Go on... rape her... she won't report it... [UniLad magazine article]

[ddraig]

By this point in the meme evolution, "Keep Calm And... " is an affront to human taste and decency WHATEVER happens to follow it.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21667348
an 'expert' in comedy writes

The subversion and continuation of the form is a classic comedy technique, suggests Dr Oliver Double, an expert in comedy at the University of Kent.
"When I see someone wearing a parody T-shirt I think 'Oh look, there's that Keep Calm and Carry On poster we're killing'."
But who is to judge when the meme has become boring?
"Humour is subjective," says Double, "How can you ever be intellectually justified saying something is cool and something else is not?"
Although the parodies "may be reaching saturation point", he argues: "We'll only know it's stale when people stop making them."

People use it to make a statement, Double says. "You wear a comedy shirt because you want to say 'This is my humour'."

 

[Firky]

I am glad we have these people to tell us what to think.

 

[DotCommunist]

How can you ever be intellectually justified saying something is cool and something else is not?"

if he has to ask, he'll never know

 

[sihhi]

To come back to the culture issue,

I think that the cultural and social changes in the 70's and 80's re:gender and sexism (and racism and homophobia) in part contributed to the creation of a space where it seemed safe to perpetrate an ironic middle class 'mock' appropriation of a caricature of working class sexism (and racism etc) within wider society that is displayed by the success of comedians like Jimmy Carr etc and as successfully skewered by Nathan Barley with Sugar Ape and the episode where he shags the model he thinks is 13. Unfortunately this safe space and the attitude it has fostered has looped back to make the reality as bad as if not worse than before, also bolstered by a genuine conservative backlash against it.

I think you're right. In early to mid 2000s several Cambridge colleges put on "chav parties" - dress codes based around wearing clothing on the lines of cheap tracksuits, cheap trainers and cheap chains.
In these some of these parties "chav behaviour" was the aim, hence sexist sometimes abusive behaviour was carried out by the male students upon the female.

And it has extended beyond being a male thing, so an Oxford university all-female lacrosse initiation is based around teenage mums/chavs and babies - with "chavs" applying alcohol and physically punishing their children.

"Older students - who played the role of "chav" mums - wore tracksuits and gold jewellery while smoking and shouting abuse at their "babies", the paper said. During the initiation ceremony Wednesday, the younger girls had to sit on the older student's laps and be "fed" from baby bottles full of booze."

The only concern of authorities seems to be the the prestige of Oxford, which would be badly damaged by extreme abusive behaviour, hence forcing people to drink excessive alcohol is acceptable, only once a year nothing to see. The assumption on the part of Oxford students that working-class women all over-consume alcohol, are all beating or being abusive their children - not tackled.

The classism is the bedrock to this kind of 'new sexism'/lad culture. The NUS has a report out about lad culture within universities. It seems to suggest this has emerged from within the top-tier universities, in particular their middle-class element, often associated sadly with sport-team-based bonds:

"In Dempster’s UK based research on male undergraduates who participated in a variety of sports, the cruder the behaviour regarding women and homosexuality the less likely it was that players’ actions would be negatively sanctioned by their peers. The words ‘faggot’ and ‘queer’ are frequently used against sporting opponents at universities in both the US and the UK. Sporting societies and clubs have also been criticised for minimising or even glamorising sexual violence and abuse: in 2012, a men’s rugby club at Durham University was banned from playing after some of its members dressed up as TV star and child abuser Jimmy Savile, his victims and police, for a night out."

See more here http://www.nus.org.uk/en/nus-calls-for-summit-on-lad-culture

Some of the very worst behaviour is coming from the top and is being pushed downwards. There is something particular going on with middle-class full-time undergraduates who aren't working during the weekends or hunting for work - they have a lot of time, not helped by the managerial funding-decision based reduction in contact time, meaning these top tier universities increasingly focus on masters and postgraduate work. Hence it is filled with this kind of ironic Jimmy Savile behaviour - it has as you say spun out of control.

