the first time Marks & Spencers have faced criticism, in May of 2009, Marks and Spencers’ CE0 Stuart Rose was quoted by The Observer as saying:
“Girls today have never had it so good, right? Apart from the fact that you’ve got more equality than you ever can deal with, the fact of the matter is that you’ve got real democracy and there really are no glass ceilings, despite the fact that some of you moan about it all the time.”
To read the full interview, and for further information regarding the gender inequalities that still exist in the workplace today, you can follow this link:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/may/31/sir-stuart-rose-marksspencer

M&S have now been trading for 126 years and market their products based on a heritage of ‘family values’. Please help us in our campaign against M&S’s false claims by coming to the protest: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=166039503425638&num_event_invites=0

Or, if you cannot make it, join the boycott:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=156976027654098

Additionally, feel free to contact the company with your complaints, email: Chairman@marks-and-spencer.com

Here are some further articles on the subject:
[1]http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2008/apr/11/women.business

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/epic/mks/8010701/Marks-and-Spencer-faces-boycott-over-sexist-Hooters-restaurant-deal.html

If it walks like a feminist, talks like a feminist, it must be a feminist. (By Michael Lumpkin for Mancunion (Manchester student paper)

As I travelled down to Feminism in London 2010 a couple of weekends ago (the third annual, one-day conference) I couldn’t help but feel a touch of anxiety. As a feminist and a man I have always felt that others (feminist or otherwise) have considered these identities to be, at best inconsistent, and at worst dichotomous. I am often confronted by remarks to the effect of: But you’re a man, what are you complaining about? Or, you’re not a feminist, you have no idea of the experience of women under patriarchy. I wondered whether the conference would augment a sense of non-belonging that these comments foster? And whether I would be trapped under the collapse of the definitions: man and misogynist?

Arriving with two delegates from the Leeds University feminist society (both still reeling in awe from our close encounter with Finn Mackay on the tube) we made our way into a small, hot room lined with stalls representing a myriad of feminist organisations. Many a petition was signed and flyer happily stuffed into pocket, however amid the happy thrall of networking and consciousness raising I was disappointed to see very few male faces as I scanned the room. “Oh, it’s nice to see a man here”, commented one woman from the Fawcett Society stall. This same welcome sentiment was echoed throughout the day; the speeches given made clear that men’s support was welcome and in fact essential to the feminist movement. However, I was still unclear as to whether this meant that I was a feminist and a man or a mere “feminist-supporting” man in the eyes of the London Feminist Network (LFN; the organisation behind the conference), and whether the answer to this question would answer my second: why were there so few men?

It was made abundantly clear in the inspiring speeches and seminars that I attended that “man” was not synonymous with “misogynist” and “woman” did not only mean “victim”. It was repeatedly made clear that as a man that opposes the asymmetrical power relations of gender in society I was welcome and that as an inhabitant of the male body I was not any less entitled to open up a can of whoop-ass on patriarchy and smash oppressive gender constructions. However this does not mean that the conference was gender-blind in the same way that liberal politics claims, and fails, to be.

The LFN is committed to the provision of women only space in its meetings and conferences. This position addresses the need for biological women, as a class oppressed by the unmitigated force of patriarchy, to discuss their experiences of womanhood without interference from men. This position, and other segregationist policies like it, are hot-potatoes in both political theory and activism, and have strengthened and weakened the women’s movement in different contexts. I believe that it is these issues that scare men into thinking they are not feminists but, instead, mere pro-feminist supporters relegated to the margins of the movement, or non-feminists. While women only spaces are important and I largely agree with the need for women only spaces for sharing experiences in a very pro-woman environment (this is, after all, the practice that has produced quantum leaps in women’s consciousness and feminist theory), this does not, and should not, mean that men are not feminists or any “less feminist” than any woman. Men have a duty to their sisters, daughters, mothers and to society at large to stop umming and arring over the feminist stereotypes fed to them and to start to behave like caring members of the human race. In short, a duty not only to support the feminist movement but to be the best feminists they can be.

