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Justice or Just Another One?
Luckily I’ve never been one for romantic movies. I always preferred a horror movie. I just didn’t know that my love life would become the worst horror movie I could ever encounter. I was only 18 when I met the monster who presented as a half decent human being. I didn’t know the world very well at that point and he made sure that he became my world. The control and coercion, at the time, seemed like romantic gestures. It’s only with hind sight that I can look back and realise every “kind” and “loving” gesture came from a menacing place of control and selfishness. I was fully under his spell. But anyway, I won’t get into every detail ever. I guess I just wanted to preface this with the fact that abuse doesn’t just start with abuse. It starts with manipulation that is often disguised as love and romance in a twisted way.
This man went on to break me down into a shell of myself before the physical abuse started. Even then, him getting that angry was somehow always my fault. I caused that reaction in his sick, twisted mind and I started to believe it was my fault too. The final incident took place and the last thing I can clearly recall is hearing how he was going to cave my head in before I felt this horrendous pressure on my neck with his other hand keeping me from making any noise that would expose him.
By chance, I managed to get free and RUN to my family. Immediately took photos of my injuries too because even in my state, I know how the Criminal Justice System would not be on my side without evidence they deemed suitable.
Anyway, my case ended up going to trial. Further trauma. Great. I had to relive the entire relationship by having every part of my character questioned on the stand like I was the criminal in this instance. I even got told by his defence that I had “Histrionic Personality Disorder”. Something I have never been diagnosed with, or even been assessed for. Just another way the CJS likes to pathologise women’s trauma. Worst of all, turns out ‘Doctor Defence’ ended up dropping my abuser as he was professionally embarrassed when he realised he knew my mother who was also a witness. Wonderful. This meant I got to go through the process of being criminalised, questioned, diagnosed with disorders I hadn’t heard of at the time, hear the messages, see the photos ALL over again.
Although “justice” prevailed in as much as he was found guilty. All for the sake of a suspended sentence. Perfect. The man who made me feel like he was my world then also tried to end my life was still going to be free enough to see me. The law wasn’t enough to stop him from harming me, why would it be enough to stop him now?
Fortunately for me, it stopped him harming me. However, it did not stop him harming his next victim. For the sake of her, I won’t share any details of her story as it is not mine to share. Yet, this man is now behind bars for a pretty short period of time as he has once again harmed a woman. Evidently, I was right. The law was not enough to stop him. Which leads me to the point of this post, at what stage does the CJS actually start to take women’s pleas to feel safe seriously? Does this man have to go as far to take away a woman’s life entirely before someone finally deems him as dangerous? Why was my harm not enough? Would the CJS have suddenly seen me as a victim, rather than making me feel like a criminal in court, if I was eternally silenced? Why do women have to keep dying at the hands of men because the CJS protects domestic abusers?”
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The True Crime Genre and Me
I have always enjoyed the true crime genre, I enjoyed the who dunnit aspect that the genre feeds into, I also enjoyed “learning” about these crimes, and why people committed them. I grew up with an avid interest in homicide, and the genre as a result. So, studying criminology felt like it was the best path for me. Throughout the three years, this interest has stayed with me, resulting in me writing my dissertation on how the true crime genre presents homicide cases, and how this presentation influences people’s engagement with the genre and homicides in general.
With this being my main interest within the field of criminology, it was natural that True Crime and Other Fictions (CRI1006) module in first year caught my attention. This module showed me that my interest can be applied to the wider study of criminology, and that the genre does extend into different areas of media and has been around for many years. Although this module only lasted the year, and not many other modules- at least of the ones that I took- allowed me to continue exploring this area, the other modules taught me the skills I would need to explore the true crime genre by myself. Something- in hindsight- I much prefer.
I continued to engage with the wider true crime genre in a different way than I did before studying criminology- using the new skills I had learnt. Watching inaccurate and insensitive true crime dramas on Netflix, watching YouTubers doing their makeup whilst talking about the torture of a young girl, podcasts about a tragic loss a family suffered intercut with cheery adverts. This acts as a small snapshot of what the genre is really like, whereas when I originally engaged with it, it was simple retellings of a range of cases, each portrayed in slightly different ways- but each as entertaining as the next. To me, I think this is where the genre begins to fall apart, when the creators see what they are producing as entertainment, with characters, rather than retellings of real-life events, that affects real people.
