Imperial College, rape culture and what to do about going to Picocon?

[major_clanger]

On Friday the newspaper of Imperial College Union, Felix, published a 'humour' piece. That article apparently never appeared in the online edition - which now leads with an apology for it - but you can see a picture of it here. As the Telegraph puts it,

Cook up Rohypnol to get laid, student paper jokes

I am disgusted with this, and I'm not alone, as this post and this post from my f-lists make clear. I will be writing not only to the ICU President but also to the Rector and the head of alumni relations to express my extreme displeasure and ask what measures are being taken to punish those responsible for this piece and to ensure that such material is never published in Felix again.

But I now have another problem. Next weekend is Picocon, the annual mini-convention of IC Science Fiction Society. My first Picocon was in 1987 and I was looking forward to my 25th anniversary of what was in fact my first convention and to meeting many of my friends there. But Picocon is held at Imperial College Union and the social side of it centres on the student bar at ICU.

I appreciate that ICSF, whilst part of ICU, cannot be held responsible for what Felix does. And the membership fee for Picocon will be spent in ways that benefit ICSF and its members (funding the guest, triciasullivan and buying books for the ISCF library) rather than going to ICU. But ICU will benefit from the use of the bar by attendees at Picocon. It doesn't seem right to me to take on ICU for its misconduct and then help boost its bar profits.

Looked at like that, the solution seems fairly clear. Having discussed the matter with darth_hamster, who shares my views, we will attend Picocon, albeit with rather uncomfortable feelings as to the venue. But we won't buy anything to eat or drink from ICU. We will either invite friends to join us in one of the local pubs (the Queen's Arms is a likely choice) or, if we are in the student bar at any point, we will drink only tap water.

Comments

[major-clanger.livejournal.com]

To make it clear, the boycott is a personal matter that reconciles my anger with ICU with my wish to attend an event held at ICU. It allows me to go to Picocon without feeling that I am benefiting ICU.

[maviscruet.livejournal.com]

But your action is not intended to achieve a specific effect it's just attempting to achieve some sort of punishment?

[major-clanger.livejournal.com]

It is intended to stop me from looking like a hypocrite.

If I am going to take a stand about how unhappy I am with ICU, then doesn't it look a bit odd if I then of my own free will go to an event run by ICU?

What I am trying to do is find a way to go to Picocon without giving benefit to ICU. It seems to me that one way of doing that is to attend the event but not spend my money in ICU's bar.

[purplecthulhu.livejournal.com]

But ICU isn't responsible for this - the Felix editor is.

[teaparty.net (from livejournal.com)]

Leaving aside my many other concerns with this thread, I'm glad someone's made that point. It's true that Felix is a suborganisation within ICU. But ICU is part of IC, which is part of the British University System, a subsidiary of HMG, which in turn is a member of the Council of Europe, and so on. Will you boycott ECHR decisions coming down from the Council's court to avoid looking like a hypocrite with respect to this article?

Membership doesn't signify; control does. You will certainly remember how fiercely editorially-independent Felix was when we were there, and because memes propagate I expect that to have continued as much as the rugger-bugger mentality clearly has. The buck stops at the editor; (s)he will have to make a decision about how far up the flagpole to run the author of this piece, and will in all likelihood have to defend that decision publicly. If his or her judgement is generally felt to be wrong, (s)he will probably have to step down as editor of Felix. This is right and proper, and in my view, proportionate.

[major-clanger.livejournal.com]

Taking your points rather in reverse, one of my immediate concerns was that the Felix editor did not seem to have taken on board the seriousness of what happened, as indicated by the rather weak apology that seemed more focussed on apologising for any offence caused than for the poor editorial decision to run the piece in the first place. Nor was there much sign from Imperial College Union of concern about this (I saw a solitary tweet about it). That makes me wonder what the general mindset across ICU is; pointing the finger just at the Felix Editor doesn't tackle the wider question of whether there is a problem with the culture within ICU.

(purplecthulhu has noted that there are no longer Union General Meetings as we knew them and that ICU is now governed solely by a student council. If the ICU mindset is that of a group of inward-looking hacks, I can see how such a situation may arise.)

As for where the buck stops, I see your legalistic point :-) and raise you my own: the concept of remoteness. For the reasons I've tried to outline above, I consider that this goes beyond just Felix. But I don't see it as as issue that went beyond IC, mainly because once we go outside College we are just too remote from anyone who made any questionable decisions.

[purpletigron.livejournal.com]

D & I have received identical letters from the Felix Editor, sent by email c. midnight last night. I expect this email was sent as a standard reply to anyone who had emailed the Felix Editor about this issue. It may soon be in the public domain.

[penguineggs.livejournal.com]

I linked a public domain apology from the editor below - recognise it?

[purpletigron.livejournal.com]

Yes - that is what I received. Thanks!

[teaparty.net (from livejournal.com)]

Taking your points in order, I agree with your first; the editor is the person whose job it is to contain this fire, and (s)he doesn't seem to have done a great job, at least at first. I don't agree that it's ICU's job to fix this, and if they were to quote "editorial independence" at a complaint I'd see that as a proper defence, not a wimp-out. I do agree that any organisation run by a bunch of hacks - up to and including Parliament - can seem rather out of touch when it comes to self-governance.

I don't find the buck-stopping discussion to be legalistic, but purely pragmatic. There's no point in leaning on person or organisation A to change the behaviour of person or organisation B, if A doesn't control B. I'm a member of the Motorcycle Action Group - the only thing I'm a life member of besides ICU - but good luck in controlling my riding behaviour by lobbying MAG. Moreover, the enormity of the issue doesn't somehow rewrite the chain of control; even if my riding was execrable, and I posed a danger to life and limb of other road users all around the M25, lobbying MAG to change my behaviour would still be a waste of time. You may be right that this issue has blown up too big to be "just Felix" any more, but that doesn't (to me) suddenly invalidate editorial independence; it only increases the risk that the current editor's head will roll.