Posh kids can’t queue

Feeding the Oxford stereotype one prick at a time 


Wednesday night saw yet another queuing crisis for Oxford’s nightlife as Cellar opened its doors to the ISIS event Grime and Punishment. Criticism aimed at the event management and organisation flooded the facebook event, just like it has done for so many in the past. But once again it seems we are neglecting to consider the real cause of the problem: us.

What even is a line?

It’s easy to blame “poor queue control” when so many people are shoving their way to the front of the line, but really – why do people feel like they have the right to do this in the first place?

The concept of orderly queuing is not remotely difficult to comprehend. In fact, in Britain, the ability to queue is often thought of as highly as the cup of tea. Yet it seems like in Oxford we just haven’t managed to grasp it. (Surprising considering our students are often dubbed the future leaders of the country.) Last term the Union queue fiasco left people standing in the cold for over four hours, while club night Disco Stu had to cancel their contract with Emporium following backlash for the shambolic entrance situation.

The queues for the Clegg/Farage double header at the Union

Oxbridge is taunted with the privileged label. Those that don’t go here assume those that do only get in thanks to parents’ paycheques. Acting like you spent your childhood without even a minimal introduction to patience or respect for others, getting anything you wanted with an attitude of indifference as to how this affects others makes you an arsehole. Pushing in a queue because you can’t be bothered to wait in the cold, without paying any consideration to those who did go and wait makes you an arsehole. This all remains true regardless of whether your club entry fee was paid with mummy’s money.

If we, as students and representatives of the university, act like spoilt brats, this is going to reflect on the university as a whole. Access schemes and outreach events can only do so much to combat this. This is not to say that everyone that pushes into a queue is a privileged “rich kid”, but simply by acting like your right to entry trumps those of everyone else, particularly those who have gone out of their way to queue like a reasonable human being, you are reinforcing this stereotype.

This is not an image we should be trying to convey. Get over yourselves. Learn to queue.