Editors’ Letters: “Pipe down, societies”

[dropcap]D[/dropcap]on’t get me wrong; societies are the heart of the Students’ Union (SU), and particular ones have entirely shaped my experience at Warwick. But let’s set the record straight. If you’ve been at the University for a while and have got all wrapped up in the Warwick bubble, it’s easy to become… too big for your boots.

Sure, the society you’re involved with might have a huge impact across the student and local population, but you don’t live at Number 10. You’re not the government; you’re not part of the UN; you don’t dictate the law. So be careful when overestimating your importance. The point of a university society isn’t to be in fierce competition with other societies (unless you’re that desperate to win a Socs Award), apart from the friendly, of course. It doesn’t matter how many members your society has, or whether it’s more successful than similar societies.

Every society has its story, and that’s what is so fantastic about them (yes, I’m even looking at you, Cheese and Chocolate Society). It sounds obvious but why do you think each group is called a “society”, regardless of whether it’s academic, musical, sporty or cultural? Because they all make up parts of society as a whole – for now at Warwick, and later, out in the big, wide world. So surely the point of a university society is to make the environment you’re in just a tiny bit better?

So that’s it.

After being news editor of the Boar for the entirety of last year, I became sick of reporting on stories which essentially said: “This society has had an argument with that society”. Nope, bored of that. I want us to report less about society conflict and more about the positives: “These societies collaborated and made an incredible event happen.”

Naturally problems are going to occur when groups of students work in such close proximity to one another, but just try discussing it calmly rather than trying to bring the whole world down on social media, or in student media.

You’re likely to be more successful as a society if you act on positive energies rather than negatives. Instead of annoying the SU and making other societies hate you, instead you could work with them to make better things happen.

Give it a go. Pipe down your complaining and pipe up your productivity, and make our societies have even more of a positive impact on our little world than they already have. And it’ll make for a nicer newspaper, too.