Having spent so much time engaging with the genre and having the skills and outlook that comes with studying criminology, you can’t help but to be critical of the genre, and what you are watching. You begin to look at the reasoning behind why the creators of this content choose to present it in such ways, why they skip out on key pieces of information. It all makes a bit more sense. Its just entertainment. A sensationalist retelling of tragic events.
Although studying criminology may have ruined how I enjoy my favourite genre of media, it also taught me so many skills, and allowed me to develop my understating in an area I’ve always been interested in. These skills can be applied in any area, and I think that is the biggest take away from my degree. Considering I now work as the Vice President of Welfare at the Students Union– and getting some odd looks when I say what my degree was- I have no regrets. Even if I walk away from my time at university and never use the knowledge I gained from my studies, I can walk away and know that my time was not wasted, as the skills I have learnt can be applied to whatever I do moving forward.
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A world without prisons follow-up. A student/staff reflection piece
As a department Criminology has pushed the envelope in promoting discussions around the key disciplinary debates. @franbitalo and myself co-ordinated a conversation where the main focus was to imagine “a world without prisons”. The conversation was very interesting, and we decided to post parts of it as a legacy of the social debates we engage in. The discussion is captured as a series of comments made by the students with some prompts in bold.
The original question stands, can you imagine a world without prisons? First thing first, there is a feeling that prisons will always exist as mechanisms to control our society. Mainly because our society is too punitive and focused on punishment rather than rehabilitation. We live in a society that ideologically sees the prison as the representation of being hard on crime. Further to this point we may never be able to abolish the prison, so it can always remain as the last resort of what to do with those who have harm others. Especially for those in our society who deserve to be punished because of what they did. Perhaps we could reform it or extend the use of the probation service dealing with crime.
In an ideal world prisons should not exist especially because the system seems to target particular groups, namely minorities and people from specific background. It important to note that it does stop people seeking or taking justice into their hands and deflecting any need for vengeance “eye for an eye”. Prison is a punishment done in the name of society, but it does carry political overtones. There are parts of political ideology that support the idea that punishment is meant to make an example of those breaking the law. This approach is deeply rooted, and is impervious to reform or change. Which can become one of the biggest issues regarding prisons.
Then there is the public’s view on prisons. When people hear that prisons will go they will be very unhappy and even frightened. They will feel that without prisons people will go crazy and commit crimes without any consequences. Society, people feel, will go into a state of anarchy where vigilantism will become the acceptable course of action. This approach becomes more urgent when considering particular types of criminals, like sex offenders and in particular, paedophiles. Regardless of the intention of the act, these types of crime cause serious harm that the victim carries for the rest of their lives. The violation of trust and the lack of consent makes these crimes particularly repulsive and prison worthy. How about child abduction? Not sure if we should make prison crime specific. That will not serve its purpose, instead it will make it the dumping ground for some crime categories, sending a message that only some people will go to prison.
Will that be the only crime category worthy of prison? In an ideal world, those who commit serious financial crimes should be going to prison, if such a prison existed. Again, here if we are considering harm as the reason to keep prisons open these types of crime cause maximum harm. The implication of white-collar crime, serious fraud and tax evasion deprive our society of taxes and income that is desperately needed in social infrastructure, services and social support. Financial crime flaunts the social contract and weakens society. Perhaps those involved should be made to contribute reparations. The prison question raises another issue to consider especially with all the things said before! Who “deserves” to go to prison. Who gets to go and who is given an alternative sentence is based on established views on crime. There are a lot of concerns on the way crime is prioritised and understood because these prioritisations do not reflect the reality of social disorder. Prison is an institution that scapegoats the working classes. Systematically the system imprisons the poor because class is an imprisonable factor; the others being gender and race.
