PolSoc gender representation controversy

Concerns about gender equality have been raised over the Warwick Politics Society (PolSoc) Question Time event, which is to take place on Wednesday 16 October.

Issues raised at the event will include the use of chemical weapons in Syria, the party conferences, and the Robin Thicke controversy.

The Question Time panel was originally made up of five men, including Jack Rankin from the Warwick Conservative Association, Warwick Labour president Robert Ankcorn, Theo LeQuesne from the Warwick Greens and Tom Diamond of the Warwick Liberal Democrats.

Stuart Shevlin was also to sit on the panel as an ex-campaign advisor, who was not affiliated to any party.
PolSoc academic officer Aidan Press is to chair the event.

However, a number of students complained on the event page and in the Warwick Anti-Sexism Society (WASS) group about the lack of female representation.

They said that if the panel is to discuss an issue which affects women – the controversy over whether song by Robin Thicke Blurred Lines should be banned as it has been at other UK universities – the panel should have a female representative.

Third-year English Literature student Abbey Lewis said: “It’s terrible but unsurprising that PolSoc wouldn’t even realise an all-male panel was unacceptable.

“They follow a long tradition of politically-minded people who don’t value women’s voices and don’t understand the importance of promoting women’s voices in a male-dominated discipline.

“As hosts, PolSoc have a responsibility to make sure that their event is representative, and they’ve failed.”

WASS released a statement on the issue: “We feel that PolSoc has a duty as a representative student society to be inclusive, and this means ensuring adequate female and minority representation at events such as Question Time.

“We believe that failing to have women’s voices represented further encourages the marginalisation of women’s opinions, a problem which is rife throughout society and one which certainly should not be accepted in any situation.

“While we appreciate that this act of sexism was not intentional by any one individual member and that there was no intent to offend, the incident cannot be excused on these grounds.”

President of PolSoc Charlie McKnight told the Boar: “I don’t want this to be a battle of statements – it’s just an unfortunate situation. Perhaps it simply shows something about the nature of student politics.

“We reached out to Politics societies asking for people to chair the panel, and only men came forward.

“We had informed the societies that there would be no women on the panel a month prior to this controversy.

“Our aim is to facilitate campus politics and we apologise to anyone we have upset in this miscommunication.

“We will endeavour to take this into account for the next Question time.

“We are looking forward to the event and in light of the situation we will aim to be as transparent and open as possible by including the said issue as a topic of discussion with the audience and panel.”

As a result of the controversy, third-year Politics student Stuart Shevlin stepped down from his position in order to make way for a female representative.

Vice-president of Warwick Labour, Mariam Tafsiri, commented: “As a principle featuring very prominently in the wider Labour movement, Warwick Labour is committed to mixed panels.

“Whilst it is an unfortunate reflection on politics that all four political club chairs [were] men, it was fitting to have them on the first Question Time event of the year, as suggested by PolSoc.

“Speaking as vice-president and with half of our exec members with portfolio being women, Warwick Labour has upheld its commitment and our social secretary Amy will take the place of our president on the panel.”

Warwick Greens has also replaced its representative with a woman, Helen McNamara, so the panel is now gender neutral with two men and two women.

A second-year student who wished to remain anonymous said that she thought WASS had taken the issue too far: “It’s not like PolSoc deliberately set out to leave women off the panel.

“Clearly no female representatives came forward originally, so they had no choice but to run with an all-male panel.

“I just think it says a lot about student politics; women just don’t want to be involved with politics as much as men do.”