Campus Notebook
Thursday 5th June - The white stuff
For anyone who didn’t see a copy, the York Press on Saturday had ‘COCAINE’ splashed across its front page. It was a direct copy of our story.
This suggests that it is a pretty serious matter, which it most certainly is, yet the internet articles for both our story and the York Press‘ have attracted comments which only belittle the findings of the investigation.
Before the York Press story’s comments fell into a class-driven arguement about University funding, posts such as “students on drugs, sorry where’s the story here?” and “Students use drugs! I’m aghast! Does anyone know the religious leanings of the pope?” appeared, while ‘Pedro’ - obviously York’s king of wit - wrote “Please comment on this article. To help you I will provide you with two words. 1. Bears. 2. Woods. Best of luck.”
On our story, similar comments appeared. Others claimed that the tests would provide untrustworthy results, and the most recent suggests that we may have bought cocaine with soceity funds. This, for the record, is absolutely false.
My concern is that if the people that are commenting are representative of general opinion, both the people of York and the students at the University are missing the point: Positive results for traces of cocaine were found in Heslington Hall.
Do we not care that the people running this institution may be taking drugs during their work hours? I imagine that if we had found traces of cocaine in the YUSU office, people would be up in arms. Though Canning and Co. do very important work for students, they aren’t half as influential upon this university as the men and women who work in Hes Hall.
While the University released a statement talking down our findings, they later thought it serious enough to request that we remove certain sentences from the internet article. We declined the request.
So if the local press, the University, and potentially the police think that our findings are important, why don’t students?
Has cocaine become a part of our culture, thanks to Winehouse, Moss, et al, that it no longer surprises nor offends us when it is linked with high-ranking and important members of soceity.
Is cocaine no longer shocking?
Previous blog entries:
Anon.
“My concern is that if the people that are commenting are representative of general opinion, both the people of York and the students at the University are missing the point: Positive results for traces of cocaine were found in Heslington Hall”
I could not agree with this statement more. I really can’t. I dearly hope Nouse will be following up on the University’s ‘Investigation’.
Moving Truck Rental
Cocaine is still shocking. Especially if we personally know the people who use it.