Contrary to an article published in the Mancunion a few weeks ago (edition 4) titled “Pro feminism, but not a feminist” I, and many others, believe that if it walks like a feminist, talks like a feminist, it must be a feminist. Patriarchal society creates the substantive categories of man and woman, with woman the oppressed category, hence the feminist movement must organise to meet the challenges that are presented. Women only groups are a part of this attempt to address the specifics of patriarchal oppression and in no way lessen the crucial role of the male feminist, let alone relegate him into a disempowered, mere supporting role. This is why I can proudly and confidently say I am a feminist and a man.

Report or be reported… or hide

Disclaimer: Turns out Amy didn’t actually write the article I refer to in this post, though it was credited to her, she did collect the quotes but it seems the article itself was written by Tom.

I’ve picked up Leeds Student newspaper today [or rather last week when I started this entry], to look for an anonymous quote I had given to Amy Nickell for her article on Mint Club’s recent clubnight, as hosted by promoters; “Filth”.

Women were told by the promotion team to call themselves sluts via facebook so that they’d get free entry and this was a report on that.

The article is credited to her and Tom Ellison and I have very little idea to what extent the editing has intervened. I feel a little misrepresented  personally and guilty to have been part of the misrepresentation of femsoc.

Amy, who I thank for her efforts to tackle these issues, approached femsoc and myself personally looking for an opinion, and a contribution… she got the ball rolling, and came to us… and as she said at the women’s assembly, objection and discomfort were the feelings of everybody she had told about the flyers she had found and including her own. I was contributing to an article by someone who was made uncomfortable by the clubnight, not representing some planned thing by femsoc. Yet, the article starts with this summary:

“An events promoter has been forced to defend a new club night after concerns from feminist society members over it’s advertising”

The first inaccuracy implied here is the causation. Actually, events promoters were asked about the clubnight, femsoc members were asked about the club night and did no “forcing”[As Georgia has pointed out in the comments, it was actually attendees of the women's assembly which represents all students who were asked, not the membership of femsoc]. But Leeds Student was doing the asking, this is important… by ignoring this, femsoc was made central to the article, and up for criticism without being represented at all, apart from one problematic quote from me.

I understand that writers of these articles for LS feel, by assumptions of what reporting should sound like, that they should not include comments about themselves in the articles… as though removing the author will some how create impartiality, as though there is such a thing.

The thing is, there is no first person in this article, but someone wrote it, people who think and believe something are behind the curtain, they have influenced events with real justification, but they make femsoc the answerable group maybe because they aren’t allowed to be.

Where the writers’ opinions could have been explicit, and therefore questionable, they have instead been implicit and it is assumed without question or projected. Later on in the article:

“Last year leeds student reported that promotional material for the “I love S.E.X.” club night had been banned after focussing on sexual activity”

Seeing that anonymous me has been chosen to represent this imaginary campaign I feel it’s important that I shout…

That isn’t me!… I DO love sex; good sex. I love thinking about it, talking about it… I am sexual. I like people freely talking about their own wants. I like knowing that people are confident and happy in their sex lives and who they are as acknowledged sexual beings, able to express themselves and truly own their bodies. But, there is no conclusion at all drawn from that statement in the article. What is put together instead, is the idea that disapproval of clubnights has previously happened because someone doesn’t like the idea of sexual activity… but disapproval can also happen because people DO like sex.

The promotion stunt was an attack on sex and people who want to be sexual, and HAVE a sex drive without getting namecalled.

Think of a word that may be used to namecall someone because of their race or skin colour… what if a group of people were throwing a party and told the people of that suppressed group to wear the racial slur round their necks on a nametag so that they can enter for free.

Would criticising that as racist and manipulative mean I was against culture, and racial herritage?

There’s a quote from a receptionist for Filth saying they thought that the girls would be happy to be called sluts.