If anyone is interested in the emergence of 'new lad' culture in the very early 1990s, Tim Southwell's memoir Getting Away with it The Inside Story of Loaded whilst a usual heap of empty anecdotes you get the feeling from his remarks that it is a middle-class grouping that felt itself hard-done-by in the changes in cultural output that happened in the 1980s (anti-Thatcher, soft-left, Rock against Sexism, pro-feminist, Red Wedge, alternative comedy). It wanted to be able to do sexism and chauvinism and saw that the best way to do this would be to openly declare itself intelligent, ironic and smart.
If you look carefully the new lad has a large dose of middle-class moulding.
Loaded, begun in 1993, produced by an entirely middle-class set, is just one example.
In to up 1990, Frank Skinner, although working-class was not particularly loved by working-class people, it was a middle-class judging panel that awarded him the Perrier award in 1991, then it was middle-class commissioners who encouraged the pairing with Baddiel in 1994.
Men Behaving Badly began in 1991 developed by middle-classed novelist and playwrite Simon Nye, first broadcast on ITV - not much support. Then in 1992 middle-class BBC chiefs took it on and encouraged Nye to make it more 'extreme' .
The key figure behind The Word in 1990 is Charlie Parsons, who later brought new a softer but still present new lad sexism into morning television with The Big Breakfast with "working-class" Chris Evans as presenter playing against "middle-class" prudish Gaby Roslin.
Baddiel & Newman are an interesting case because they begin from 'alternative comedy' shows, but by 1991 with BBC producers behind them etc, in a primetime interview on Clive Anderson's talk-show, their approach to Mary Whitehouse is once again ironic sexism, and straightforward chauvinism over the Middle East and the Gulf War.

 

[frogwoman]

That chav thing is a joke because everyone knows how widespread massive over-consumption of booze is at university

 

[Frances Lengel]

I think you're right. In early to mid 2000s several Cambridge colleges put on "chav parties" - dress codes based around wearing clothing on the lines of cheap tracksuits, cheap trainers <snip>

I refuse to recognise the concept of chav, but no scally wears cheap trainers.

 

[Firky]

That chav thing is a joke because everyone knows how widespread massive over-consumption of booze is at university

Chav / charver used to mean something very different to me and my friends than it does elsewhere. Before Little Britain and BBC 3 popularised it, it wasn't really the derogatory term that it is now. I know better than to use it on here or in a wider area but it is odd to see one of "your" words corrupted.

Reminds me of that episode of the Simpsons where Homer is worried Bart is gay and says, "They took our word [gay] from us and made it bad" or words to that effect.

 

[ymu]

I refuse to recognise the concept of chav, but no scally wears cheap trainers.

You think these twats know anything about the people they're sneering at?

 

[seventh bullet]

no scally wears cheap trainers.

Yep.

 

[ymu]

This article is appalling on so many different levels it is hard to know where to start. Perhaps your disgustingly classist approach to feminism has something to do with the failures you lament, love?

 

[equationgirl]

This article is appalling on so many different levels it is hard to know where to start. Perhaps your disgustingly classist approach to feminism has something to do with the failures you lament, love?

That's a pretty vile article though

 

[equationgirl]

Response from Glasgow University:
http://www.gla.ac.uk/news/headline_269666_en.html

The University of Glasgow has reacted to the reports of misconduct at this year’s Glasgow University Union (GUU) Ancients Debating Championship with serious concern. The University authorities welcome the full and unreserved apology that has already been extended by the GUU President. The University is also supporting the GUU in its investigation into the disruptive behaviour during the contest. The University will not tolerate abusive, threatening or sexist behaviour.

 

[ymu]

That's a pretty vile article though

On so many different levels, yes.

I posted it for the stuff that is relevant to this thread (male backlash), as well as the stuff that (for me) helps to explain why feminism has largely failed to improve things much for women (apart from middle-class ones who want to compete with middle-class men, and hence this backlash being a very middle-class male phenomenon).

 

[sihhi]

Glasgow's student union has had sexism (and classism) running back a long time, it's not a new problem of "declining standards", elite adopting the culture of the those below.

A small summary from this article

The GUU was originally set up as the men's union, while women had the separate Queen Margaret Union. With the passing of the Sex Discrimination Act in 1975, both unions were under pressure to admit members of the opposite sex. QMU did so in 1979, the GUU in 1980 – but despite pressure from university management, 139 members voted against allowing women to join the GUU. The 139 Club was later formed, an "exclusive gentleman's club" named in honour of the 139 recalcitrant members. The club held dinners on the anniversary of the vote to celebrate these members. The dinners were only banned from being held on campus in 2011.

Other longstanding traditions at the GUU include initiation procedures which are rumoured to involve male members having to strip naked and stand outside the union for a period of time. The week before Daft Friday, the night of the GUU Christmas Ball, it is tradition for the union president to be stripped nearly naked, placed on a trolley and left outside the QMU building.

