anne's dispatches from sydney

...

a very wet montreal the day before term begins. i can't believe the way that I miss home. I even admire the protests against the Forbes 500 CEO's in Sydney- sound like they are actually authentic rather than sloganistic! There are some great sound bites in this article in the SMH, calling the Forbes people 'free market freaks'!! great work, Bruce! Also, the VSU and Clean Energy campaigns sound excellent!

McGill in comparison with sydney uni seems impersonal- I haven't found the eddies- the still places amid the stream of people- where I can sit and chat with people, (and I keep noticing my disagreements with the unspoken decisions made by the activists)... Apparently the Architecture Cafe is good...

I have just emerged from two days of "radical frosh" . Frosh week is a very weird tradition here- where groups such as arts or commerce go around in gangs of people in identical t-shirts and get totally drunk, act really stupid and see how many people they can score with for a few days and then boast about it - no wonder there are stories (even being warned by my mum before I left) about sexual assault here- there seems to be more peer-pressure about sex here than at home- a group of commerce frosh people ridiculously chanted 'virgins' at the radical frosh people as an insult whilst walking past us [we happened to be on a history tour of the dodgyness of the uni- from the fur trade to Indigenous dispossession to crazy misanthropic psychiatrists- this uni is proclaimed to be built on BAD MONEY].

It's not even an insult- I can't BELIEVE that kind of attitude. Its none of their business being so manipulative in such a personal part of one's life, where you require autonomy!!  I would actually take it as a compliment that we appear more civilised. They must be total sleazes.  I have just witnessed and been affected by so much misery by people close to me in my life who have been sexually assaulted. However, the Radical frosh people are just as determined to be (perceived to be) sexually free, with its sponsorship by a sex toys company- In our showbags we got a brochure with many model penises in it- which embarrasses me. Though  there is much less coercion associated with 'picking up' in progressive circles. Maybe I'm a prude but I don't care.
(actually- my issue with sex toys is that they instrumentalise sex into a 'thing' that you 'get' rather than an expression of a relationship. It becomes a commodity so that an individual can satisfy a selfish need for 'pleasure' rather than an expression of mutual care).

My critiques:

0. NO permanent place to gather
1. guilt-driven identity politics
2. lack of organisation
3. lack of long term big picture thinking
4. a determinist interpretation of history of the university
5. lack of interrogation of the stereotype of radical-as -streetfighter
6. lack of community
7. lack of cultivation of a radical intellectual scene
7. not much political debate
8. not much organiser training
9. sponsorship by a sex toys business

posted by: anneinchaosland at 19:54 | link | comments |

Comments: