KCL media war: there’s room for two

In an unsporting act of protectionism, I witnessed the King’s Student Media Coordinator ripping down, tearing up and binning Tab flyers on campus.

This declaration of journalistic war was confirmed by an informant at the student newspaper Roar! who told us how the staff member in question told him simply that The Tab posters “weren’t allowed”.

Our Roar! insider also told us how the media coordinator boasted that he stopped the leafleting, despite those who distributed the posters stating that no such conversation occurred.

The poster in question. One can only presume KCSLU Media dislike Amsterdam.

However we shouldn’t really see this defensive stance from union media as a negative. Instead, we should rejoice in the fact that King’s media are so intimidated by The Tab that they have to make the campus a ‘one read only zone’ – Roar!, the ‘intelligent student tabloid’.

No really, that’s their slogan. But ‘intelligent’ and neutral they’re not. For instead of holding their council to account, Roar! sees their role as more of a pressure group/socialist fraternity, a point displayed in their campaign to rid Lord Carey of his alumni window.

In fact the intelligence of Roar! has been recently manifested in their hot off the SD card production ‘Roar!: A Documentary’. [Please note viewer discretion is advised as some scenes contain graphic cringe and unbearable egos.]

And unfortunately agency does come into account. For with Deputy Editor Robbie Hirst also being Student Council Chair, I ask whether Roar! has heard of the separation of powers or merely has a fondness for careerists.

Having applied for positions at Roar! myself, I have experienced the extent to which the paper is both organisationally inept and arguably biased. For it took 3 months of waiting to eventually get a response to my application, let alone an interview.

But I wasn’t alone, as I found similar treatment was also given to one of my fellow friends Reece Warren.

Student media shouldn’t be like that. Our campus media should be diverse and up for debate, not strongholds of socialism.

But we’re not like that at The Tab. So roll up your sleeves, whip out your laptop and have your say by joining The Tab today. Oh, and don’t worry, there’s no need to be ‘intelligent’.

Email [email protected] to get involved.