I remember bullies at school telling me I could be their friend if I did something funny just to entertain them. I remember kids who wanted to be accepted, groomed and then put up for ridicule… They  would get into trouble while the bullies would sit back and watch, then congratulate them with shrouded sarcasm clapping and laughing at the easy manipulation, while the kid would be dragged off  by teachers to be told off, wondering if they had really been accepted, and whether they had gathered any respect. The truth was not at all. When they realised, it was visibly shame and humiliation which they were then left to endure along side the fallout. Just because someone volunteers to do something, doesn’t mean it’s un-harmful.

Finally, the most upsetting part of the article for me was the quote from me… I really wish I hadn’t contributed. I said:

“Filth seems to assume we live in a world where rape doesn’t happen, where survivors of sexual assault don’t suffer the threat of triggers,”

and I went on to say, that slut was a word used as part of a culture that attacks women for trying to possess their own sexuality, sighting triggers as a part of  people’s lives in a society where sexual assault is a fear and a reality… I didn’t relate triggers to flyers or the party specifically. What was printed however, was that beginning of my statement, then a reiteration of what the word trigger meant,within my quotation marks, implying that I had meant that seeing sexual imagery on a flyer would “remind people of their rape”…  maybe this is what was innocently interpreted from my quote, but it didn’t need to be ghost written into my text, unless I did write it, which I’d really regret. What I feel is more complex… and I’d mean it broadly.

Sexual violence is a big part of society, and for Filth, like my school bullies, to goad women into using a term for themselves that is used to victim blame and to criticise people for wanting and having sex, they present them with a conditional acceptance, telling them that they’re worth more to the club if they do call themselves so.

All of us deserve to be accepted for all of our sexualities, and that is really important to me. I have rarely felt completely accepted. Femsoc is somewhere I really feel I can be.

I chose to be anonymous because, in the paper’s account of the Lynx‘s publicity stunt last week, they called me “One of femsoc’s few male members” while quoting what I had to say, instead of just attributing my views to me as a person, it made my presumed gender somehow important. Instead of just allowing for the fact that, somebody called “Jacob” can indeed be part of a feminist society and then talking about issues, it turfed up a debate without addressing it.

Here however I was quoted as “a feminist society member who wanted not to be named”… again bringing about more debate…

I imagine people thinking: “WHY don’t they want to be named? We know nothing about them, maybe they’re ashamed of what they have to say, maybe while they have whole articles recounting their “campaigns”, and won’t even be named, their views too wierd to admit to?”

It feels like a minefield… I was really nervous to be quoted in the first article. But, it was a great piece.

Self publishing is a valuable option, but stuff with a big circulation is way more influentual and needs to be done well.

I’ll be featured on LSR today talking about this same issue and pointing people in the direction of the blog. I don’t want to spend any more of my time on the back foot, defending what I dislike about some well-intentioned media gone awry. [It went really well, unfortunately you can't listen again, but if anyone was listening I mostly said things that are already on the blog, or spoken about at meetings].

I want to work on the positive stuff that we all need to get through and be inviting to people to open up and share experiences and ideas. I’ve got a problem with the way we do stuff, the way I do stuff that I want to change, and no problem with people who are, like me all working at life trying to work out how to do it. I feel incredibly lucky that mediums like blogs are available to make it possible to say exactly what I think fully. I really want to get back to working on positive enforcement of what I DO like about what I see and read and who I meet.

I met Amy and she’s a great person, who’s really targeting some complex and problematic issues, and her involvement is giving me an insight into how the paper works. I see that mechanism as something that can always change (and inevitably will) and look forward to the future of that… and most of all I look forward to the change the uni’s  media landscape as a whole and seeing how I (and you) can have an influence on that.

There was a number of things, such as femsoc’s non-attack that were explicitly untrue in this article.  That goes against the paper’s policies… but also some issues with how we write, report and edit which feed into it. I also made a mistake to write a quote so quickly and without my own copy, it probably left too much to interpretation. I’ve learnt and I feel glad that I have the privilege to be able to learn. It’s the way things change.

