What the fuck is wrong with our SU?

Now to kick things off, I’ll tell you about a conversation no one has ever had. 

“Did you have a good time at the Union last night?”

“Yeah awesome. Apart from sometime around midnight the DJ dropped ‘Blurred lines’. Whilst carefully listening to the lyrics I suddenly noticed my regard to gender equality disappear. I questioned my views on rape, and wondered if maybe women are just sexual objects.”

“Jesus, that’s awful. When will the Union realise that we are just too susceptible to the lyrics of songs? Its not about the drinking or the dancing, its about the message you take home.”

So yes, as we all know by now, back in November the SU took heed of this fictional conversation, and decided to ban all employees and DJs playing the song on Union grounds. This follows a national trend set by other UK universities. 

This is poor form from the Union Council. The decision just screams unoriginality, and not to mention the use of undemocratic process; a recent Forge survey of 589 students showed that 80% thought the decision should at least go to a referendum.

What really is it about ‘Blurred lines’ that is so unacceptable? We found 5 lyrics the Union thinks are less offensive than Blurred Lines. If we’re going to start banning songs that include hints of bigotry, why not go the whole shebang? Let’s all sit and hold hands and listen to Snow Patrol, or Coldplay or some other shit.

Another bandwagon the Union blindly made a leap of faith on to, is to take part in the national ‘No more page 3’ T-shirt campaign, which aims to keep censorship alive in 21^st century Britain.

This publicity stunt forms part of the larger campaign to boycott The Sun newspaper from SU outlets until they remove their naughty pictures.

In February this year, a petition was started by Dominic Johnson to stop this censorship, he stated that: “This is not a petition to support Page 3, but a petition to return our freedom to choose what we believe and what newspapers we want to read. It is unjust to force opinions on others.” 

Despite the petition gathering enough votes, the Union council did not see the truth in this notion.

Although Emma Kuziara (a student glamour model) raises a point that this sort of campaign only reinforces the idea of gender inequality, this isn’t where my concern lies.

My concern lies with how Sheffield, amongst many other universities, has dealt with trying to eradicate sexism on the whole. By beating it to submission using techniques that are just downright dirty.

There are right and wrong ways of doing things. Whilst the intentions are good, the execution almost seems ironic: creating a liberal environment through the oppressive use of censorship and undemocratic process. How does that work?