If we keep only certain serious crimes on the books, we are looking at a massive reduction in prison numbers. Is that the way to abolitionism? The prison plays too much of a role in the Criminal Justice System to be discounted. The Industrial Prison Complex as a criminological concept indicates the strengths of an institution that despite its failings, hasn’t lost its prominence. On the side of the State, the establishment is a barrier to any reform or changes to this institution. Changes are not only needed for prison, but also for the way the system responds to the victims of crime as well. Victims are going through a process of re-victimisation and re-harming them. This is because the system is using the victims as part of the process, in giving evidence. If there is concern for those harmed by crime, that is not demonstrated by the strictness of the prison.
As a society currently we may not be able to abolish prisons but we ought to reduce the harm punishment has onto people. In order to abolish prisons, the system will have to be ready to allow for the change to happen. In the meantime, alternative justice systems have not delivered anything different from what we currently have. One of the reasons is that as a society we have the need to see justice being served. A change so drastic as this will definitely require a change in politics, a change in ideology and a change in the way we view crime as a society in order to succeed. The conversation continues…
Thank you to all the participating students: Katja, Aimee, Alice, Zoe, Laura, Amanda, Kayleigh, Chrissy, Meg, and Ellie also thank you to my “partner in crime” @franbitalo.
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The dance of the vampires
We value youth. There is greater currency in youth, far greater than wisdom, despite most people when they are looking back wishing they had more wisdom in life. Modernity brought us the era of the picture and since then we have become captivated with images. Pictures, first black and white, then replaced by moving images, and further replaced by colour became an antidote to a verbose society that now didn’t need to talk about it…it simply became a case of look and don’t talk!
The image became even more important when people turned the cameras on themselves. The selfie, originally a self-portrait of reclusive artists evolved into a statement, a visual signature for millions of people using it every day on social media. Enter youth! The engagement with social media is regarded the gift of computer scientists to the youth of today. I wonder how many people know that one of the first images sent as a jpeg was that of a Swedish Playboy playmate the ‘lady with the feathers’. This “captivating” image was the start of the virtual exchange of pictures that led to billions of downloads every day and social media storing an ever-expanding array of images.
The selfie, brought with it a series of challenges. How many times can you take a picture, even of the most beautiful person, before you become accustomed to it. Before you say, well yes that is nice, but I have seen it before. To resolve the continuous exposure the introduction of filters, backgrounds and themes seems to add a sense of variety. The selfie stick (banned from many museums the world over) became the equipment, along with the tripod, the lamp and the must have camera, with the better lens in the pursue of the better selfie. Vanity never had so many accessories!
The stick is an interesting tool. It tells the individual nature of the selfie. The voyage that youthful representation takes across social media is not easy, it is quite a solitary one. In the representation of the image, youth seem to prefer. The top “influencers” are young, who mostly like to pose and sometimes even offer some advice to their followers. Their followers, their contemporaries or even older individuals consume their images like their ‘daily (visual) bread’. This seems to be a continuous routine, where the influencer produces images, and the followers watch them and comment. What, if anything, is peculiar about that? Nothing! We live in a society build on consumption and the industry of youth is growing. So, this is a perfect marriage of supply and demand. Period!
Or is it? In the last 30 years in the UK alone the law on protecting children and their naivety from exploitation has been centre stage of several successive governments. Even when discussing civil partnerships for same sex couples, Baroness Young, argued against the proposed act, citing the protection of children. Youth became a precious age that needed protection and nurturing. The law created a layer of support for children, particularly those regarded vulnerable. and social services were drafted in to keep them safe and away from harm. In instances when the system failed, there has been public outrage only to reinforce the original notion that children and young people are to be protected in our society.