Image 1… The News room in “The Wire” TV series
Image 2… The Ethical Slut by Dossie Easton, reclaiming words the right way!
Image 3… S.E.X. - an encyclopedia of  sexual health and positivity, by Heather Corinna, the founder of the brilliant Scarleteen.com
Image 4… Bitch magazine, a questioning ever-fresh feminist response to pop culture (with a great website Bitchmagazine.org)

from  Jacob x

Adventures in Menstruating

We were lucky enough to have a visit from the lovely ladies that are Adventures in Menstruating in freshers’ week.  It was a fun evening with lots of laughing!

Adventures in Menstruating

The Crowd

And here’s what they had to say about the night…

Leeds Uni Femsoc Rocks!

28/09/2009 · 1 Comment

Wow. We had such an awesome time and such a great reception at Leeds Uni!  Sarah and I feel really lucky to have been invited and can’t wait to go back next term!  We got some nice audio that I’ll be putting into our first podcast episode, including the debut performance of our new song, Crimson Tide. In fact, mad props to Godot* and Cunning Stunt* for asking if their band could cover it at their next gig!

We did readings from the zines, Sarah read some comic menstrual poems, and we took along the Mobile Menstrual Zine Library as well. At the interval, we did a new craft in the style of online avatar creating games:  Tampon Yourself!

Thanks specially to Oonagh and Bernie for hosting us, The Peanut Gallery for providing the venue-with-everything, Johnny for doing lots of never-before-seen (by us) technical things, Zoltan for making his Skids sketch debut, and Ryder for giving us loads of leads for our Period Positive Comp Album. We met lots of other interesting and interested people who are keen to contribute to the zine and the blog in future, and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. Keep track of Leeds Uni FemSoc at their blog!

*To link with our free min-zine that explores menstrual euphemisms, How Do You Feel About Your Friend?, we borrowed an idea Tina uses for her CreativeMornings over on Swissmiss. Thanks, Tina!  Here are a few of the names people came up with:

http://chartyourcycle.co.uk/

Read more fantastic menstruation themed things here (http://chartyourcycle.co.uk/) on Adventures in Menstrating’s blog!

Lynx me not!

After reading Georgias excellent post about objectification in freshers week… I really got into writing a long response about the lynx advertising stunt inside the union building in front of the entrance this thursday… I carried on writing indignantly until eventually I found myself with a fully fledged complaint ready to send to the university union. So here it be:

Hiya,

I have a complaint to put to the union, and I’d be happy to talk to someone about it or redirect it to the appropriate place. I may also repost my complaints publicly, as I think it’s important that the number of people who feel the same way lend their voices to this objection.

I’m a 2nd year civil engineering student and on Thursday I walked into the union through the main entrance of the union to go to my shift at the record library for which I am a volunteer.

There were about 7 representatives for Lynx handing out free samples of “lynx bullet: pocket pulling power” who have an already questionable and in my opinion sexist advertising policy of presenting women as fickle and as objects; presenting those who look a certain way (which is presumed optimum by lynx without question) as easily obtained by smell alone when you buy lynx’s product and use it.

However, in addition to my objections to their wider campaigns, my complaint here focuses on their advertising stunt within the union. In collaboration with aforementioned representatives, there was also a photographer and a model wearing far fewer clothes than the other uniformed promoters were expected to wear, in a big fake denim booth, obviously chosen because of how well her appearance adhered to whatever body type lynx assumes is desired by me as a generic unspecified male and because she was prepared to wear and do what was asked… I saw guys uncomfortably get into the booth, nervous and awkward, while she did her paid job, which was to press herself against them and look up at them or pout happily towards the camera, so that the guys could have photographic proof of their experience… I was so so so so upset, to find the advertising which undermines and threatens me imposed on my fellow students, my friends and myself in a confrontational live performance when all I wanted was to get from one room to another.

