I like to imagine there was once a time when being a student meant your politics were more radical and liberal than almost everyone else's.
I imagine, during this magical time, student media took it upon itself to fight for those less advantaged than themselves, or to at least take some kind of anti-establishment stance on current affairs. I dream of a time when student media wasn't about who can be the biggest, most ignorant jerk.
Being a student now is a pretty conservative business. It's more radical to tell people outside of the mainstream to be quiet and take a joke than it is to stand up against discrimination.
Specifically, I'm talking about Critic, the University of Otago student magazine. The current deputy editor is wonderful, and writes thoughtful, considered pieces, but the trend of having an editor who thrives on offensive controversy has continued.
Last week we were treated to an editorial about how the pay gap in sports isn't discriminatory because women just aren't as good at sports as men. This opinion is so boring it seems almost as though the editor was deliberately winding up readers who know better than him.
Naturally, people were offended and wrote letters explaining why this column was inappropriate and offensive, and the response from the editor and some other students was generally that feminists need to lighten up and take a joke.
This absolutely shuts down conversation and discussion, and what else is student media for if not for discussions that can't take place in mainstream media?
Although, sadly, I think that these kinds of editorials aren't written to stimulate discussion, they're written to maintain a dominant social position. It seems if you can be offensive and then refuse to take criticism you are untouchable.
I don't like reading a magazine that makes people feel that if they disagree with conservative, blinkered world views and opinions they will be ridiculed for being humourless and weird.
Having a conservative stance is, of course, personal choice, but if you can't stand having anyone challenging you then maybe you shouldn't be involved in a media outlet sponsored by a union, that is supposed to support a variety of voices.
It's not really about whether men or women are better at sports (this is a stupid, binary distinction anyway), it's a matter of not resorting to writing on deliberately provocative topics so that you can shut down people who disagree with you in a childish, school-yard bully fashion.
People aren't easily offended; people are almost constantly offended because we live in a world that massively discriminates against anyone who doesn't fit (white) patriarchal standards.
I'm not impressed by those with public platforms showboating their privilege and scorning those who challenge them. Bringing out a tired, typically chauvinistic opinion column just to cause trouble and offence is not edgy; it's just nasty and shows an enormous lack of imagination and basic human empathy.
Are students so apathetic about our precarious position in the world that we can't even be bothered taking a different stance to the baby-boomers who landed us living on a doomed planet in piles of debt?
Maybe I'm just confused, but I did think youth was supposed to be about being at least a little bit radical, and to my mind there is nothing radical about parroting your dad's political views.
As a generation we are so good at learning new things, and we need to start applying that skill in all social scenarios.
●Millie Lovelock is a Dunedin student.
