That Girl from Derwent dwells on the value of religion this Christmas.
That Girl from Derwent has learned a few more things about prejudice since moving up North.
That Girl From Derwent reckons if you're going to be offensive, you should find a better reason.
That Girl from Derwent considers why it is that some words have wider implications than others.
Porno V is just about to rear its uncontested head, and I think this is the time to think about some things that worm their way in to our consciousness, without us having any idea.
That is to say, sexualised women.
We live in a society that relies on half naked women as the most powerful advertising campaign. If there is a way to post an image of a woman in fewer clothes than normal, it will be done. If it were possible to have a semi-nude woman eating cat food to sell it, I’m sure that someone would do it. And yet who are they advertising for?
If it were possible to have a semi-nude woman eating cat food to sell it, I’m sure that someone would do it.
Our Derwent Bar Reps are advertising the St. Patrick’s Day bar quiz with the image of a severely out of proportioned woman, in tiny green pants and a drooping green top. This greatly confused me. Will she be there? Will there be suggestive women reading out the questions? Or worse, is it possible that she could be the prize? I really do not think so.
And so my next point of query. Do they not want me there, as a straight female? Is this quiz specifically for straight men and lesbians? Do I need to attach a penis onto my body to be allowed in? Again, I came to the conclusion that this is probably not so. And so what is her relevance? She is possibly a great fan of St. Patrick’s Day, and she may even enjoy the odd bar quiz. But this tells me personally nothing about why I should attend.
I think that it is down to a severe lack of imagination on the part of advertisers to rely on the bodies of women. But it is rather offensive that as a straight female I am kept completely out of the loop. It feels like my presence is unwanted unless I choose to dress like she is. Possibly I will be allowed in if I wear nothing but a pint of Guinness on my head.
The advertising for Porno V at least makes sense in the way that it is relevant to the theme. But, unless I have been tricked into believing this, the event is about safe sex. Porn does not encourage safe sex. The participants often suffer from STIs, partly because condoms reduce the appeal for a lot of people. A condom bukake may not work. If you know what that is, you will know why.
And apart from a little snippet at the end of the YUSU page for the event, saying, rather inconspicuously, almost as if to avoid detection, “...and remember, use protection”, there is nothing about safe sex, only lots of it and with the most scantily dressed people.
This is closely followed by the screamingly uninventive “CUM ON DOWN”... Right. Firstly, ‘come’ spelt ‘cum’ refers only to men. Secondly, I’m aware that this is a joke. And yet the advertising cannot be called a joke. It is not funny. I do not see anything amusing about a woman’s backside. It seems that at the heart of this seemingly tongue in cheek night, equipped with bucking cock to ride, there is the very real notion that women are the sexy ones in porn, boring unless they constantly have their skirts hitched up.
And to have fun if you are a woman, you must be that sexy woman. There are no other roles for women featuring in the event. There are awards at the end for the ‘kinkiest dressed’, and I’m positive that girls will feel the need to dress sexily and revealingly, whereas the guys will dress to get a funny reaction. This is the incredibly serious distinction. It is acceptable for men to dress as revealing or conservative as they like and still fit into the theme. They could go as Hugh Hefner. And any costume that a girl chooses to wear will have to be sexually attractive. There is no other option, unless they choose to not go, or do not go in costume. And I think this is crucial: should the university be encouraging and supporting events that potentially make people feel so physically inadequate that they do not attend?
A major cause of concern for me at the moment is the amount of young women in education who strive to be glamour models. There is an abundance of Facebook groups started by these entrepreneurs, asking people to vote for them in various ‘Nuts’ competitions. And yes, it is nuts! Most of these young women are at university. Does our society tell them that the glass ceiling is still there, so just lie back, have your photo taken, and think of England? Is this what the suffragettes went on hunger strike for? I do not know enough about psychology to say this and uphold it fully, but I think that they are really lacking in confidence. It may sound like a cliché, but confidence in your mind and personality is much harder to sustain that confidence in your breasts. Surgery can fix it for one thing.
So, at universities where women can be educated into holding top positions for leading companies, can begin their political careers, can become doctors, we have naked women selling things, and students becoming those women. How depressing.
"And so my next point of query. Do they not want me there, as a straight female? Is this quiz specifically for straight men and lesbians?"
Not something I brought-up mate
Fact 1: JCRCs are primarily welfare organisations and the services and events they run are part of that welfare provision.
Fact 2: Events are meant to be inclusive.
Fact 3: Events designed to make certain students feel particularly uncomfortable or excluded go against both these principles.
Now I'm all for this kind of event to be run independently, it sounds like a bloody good laugh, but I think it would actively put students off approaching Vanbrugh JCRC in a welfare situation.
I also believe there should be a stronger emphasis on sexual health and not just in a "here's some condoms, go fuck a bunch of people and be safe" way, but also putting emphasis on the issues of peer pressure etc.
"Fact 1: JCRCs are primarily welfare organisations and the services and events they run are part of that welfare provision"
"Fact 2: Events are meant to be inclusive."
As a member of the GSA Executive, I can attest to the fact that we've tried to put on events that are inclusive.
The problem is, no matter how much we have tried, this has invariably not the case for all of our events. Some people would have been put off from coming to our Casino Night in Week 1 of this term, because they don't agree with gambling, even though gambling with money did not take place. It could be said that by holding a Jazz Night, we alienated all of our members who don't like jazz. Similiarly, it's been said that by holding our events in Edge, we aren't making those who don't drink feel included, which is one of the reasons why the GSA has been looking into holding off-campus events.