That is exactly the issue here! In the Criminology of the selfie! Governments introducing policies to generate a social insulation of moral righteousness that is predicated on individual – mostly parental – responsibility. The years of protective services and we do not seem to move passed them. In fact, their need is greater than ever. Are we creating bad parents through bad parenting or are people confronted with social forces that they cannot cope with? The reality is that youth is more exposed than ever before. The images produced, unlike the black and white photos of the past, will never fade away. Those who regret the image they posted, can delete it from their account, but the image is not gone. It shall hover over them for the eternity of the internet. There is little to console and even less to help. During the lockdown, I read the story of the social carer who left their job and opened an OnlyFans account. These are private images provided to those who are willing to pay. The reason this experience became a story, was the claim that the carer earned in one month of OnlyFans, more than their previous annual income. I saw the story being shared by many young people, tagging each other as if saying, look at this. The image that captures their youth that can become a trap to contain them in a circle of youth. Because in life, before the certainty of death there is another one, that of aging and in a society that values youth so much, can anyone be ready to age?
As for the declared care for the young, would a society that cares have been closing the doors to HE, to quality apprenticeships, a living wage and a place to live? The same society that stirs emotions about protection, wants young people to stay young so that they cannot ask for their share in their future. The social outrage about paedophiles is countered with high exposure to a particular genre in the movies and literature that promotes it. The vampire that has been fashioned as young adult literature is the proverbial story of an (considerably) older man who deflowers a young innocent girl until she becomes infatuated with him. The movies can be visually stunning because it involves the images of young beautiful people but there is hardly any mention of consent or care!
It is one of the greatest ironies to revive the vampire image in youth culture. A cultural representation of a male prototype that is manipulative, intruding into the lives of seemingly innocent young people who become his prey. There is something incredibly unsettling to explore the semiology of an immortal that is made through a blood ritual. A reverse Peter Pan who consumes the youth of his victims. The popularity of this Victorian literary character, originally conceived in the era of industrial advancement,at a time when modernity challenged tradition, resurfaces with other monsters at times of great uncertainty. The era of the picture has not made everyday life easier, and modernity did not improve quality of life to the degree it proclaimed. Instead, whilst people are becoming captivated by ephemera they are focused on the appearance and missing substance. An old experience man, dark, mysterious with white skin may be an appealing character in literature but in real life a someone who feeds on young people’s blood is hardly an exciting proposition.
The blood sacrifice demanded by a vampire is a metaphor of what our society requires for those who wish to retain youth and save their image into the ether of the cyberworld as a permanent Portrait of Dorian Gray. In this context, the vampire is not only a man in power, using his privilege to dominate, but a social representation of what a consumer society places as the highest value. It is life’s greatest irony that the devouring power of a vampire is becoming a representation of how little value we place on both youth and life! A society focused on appearance, ignoring the substance. Youth looking but not youth caring!
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Refugee Week 2022
Next week (20th-26th June) is Refugee Week, coming at a moment in time days after the first deportation flight of asylum seekers to Rwanda was scheduled. Luckily the government’s best efforts were thwarted by the ECHR this time. Each year Refugee Week has a theme and this year’s focus is healing. People fleeing conflict and persecution have a lot to heal from and I am pessimistic about whether healing is possible in the UK. My own research examines the trajectories of victimisation among people seeking safety. I trace experiences of victimisation starting from the context from which people fled, during their journeys and after arrival in the UK. It is particularly disturbing as someone who researches people seeking safety that once they arrive in a place they perceived to be safe, they continue to be victimised in a number of ways. People seeking safety in the UK encounter the structurally violent asylum ‘system’ and discriminatory attitudes of swathes of the public, sections of the media and last not certainly not least, political discourse. Even after being granted leave to remain, refugees face a struggle to find accommodation, employment, convert education certificates and discrimination and hate crime is ongoing.
Over the years I have supported refugees who suffered breakdowns after having their asylum claim awarded. They are faced with the understanding of the trauma they suffered pre-migration, compounded by the asylum system and the move-on period following claims being awarded. Yet this is no time to heal. In the wake of the Nationality and Borders Act 2022, no migrant nor British citizen with a claim to citizenship elsewhere is safe. There is no safety here and therefore there can be no healing, not meaningful healing anyway.