Siobhan Barrett-Gostelow recalls being harassed repeatedly when attending Hive – the GUU nightclub – in the past. She told the Sunday Herald: "The weekend before Fresher's 2012, I was at the Hive with two of my friends and a man approached me. He tried to kiss me. I said, 'No' and told him that I was a lesbian and I simply wasn't interested. He then responded by forcefully pushing me backwards into a crowd. This behaviour is totally intolerable." She said she's lost count of the times "in which my female friends and I have experienced groping from thick, sleazy GUU f***wits.

In 2002, a GUU publication infamously contained these words: "No means yes, and yes means harder." In 2004, the university newspaper Glasgow Guardian exposed how the GUU used its funds to purchase pay-per-view pornography for its members. The Hetherington Occupation of 2011 at Glasgow University, a lengthy sit-in protest about higher education funding cuts, was marred by GUU members running around the building naked. Just this academic year, yet another celebratory LAMB dinner was held – LAMB stands for Last All-Male Board.

Louise McTavish, says she was repeatedly groped when she was at the Hive nightclub during her first year. She said: "I only went to the Hive three times, but each time while at the bar, guys would stand behind me, grope my bum and run away before I could turn around and see who it was. I also had an extremely drunk guy talking to me while I was at the bar, and it took me a while to realise that while he was talking to me, he actually had his penis out and was peeing all over the floor."

Cat Watt is wearied by the constant sexist jokes. She said: "I think the 'lad culture' is really sexist, yet it is taken as 'banter'. Jokes about sexism are not OK and I have felt the victim of those kind of jokes before." And Emily Grenfell said she stopped going to the GUU after feeling uncomfortable there. She said: "In first year, I was there a lot and it was such a 'lads' atmosphere, such a 'jock' haven, that I just didn't fit in."

 

[xenon]

Useless hammer drills and kneecaps post.

 

[equationgirl]

Cambridge has revoked its reciprocal arrangement with the GUU and will no longer send debaters to the Ancients competition:

http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/...ebaters-allegations-of-anti-feminism.20412131

 

[ymu]

That's not unique to Glasgow by any means. The worrying thing is, it does appear to be getting worse. I don't think that's me getting old and forgetting what it was like. I didn't encounter any rape jokes from the age of 13 (when girls would make them mostly, and it was a virtual synonym for sex in the 1970s) and around 10 years ago. Now, they're everywhere.

Summat very nasty going on.

 

[Superdupastupor]

I've been to a lot of bad night clubs but the absolute most appalling disrespectful behaviour that I've ever seen was at the GUU.

It's a shoddy shitty culture that says I'm allowed to do what want and fuck you.

It's tolerated and endemic there cause it's insular -you know what you are getting there and what the dicks in there will be like, uni sports teams, twats in shirts. And nothing will meaningfully change cause the board is made up of the most loyal patrons.

My brother was once asked to leave after kissing a boy cause he was "too drunk"

and it fucking stinks.

And they water their optics.

Don't go.

 

[Superdupastupor]

Summat very nasty going on.

pornography/media maybe. Changes in the way these are consumed.

I can't really tell and don't know how you'd quantify it but I get the impression that woman hating speach and attitudes are being more widely expressed.

Was late 80's- early 2000's an historic low point for sexism?

 

[ymu]

I think it's the pressure of being expected to be an alpha male in a system which affords very few that privilege. It's a middle-class phenomenon because feminism has primarily benefited middle-class women, who are now doing better than men at school, university and in job entrance (but are still largely absent from most management structures even in areas where they are over-represented in the less senior layers). Working-class women have a much bigger pay gap still and little opportunity to get paid at all when childcare often costs more than they can earn.

It's the EDL for male psyches under attack. We're having a shit time because women are getting it better. Fuck those bitches.

 

[sihhi]

I think it's the pressure of being expected to be an alpha male in a system which affords very few that privilege.

I sort of agree, but these people are often already alpha males. The ringleader behind the planned sexist abuse at the debate is apparently former GUU President, Chris Sibbald.

Sibbald, who was studying history, went to Edinburgh’s fee-paying George Heriot’s school and is the son of a university vice-chancellor. He was president of the GUU from 2011 to 2012. Fellow students say he has political ambitions and he lists a stint as a House of Commons researcher on his CV and spent last summer as a voluntary intern in the office of Angus Robertson, the SNP’s leader in the Commons.