I’ve no problem with a model making her own money the way she wants to, or people wearing what they want, but I object expressively to the propagation of the assumptions that lynx promotes, of what physical and availability traits are and should be desirable in other human beings, and so insults everyone else as undesirable. I object to the union allowing it to be paraded in front of everyone walking in through the entrance of the student union building.

I feel it preys on the people who are made to feel insufficient without lynx’s product, by confirming that untrue feeling for lynx’s own gain. People are only given the opportunity to enter the, usually socially unacceptable, personal space of the model through lynx who uses her to represent an uninvited physical ideal and simplifies her to nothing more than her appearance but also an attainment we somehow need to confirm our own worth. In usual situations it is entirely inappropriate to enter the close space of a stranger like that and would be deemed sexual harassment if uninvited. Presenting this situation, as some sort of prize, where the role of the model was to completely ignore her own preference and reduce her boundaries, is really frightening for me.

It also stamps on all of us who want to be attractive, respected and human beings with feelings and with opinions. It attacks all students who want to exist as everything they are which is more than just a proximity to the arbitrarily celebrated proportions of what bodies apparently “should” look like and it does this by denying such convictions with presumptions of the opposite. All of this hit students instantly when doing nothing more than innocently trying to access the resources of the union.

Students have asked not to feel like this collectively by passing the anti-objectification of women motion in last accademic year’s union referendum which my vote confirmed, and so even if the harmfulness of such public display of objectification was unforeseen, the motion is something which confirmed that this is not something we as a student body want, in any way.

I understand that this may have been the result of miscommunication between the departments of the union and the marketers, but I think it’s so important that I tell you how I feel and how much this upset me personally and how damaging I feel it is.

I hope you can help,

Thankyou very much,

Jacob Mirzaian

It’d be really good if they got as many complaints as possible and so until I’m told otherwise, the place for them to go is leedsuniversityunion@luu.leeds.ac.uk .

Welcome to Leeds University Union! We Objectify Women!

Sounds like an inappropriate opening statement, but this is exactly the kind of impression Fresher’s will be having this week.

I thought it would be nice to take the Fresher’s from my old halls out to the union Welcome Night so they could all get to know each other. What I didn’t expect was to walk in to the DJ playing ‘Flo Rida – Low’ with a ‘Whoever can get the lowest [sexiest] wins £20’ competition.

In May of 2009 the union council passed the ‘Motion against the objectification of women in LUU Media, Trade and Activities’, but is it just me who finds this activity in Stylus; in a Union building objectification? Being a self identified Feminist, it would be easy to say that I just get easily offended, but after storming the stage with two fellow Feminists (and promptly being aggressively removed from the building by security), the response I’ve received is phenomenal.

Lewis Hyde, 2nd Year Law, said he was “Pretty shocked at how heavy handed, rude, and un-informed the bouncers were, and shocked that the DJ called a girl on stage a ‘skank’”.

The fact of the matter is, that this is the first impression people will get of Leeds University Union. Regardless of whether you agree it’s alright for clubs to do this kind of thing, do you agree that it’s right for the University Union to behave in this way? The Union is supposed to be a safe place for students; I don’t believe that it should be displaying these shows, which many people (males included) find outright offensive.

Saskia Wenzel, an Erasmus student from Leipzig, Germany said “It’s just wrong for a University; it’s wrong in general, but it’s especially wrong for a University”.

Leeds is notorious for the amount of strip clubs it has, if people wanted to see this kind of action, they know where they can get it. It seems hypocritical for a union who banned the idea of a pole-dancing society because they were worried about their image and the sexual connotations behind such a society, to turn around and encourage sexual promiscuity in fresher’s week.

I feel let down by the Union, as on a whole I usually feel it is a safe space, and I feel that they listen to everyone and are keen to help people feel unthreatened. This is maybe why I am so angry that the motion passed by Union Council about the objectification of women in LUU media has been blatantly disregarded. The motion even noted ‘during Freshers’ week … that the atmosphere generated at this time caused students of all genders to feel pressurised into having sex and conforming to gender ‘norms’.’ Yet, we are still having promotional copies of FHM magazine thrust into our hands at the Freshers’ fair?