Despite my negative outlook on the state of immigration policy in the UK, there are some positive signs of healing for some people seeking safety. These experiences are often facilitated by peer support, grassroots organisations and charities. I recall one woman who had fled Iraq coming into a charity I was undertaking research in. When we met for the first time, she was tiny and looked much older than she was. She would pull her veil tightly around her head, almost like it was protecting her. This woman did not speak a word of English and the only volunteer Kurdish Sorani interpreter did not attend the group every week. The womens’ group I attended conducted activities which overcame language barriers and at the time we were working with tiles and mosaics on a project which lasted a few weeks. During this time I could visibly see this woman start to heal. She started to stand up straight, making her appear taller. Her face softened and she appeared younger. She started smiling and her veil loosened. She was relaxing among us. In my experience, I’ve noticed that the healing comes in ebbs and flows. Relief of being ‘safe’, compounding stress of asylum, making friends, waiting, waiting, waiting for a negative decision, being supported by NGOs, letters threatening deportation, having a ‘safe’ place to live, having a firework posted through your letterbox.
For me this week is about celebrating those fleeting moments of healing, since I spend so much of my time discussing and researching the negative. The University of Northampton is co-hosting a number of events to mark Refugee Week 2022, starting with a service being held to remember all those seeking sanctuary both past and present. The event will be held on Monday 20th June at 1pm at Memorial Garden, Nunn Mills Road, Northampton, NN1 5PA (parking available at Midsummer Meadow car park).
Monday will end with an ‘in conversation with’ event with University of Northampton doctoral candidate Amir Darwish. Amir is Kurdish-Syrian and arrived in the UK as an asylum seeker in 2003. He is now an internationally published poet and writer. This event will be run in conjunction woth Northampton Town of Sanctuary and will be hosted at Delapre Abbey at 7pm. You can find further details and book tickets here.
On Wednesday the University of Northampton and Northampton Town of Sanctuary will be hosting an online seminar at 3pm with Professor Peter Hopkins, whose recent research examined the exacerbation of existing inequlaities for asylum seekers during the pandemic. I’ve just written a book chapter on this for a forthcoming volume reflecting on the unequal pandemic and it was staggering – but unsurprising – to see the impact on asylum seekers. This seminar can be accessed online here.
The week’s events will conclude with a Refugee Support Showcase which does what it says on the tin. This event will be an opportunity for organisations working with refugees in the local area to show the community the valuable work they do. This event will take place on Thursday 23rd June 4-6pm at the Guildhall, St. Giles Square, Northampton.
This year the University has worked with a number of organisations to produce a well-rounded series of events. Starting with reflection and thought of those who have sought, and continue to seek sanctuary and celebrating the achievements of someone who has lived experiences of the asylum system. Wednesday contibutes to the understanding of inequalities for people seeking safety and we end Friday on a positive note with the work of those who facilitate healing.
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Auschwitz – secrets of the ground
Indifference is not a beginning; it is an end. And, therefore, indifference is always a friend to the enemy, for it benefits the aggressor – never his victim
Elie Wiesel
I have been fortunate enough in my life to have been able to live and travel abroad, a luxury you should never take for granted. Having traveled in every continent there are plenty of things I will never forget, mostly good but one thing that will stay with me will be Auschwitz. It is hard to get excited about visiting Auschwitz, but it is also hard to not get excited about visiting Auschwitz. The day I visited Auschwitz, on the journey there a flurry of strange thoughts went through my head, perhaps ones you would only have when attending a funeral where you are supposed to be in grief. What do you wear, should I smile, what do you talk about, essentially you are creating a rule book inside your head of how not to be offensive. It’s a strange thought process and perhaps completely irrational, one of which I will probably never go through again. If I had to describe Auschwitz in one word, that word would be haunting and I could write for hours about Auschwitz without ever being able to get across the feeling of visiting it, but instead, I am going to share with you a poem I wrote on the journey back from Auschwitz, this poem has never seen the light of day and has been in my diary for over a decade, until now, but it feels like a perfect time to finally share, it’s called secrets of the ground.
Dark skies and tearful eyes,
only God knows the secrets this ground hides.
