Kittens show their claws as Catz male drinking society BANS all initiations

In an email sent to all college members on Monday afternoon, the Kittens revealed drastic constitutional change and claim to have repositioned themselves as a “sporting society” rather than a “drinking society.”

Clause 8 of the Kittens” new constitution explicitly states that new members will no longer have to endure the infamous alcohol-fuelled bushtucker trials that have become synonymous with Oxbridge.

They will, however, still have to buy a tie.

The constitution now reads: “Any eligible persons who accepts their invitation to join the club shall be considered a member after attending a Kittens Meeting or Dinner and purchasing the Kitten Club tie. There will be no initiations for new members.”

Membership will now be governed purely by sporting success at university or college level. The only sports that will be considered for eligibility are rowing, football, rugby, cricket, hockey and tennis. Ultimate Frisbee loyalists, we are sad to say, will continue their isolated existence.

No minor sports allowed

In a correspondence sent to all St. Catharine’s students on Monday, President James Digby outlined the club’s desire to “rethink what a sporting society looks like in contemporary Cambridge” as they seek to “promote a new ethos.”

Head Kitten Digby wrote: “Drinking societies” are a contentious issue in Cambridge. They lurch from scandal to scandal, alienating both the public and the college communities.

“The Kitten Club is acutely aware of this, and by making certain basic changes to our structure and to our ethos, we really hope to distance ourselves from these types of activities.

“Firstly, we are a sporting society – not a drinking society. This is not a facile or disingenuous distinction. In the past, eligibility was determined by sporting prowess and then members were decided by a vote, making it essentially a popularity contest.”

Lest we forget: “We are a sporting society – not a drinking society”

In an email to students, the group revealed that it represents a response to the recent scathing criticism of drinking society culture and directly referenced an article written in the Guardian by Charlotte Proudman, a PhD student at Cambridge.

In the article, published on Monday, Proudman alleges: “One undergraduate student told me that when she was a fresher, she was invited along to a drinking society event. Women were encouraged to drink until inebriated, at which point, male members goaded them to remove their clothes. She was sexually assaulted and hospitalised. Another woman has told me that she drinking at a clubhouse when someone pulled out his penis and masturbated over her.”

She isn’t a ‘feminazi’, she says

It followed a blistering attack by Caius Master Professor Sir Alan Hersht a fortnight ago. He accused his own students of forming part of a “national scandal” in which they indulged in “laddish behaviour and sadistic initiation writs”. Fersht claimed the same drinking culture sees women “abused” by young men after being overloaded with alcohol.

The scandal broke on the first Tuesday of full term, when Caius students were caught on camera forcing freshers, “including women”, to drink shots until they vomited. Fersht expressed his fear that they will end up as “unethical pariahs like insider traders, exchange rate riggers and corrupt Volkswagen engineers.”

Totally, totally unrelated to this, of course, is the Kittens’ own past. They were banned last year, though it is not clear entirely why.

Now it seems they are back in their college’s good books, with the Head Kitten has even bagging himself an @caths.cam.ac.uk email address.