Oonagh Ryder, 2nd Year Sociology, Union Council General Rep and Coordinator of the Feminist Society stated “This issue could easily be resolved; all that needs to happen is for all LUU staff, and especially the bouncers to be briefed on the motion thoroughly so that they can implement it successfully”.

The Union believes ‘That all members of LUU have the right to feel safe and comfortable on campus and at LUU events regardless of their gender.’ Let’s hope we can soon make this a reality for all members of LUU.

Georgia Emblen

Freshers’ Week

We’ve been really busy this week as it’s Freshers’ week. We had a crafty tshirt making afternoon and we’ve had a dance mob everyday outside the union, which has given us a lot of publicity. We also had a stall at the Freshers’ Fair and managed to sticker 600 students with the message ‘LUU Feminist Society, Bringing sexy back, YEAH!’. We now have a blow up doll which has OBJECT written on it, and we have Human on us, it’s a really good way of drawing attention to us and getting lots of people to ask what it.s all about, aswell as sending out a political message.
It’s been a really fun week and we just can’t wait to meet the new members!

Fem Soc making tshirts

Chris, Bernie & Allie - Fem Soc Freshers Fair Stall

OBJECT vs. HUMAN

Dance Mob

Fem Soc at the Freshers’ Fair

We had a stall at the LUU International Freshers’ Fair on Friday 18th Sept. We’re having another on Wednesday 23rd Sept, hopefully we’ll recruit loads more Feminists!

Liz, Oonagh and Bernie

A Brief History of LUU FemSoc!

LUU’s Feminist Society was conceived in 2008 by Rachel Clarke and Sofia Hicks, both of whom graduated in 2009. They felt dissatisfied with the level of activism provided by the Women’s Assembly, which was the only society in the union explicitly dealing with gender issues, and wanted an alternative that was primarily for feminists of all genders rather than implicitly excluding those who did not self-identify as women. They also wanted to meet other feminists and exchange ideas and inspiration with them. With Mary Frankland and Liz Grashoff, they comprised FemSoc’s first (and tiny) committee and applied to the union to be an official society.

While Liz had some experience as LUU’s LGBT society women’s officer, none of the committee had ever started a society before and, while it was really fun and rewarding making tartan banners, it was a lot of hard work! Since the application to the union did not go through until weeks before the beginning of the 2008/09 academic year, they were not awarded any funds from the university, so all advertising and craft materials had to be bought with money from their own pockets.

It was all totally worth it, though, because the response from the student body was really positive and heartwarming! Several people who approached the FemSoc table during freshers’ week remarked that they couldn’t believe a feminist society hadn’t existed before. Obviously the committee also had a lot of backlash, mostly from boys insisting that ‘if it really is about gender equality then why can’t it be called humanism’ – which served to demonstrate how necessary an official feminist presence in the university was.

Most of the society’s events in its first year were socials, like film nights and reading groups. While they were not specifically political events, the committee felt that just the act of gathering feminists and creating a space that supported gender liberation was political in itself, and we certainly felt more justified and supported as a result of these sessions. They also made society members aware of feminism-related events held by other societies.

Now the feminist society is in its second year, with a much larger committee (hooray!). They feel that, having established ourselves, they’re in a much better position to reach out to more students and really make a difference to the way feminism is perceived by many. Follow them on Facebook (their group is called LUU FEMINIST SOCIETY) and keep an eye on this blog to see what they’re up to and get involved!

2009-2010 committee: Oonagh Ryder (president); Allie Hughes (co-secretary); Georgia Emblen (co-secretary); Rosa Thomas (treasurer); Bernie Snell (campaigns officer); Steph Fothergill (social secretary); Rosy Dorfman (communications officer); Liz Grashoff (events officer).

Get in touch: luufemsoc@gmail.com