Ow. And Ower.

[major_clanger]

As various people are noting here on LJ, a bunch of Exeter students have given themselves a lasting momento of their time at Uni:

BBC: Students burned in branding caper

Fortunately for those involved (who will I suspect be the target of enough ridicule and mirth) the police seem to be keeping out of all this. Perhaps more liberal views have emerged since the Spanner case, or it may be that it seems here the students injured themselves rather than each other.

Mind you, they're still not anywhere near the league of this chap:

Fulminant acute colitis following a self-administered hydrofluoric acid enema

Comments

[sashajwolf.livejournal.com]

Perhaps more liberal views have emerged since the Spanner case, or it may be that it seems here the students injured themselves rather than each other.

Unfortunately the gender of the participants, and the presence or absence of a sexual motive, could also make a difference here. Where there was a sexual motive, juries have shown themselves more reluctant to convict opposite-sex couples than same-sex couples, and the police will be aware of this. I also suspect that juries would generally be more reluctant to convict in a non-sexual case, particularly one that can be characterised as "students larking about", which has a certain sort of social acceptability about it. Basically, I think the more you conform to the cultural narrative of what is acceptable behaviour for someone of your gender and life-stage, the less likely you are to be convicted, regardless of what the letter of the law says.