Taylor Swift anyone? The Tab rounds up April Fools’ Day 2016

If you’re looking for a barrage of journalistic lies, here’s the grand list. 

Varsity

Our rival paper published a piece on the UL’s 600th anniversary being deemed “triggering.” I don’t know about you guys, but I am definitely demoralised every time I step into that imposing emblem of All The Things I Will Never Know.

The joke article caused controversy, with some reacting negatively to the way it treated mental health.

The Blue Bird

Cambridge’s sports newspaper covered impressive ground with their April Fool’s Day coverage, publishing five different articles, from the announcement that VKs would include dark blue among their colours, to a rather iffy review of the Girthton Spring Ball (yay, sports jokes). You can read them all here.

And their “Girthton Spring Ball” article was really rather outré

TCS

Interestingly, The Cambridge Student didn’t get involved in the April Fools’ press extravaganza, perhaps because they wanted to stand against the besmirching of journalistic integrity that it represents, or perhaps as part of an elaborate meta-joke. We may never truly be sure.

The Varsity Ski Trip

In the spirit of, ahem, inclusivity, the Varsity Ski Trip page bamboozled students with their announcement that they would invite failed Oxbridge interviewees, that is to say, Durham students, on this year’s iteration of the famed ski trip. Even our perceptive editor Joseph Spencer was caught up in the excitement of this not-quite-news!

When journalistic rigour gets the better of you

The Varsity Trip posted the joke on their Facebook page, as did the Durham ski trip organisers, “Palatinalps”, who went a step further, calling on “all you failed interviewees” to “let go those grudges” and “prove your worth to your peers at Oxford and Cambridge.”

Nobody speak of this again please

Cambridge University Conservative Association

CUCA released a statement that they had elected their newest Vice Presidents, which included Donald J. Trump. 

Surprisingly, the only society to mention the bottomless joke source that is Trump.

Cambridge University Pythons American Football Club

The Pythons announced that retired Denver Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning had accepted an offer to enroll in Cambridge, and play for them. 

I didn’t even know we had an American Football team.

University of Cambridge

Cambridge itself got involved in the fun, publishing the announcement that from now on all signage would accommodate for its millennial student body. Those who believed this one were few, considering Cambridge hasn’t been particularly keen on change since 1209.

Surprisingly, this does not say “Feel free to walk on the grass”.

King’s College, Cambridge, in collaboration with CUTV

King’s Chapel appears to have “lost” its organ.

Homerton College, Cambridge

We’ll all be studying Education now, guys.

Gonville & Caius

Gonville & Caius announced that Senate House passage was to undergo serious traffic works, including the removal of cobblestones, traffic lights and speed bumps for cyclists, and a traffic-calming island at the Trinity Street exit.

Speed bumps and traffic islands

Caius’s Master, Professor Sir Alan Fersht, who in Michaelmas famously accused drunken Caius undergraduates of being on the road to becoming amoral “Volkswagen Engineers”, even suggested that “a small moat to create a clear division with Trinity Hall wouldn’t go amiss either”.

Tit Hall get in on the banter

University of Cambridge Graduate Union 

Puns and puddings galore! Who knew graduate students had a sense of humour?

The Tab

And finally, we at The Tab simultaneously lifted and enraged the spirits of Cantabs, announcing that Taylor Swift would be headlining at Trinity May Ball and that Germaine Greer would be running for Vice-Chancellor. 

Wronged by the press, just like Taylor was wronged by John Mayer.

You can all stop posting desperately on the May Ball Marketplace now, Swiftie isn’t coming (as far as we know), and there is no need to practice saying “feminism” in an Australian accent.