Friday, 3 April 2009

First they came for the Kit-Kats...

TB is still pretty pissed off about this ridiculous move to attempt to ban the Daily Mail from union outlets at Edinburgh University. In discussing this with real students tonight, those who aren't warped by the bubble of hackery, there has been wide spread outrage at is this totalitarian and deluded action. He finally got round to getting hold of the offending press release that went out on April Fools day. Would have been a great prank if it had actually been a joke:


Awaiting the press release that announces student association re-education camps.

5 comments:

JD said...

EUSA President Adam Ramsay said:

"We don't sell low quality sandwiches."

Que? The sandwiches taste worse than actually eating the Daily Mail itself.

Jess The Dog
said...

Would have thought it would require more than an internal management committee decision....surely something for a general meeting? That's the way it worked in my distant student days, when it was Nestle and baby milk substitute etc.

There's a large and mostly invisible Conservative student community at Edinburgh (and at most other "old" universities) who may be outraged enough to actually turn up to a general meeting.

I tend to read the Mail with just one eye open myself, cringe at parts of it, but as far as I've seen it hasn't broken any laws on racial hatred etc.

Jess The Dog
said...

I shouldn't really be pondering this as it has nothing to do with me, but.....

1. This may be ultra vires - beyond the remit of the management committee. I assume they've checked with their advisors.

2. This is surely more appropriate for a general meeting - if it is passed by a management committee, there is surely scope for calling an extraordinary general meeting to challenge the decision?

3. Most student political hacks are utterly boring and self-obsessed, so will be on the back foot in any public forum (hence the New Liabour preference for decisions behind closed doors, sofa government etc).

4. If passed at a general meeting, such a motion would be entirely appropriate - it is the students union and if they don't want the Mail to be sold, then fair enough. It would be for the proposers to persuade members of the merits of the motion and if they did so then that would be democracy.

5. If passed by an internal committee and ultra vires, could the Mail take legal action? The Mail don't care about a few dozen sales but this would be good headlines for the middle classes to rant over their Waitrose cornflakes while reading!


I'm a libertarian, but I believe that student unions and other clubs should determine their own affairs in accordance with their own constitutions, and no one outside should complain (same for golf clubs and lady members etc....). If I had my own little empire, I would personally wish to relegate magazines like Zoo and Nuts to the top shelf with the better-value pornos....but that's just my opinion!

Anonymous said...

Seriously, what a bunch of jumped up pricks. Free choice? no thanks says adam ramsey.

Anonymous said...

The Daily Mail is not being banned. A student (in this case Adam Ramsey but it could be anyone) has decided to bring a motion and CoM will make a decision on it but there is no way that they would decide to ban a newspaper just because someone thinks they should, irrespective of his status as President.

The Committee of Management has never as far as I'm aware banned anything on "moral grounds" (Nestle etc were all GM policies) and has already opposed similar motions over the past year and a half.

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