These psyches aren't under attack they are sustained by popular culture, and expectations that students will be students.

 

[Frances Lengel]

I sort of agree, but these people are often already alpha males. The ringleader behind the planned sexist abuse at the debate is apparently former GUU President, Chris Sibbald.




These psyches aren't under attack they are sustained by popular culture, and expectations that students will be students.

Those sort of squeakoids aren't alpha males though, except in their own minds - Their entire shtick stems from their barely concealed inadequacy IMO.

 

[ymu]

I sort of agree, but these people are often already alpha males. The ringleader behind the planned sexist abuse at the debate is apparently former GUU President, Chris Sibbald.

These psyches aren't under attack they are sustained by popular culture, and expectations that students will be students.

If you're saying they're mostly middle-class, then yes. If you're saying they actually feel secure in their superior position vis-a-vis other human beings then no, I don't think so.

 

[equationgirl]

Interesting, one of them is a trainee solicitor at quite a big Scottish firm. Bet they have taken a dim view of his behaviour at the debate. The fact they got indirectly namechecked in the Daily Record thanks to him will do wonders for his career progression...

 

[The Boy]

Interesting, one of them is a trainee solicitor at quite a big Scottish firm. Bet they have taken a dim view of his behaviour at the debate. The fact they got indirectly namechecked in the Daily Record thanks to him will do wonders for his career progression...

If my limited experience of solicitors is anything to go by he'll fit right in.

 

[Greebo]

If my limited experience of solicitors is anything to go by he'll fit right in.

 

[ViolentPanda]

That's not unique to Glasgow by any means. The worrying thing is, it does appear to be getting worse. I don't think that's me getting old and forgetting what it was like. I didn't encounter any rape jokes from the age of 13 (when girls would make them mostly, and it was a virtual synonym for sex in the 1970s) and around 10 years ago. Now, they're everywhere.

Summat very nasty going on.

People, especially people (most obviously males) away from their usual regulating influences, will often push the boundaries of social acceptability. In some environments, perhaps most nowadays, such boundary-testing is swiftly shut down through appropriate peer-policing.
A uni, though, is an environment where most of your peers are as ignorant as you of appropriate behaviour and/or are engaged in the same sort of "boundary-testing" that you are. If you happen to also have some sense of entitlement (as many middle-class males are inculcated with almost from birth), then the social scene is set for some pretty horrific behaviour, and without either the uni authorities or the union making it patently and transparently clear that some behaviours are unacceptable/will result in immediate action up to and including expulsion from your course and/or legal action, then it'll keep on happening, and continue to be excused as "high jinks", "banter", "ironic humour" and other such bullshit excuses for bad behaviour.

 

[ViolentPanda]

I sort of agree, but these people are often already alpha males.

I disagree. They're beta males (or lower) reared in environments (the public/private school, the comfortable upper middle-class home) where they come to believe that they are alpha males, and act accordingly. Most of them, however, are "followers", not leaders by any stretch of the imagination.
This is why I've always seen Sandhurst's mania for recruiting from the public schools as an "open goal" for the British military - these people are conformist-as-fuck followers, not leaders, not thinkers-outside-the-box.

 

[sihhi]

I disagree. They're beta males (or lower) reared in environments (the public/private school, the comfortable upper middle-class home) where they come to believe that they are alpha males, and act accordingly. Most of them, however, are "followers", not leaders by any stretch of the imagination.

If someone is the elected president of the student union of a major university, graduated from a premier private school (Edinburgh's no.2 school), basically loaded, and already securing internships with senior powerful figures - then that is alpha male at that age.

This is why I've always seen Sandhurst's mania for recruiting from the public schools as an "open goal" for the British military - these people are conformist-as-fuck followers, not leaders, not thinkers-outside-the-box.

How is it an open goal - do you mean own goal?
Sandhurst doesn't really have the mania by itself does it? The private schools produce and drive forward people who quite consciously select British Army officership. They choose Sandhurst, don't they? Obviously, Sandhurst is terrible in general. Women on the site are apparently called 'baggers' (needing a bag over their heads to stop them talking) by students/trainee officers.

 

[Frances Lengel]

If someone is the elected president of the student union of a major university, graduated from a premier private school (Edinburgh's no.2 school), basically loaded, and already securing internships with senior powerful figures - then that is alpha male at that age.<snip>

.

Nah pissing around in the student union and being an alumini of a private school and joeying about as an intern pretty much precludes a guy from being an alpha male, I reckon.