Editorial November 26th 2014

Something I always say in response to misogyny is that I don’t understand how a a man, who will most likely know the woman responsible for his creation and rearing can reach a point where he turns around, looks at that woman and says ‘I’m better than you on the basis of the circumstances of my birth, which you were pretty crucial in’.

Misogyny is illogical; it’s pointless. This is why I find it so shocking that the GUU persists in hosting all-male dinners. The Glasgow Guardian has published on the issue on numerous occasions and we’ve pretty much run out of things to say on it. I can assure the GUU that we will keep publishing on it, ad. nauseum, because sometimes it feels like the GUU keeps its doors so tightly closed to reality it might well still be the late 1800’s in their heads.

The GUU itself suspended the dinners following a separate misogyny scandal, as big an admission that they are problematic that you’re ever likely to get from the hardline GUUer, who will insist that it is a traditional element of their calendar and that there are women’s dinners too. I’m sure that will satisfy the many students on this campus who don’t identify with either categorisation, although, clearly they are not the people closest to the GUU’s thoughts.

Ali and I were worried that the GUU would simply dismiss this because I’m an old QM boy (I will admit that I am). If that is so they will fail to realise that, by ignoring these arguments on that basis, they ignore their responsibility to treat their members with equality of respect and the care that all bodies that think of themselves as more than a building and a bar should aspire to. I hope desperately that this board or some future GUU board comes along to buck the trend of appealing to ‘tradition’ in order to ignore their responsibility to the people who are actually at this university now and that the Glasgow Guardian finally gets something positive to write about the GUU.

Another matter that has come to our attention is the matter of the university considering a ban on the use of english language dictionaries in examinations. It is plainly obvious that the potential for cheating is a serious concern. However, it is also plainly obvious that simply providing approved dictionaries at examinations would be the best solution for both staff and students, and is well within the range of affordability for a university such as ours. I hope the university will come to the right decision.

We would also like to thank Sam Wigglesworth, who has resigned from being this publication’s News Editor due to the obscene amount of work she is doing in her life. She has been excellent, intelligent, organised and dedicated. We wish her well.