The point I'm trying to make is that, no matter how hard you try, you will invariably make someone feel like they aren't included or haven't been considered. The way to combat this is to hold a variety of events (Casino Night, Jazz Night, Bingo Night, etc) so that everyone hopefully feels included at some point.
I've never been to a PORNO V event before, but from what I've been told, this has the potential to be a good, fun event that also pushes a serious welfare message about the dangers of unprotected sex.
Until folk have been to the event, I don't think that they should judge neccessarily. It's an event about sex, and thus, they have promoted it accordingly in order to grab the attention.
As long as the message at the heart of the event (promoting safe sex) is pushed prominently by Katie Taylor and the other Vanbrugh Welfare people, then the point of the event has been achieved, whilst also being fun, and thus two of the JCR's functions (giving their members fun events to attend, and ensuring their welfare) will have been achieved as well.
"I've never been to a PORNO V event before, but from what I've been told, this has the potential to be a good, fun event that also pushes a serious welfare message about the dangers of unprotected sex."
I'm afraid to say you might be disappointed to find this is not true. I attended the event last year and felt VERY uncomfortable during the night seeing women wearing hardly anything. What I did not take away from the night was that I should use condoms when I have sex.
If the whole thing is used as an excuse to promote safe sex then more emphasis really should be placed on the welfare side of things rather than simply encouraging people to dress in a sluttish way.
To clarify #23, I didn't write that comment as a "[member] of the GSA Executive" but as a member of YUSU.
Besides, Jazz music is hardly a welfare issue - though I'm told it can lead to marijuana and jive talking.
To clarify Mitch, I certainly wasn't meaning what I said in that way. My apologies to you. I'll edit my post now to remove all confusion.
I was writing as a normal student of this university, but I'm drawing on my experiences as a GSA Exec member, who sits on the GSA Event Committee and two YUSU welfare-based committees, to bring something more to my points.
P.S. The use of recreational drugs wasn't encouraged by anyone at the Jazz Night event. Jive-talking was optional though!
I am very pleased that this article, among other things, questions the appropiacy of a 'Porno themed' campus event itself. There are countless other themes which could have been chosen and wouldn't have offended anyone but the choice of a 'Porno' theme belies the ignorance of those who made the choice to the wider issues surrounding pornography which make it a throughly inappropiate theme for a campus, let alone 'safe sex', event. The issue of pornography is not one so neutral and uncontested that it is fair game for an event which is meant to be accessible and enjoyed by all students who would wish to go. I am really very dissapointed in the lack of awareness and foresight of those who planned this event.
Today I saw two students dressed up promoting 'porno v', one was dressed as a school-girl. Is this really appropiate for an institute of learning? To me it only illustrates that even in the institutions which alledgedly champion equality, women are consistently reminded of thier subordinated position and of how male sexuality ultimately defines them. The fact that women were invloved in organising 'porno v' means nothing, the face of modern patriarchy is often female. Through events such as this women are encouraged to consider personal sexuality and sexual liberty as synonymous with male- approved sexual degradation.
Wow, so many incredibly poor arguments...
Just substitute women for whatever group you are used to defend against prejudice or offense, and you'll realise just how guilty you are of using double standards.
Was that not partially because Grace FH refused to give Vanbrugh JCRC condoms for the end of the event if people wanted them?
Good article Hannah!
Advertising for events is a very interesting point. When I was first RP trained, a large proportion of the training dealt with advertising events. We were shown clear examples of how to NOT advertise events; such as put images that one may find intimidating or offensive. I am not sure if it occurred in this year's training, however I found it useful when advertising for our Club D events.
Common sense should prevail; if you put up a poster with an image of a ladies bottom you should know that it is bound to offend someone. If a college rep, be it chair or P+P, isn't clear on this matter than YUSU should produce some form of guidelines on what is and isn't acceptable.
In terms of the event itself; I do feel it is a perfectly acceptable theme having been for the last two years. A lot of welfare information was provided at the event, as well as "interesting" costumes from both men and women.
"The point I'm trying to make is that, no matter how hard you try, you will invariably make someone feel like they aren't included or haven't been considered." So you are comparing 'not being born as a man' to 'not listening to jazz music'? Music taste is a choice, drinking is a choice, gambling is a choice. Your gender is not a choice (without going into the example of transsexuals). You should not be made to feel excluded or uncomfortable because of something you did not chose. Again, you wouldn't use that line of reasoning if you were dealing with a racial issue."
Errr...., I was using Jazz Night as a nonsense example if that wasn't already clear enough! Also, as someone who is very proud to sit on YUSU LGBT Committee, I find your comment about trans-gender persons very offensive. The same goes for the comment about race as well. No line can be drawn from what I said to either of those, and you full well know it.
Also, if you are going to lay into multiple people, have the intregrity to not do it anonymously.
They're obviously meant as metaphorical hyperboles Jay. If you're so bloody sensitive about race and LGBT issues, why can't you be sensitive about women's issues?
What is the suggested male dress for porno v?
I don't know but I suspect that Oli Lester's going in a dress 
How would Jason Rose dress for the occasion?
Women self repress all the time - perhaps to escape being labelled as 'fun killers'and being told to 'let our hair down'.
why is it not OK that some things offends some people? if people like the event we can't censor them?
hahaha "is that really appropriate for an institute of learning" etc etc.
If someone shuts down a event that has been running for however many years and been popular, I reckon that is pretty fascist. Why are people telling others that they should not dress as schoolgirls or anything else? I thought we left this kind of baggage in maybe the 70's.
If you just do what you want then other people will do the same, there is clearly a demand for this event. last year it was awesome.
Since when does demand for something automatically make it right?
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