The flowers mask the crimes of old,
the walls are chipped by bullet holes.
Haunting sounds drowned out by hymns,
the shoes of children too scared to blink.
A cold wind howls in these Polish fields,
one million people how can this be real.
A train stands alone on the blackened track,
barb wire fences to hold them back.
The secrets out, the grounds have spoken,
we must never forget the lives that were taken.
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Holocaust Memorial Day: 27th January
The 27th January marks an important event, Holocaust Memorial Day. This is a day to remember those who were murdered by the cruel Nazi regime, including 6 million Jews. These people were subject to the worst treatment that the modern world has ever seen. The Holocaust reminds us of how dangerous humankind can be to one another. These Nazi men went to work each morning knowing what they were doing and going home to their family at the end of their day of murders. This is something that I cannot comprehend, people that were so truly evil to degrade a whole group of people just because of who they are.
As someone who has had the opportunity to visit Auschwitz on an education trip while at school, I can say that the place is like nothing I could have ever imagined. The vast size and scale of both camps was inconceivable. To be in a place where so many people suffered their worst pains and lost their lives, it was a harrowing experience. From the hair to the scratch marks on the gas chamber walls, the place felt like no other. There was an uncomfortable feeling when you enter the gates of Arbeit macht frei, meaning, work will set you free. To know that so many walked under these gates not knowing what their fate held. And all of this for the Jews was because of their religion and the threat Hitler perceived them to have on Germany.
This is a topic that has always interested me, questioning why the Jewish community? My dissertation research so far has shown how the Jews were scapegoated by the Nazis for their successful businesses in and around Germany. Many Jewish families owned banks, jewellers and local businesses. The Nazis used this peaceful group of people and turned them into the enemy of the Nazi regime. The Jewish community was seen as a financial threat to the Nazis and needed to be eradicated for Nazi German to be successful. The hatred of the Jews developed, bringing in more dated views of the Jewish community. Within Nazi Germany, they were treated like filth and seen as subhuman because of their ‘impure’ genetics. Anyone seen to be from Jewish decent was seen as dirty and an unwanted member of society.
The stereotypes that the Jews are rich continued even after the war and still to this day, along with the stereotypes that Jews are the evil of society. Since March 2020, there have been conspiracy theories circulating on social media that the Jewish community was behind the COVID 19 pandemic. Many are suggesting that the Jewish people are trying to gain financially from the pandemic and destroy the economy. This is not something that is new, the Jewish community has faced these prejudices for as long as time.
My dissertation incorporates a study on social media and archival research. This project has taken me to the Searchlight Archives, located at the University of Northampton. The information held here shows how Britain’s far right movements carried on their anti-Semitic hate after the end of WWII. It’s very interesting to find that antisemitism never went away and still has not. Recently, the Texas Synagogue hostage crisis has show how much anti-Semitic hate is still in society. Three days after the Texas crisis, there was no longer headline news about it and those tweeting about it were part of the Jewish community.
Does this suggest that social media is anti-Semitic? Or is anti-Semitic hate not shared on social media because it is not of interest to people? Either way, Jews are still treated horribly in society and seen as a subhuman by many. This is the sad truth of antisemitism today, and this needs to change.
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Rule makers, rule breakers and the rest of us
There are plenty of theories about why rules are broken, arguments about who make the rules and about how we deal with rule breakers. We can discuss victimology and penology, navigating our way around these, decrying how victims and offenders are poorly treated within our criminal justice systems. We think about social justice, but it seems ignore the injustice perpetrated by some because we can somehow find an excuse for their rule breaking or point out some good deed somewhere along the line. And we lament at how some get away with rule breaking because of their status or power. But what is to be done about people that break the rules and in doing so cause or may cause considerable harm to others; to the rest of us?
Recently, Greece imposed a new penalty system upon those over 60 that are not vaccinated against Covid. Pensioners who have had real reductions in their pensions are now to be hit with a fine, a rolling fine at that, if they do not get vaccinated. This is against a backdrop of poor vaccination rates which seem to have improved significantly since the announcement of what many see as draconian measures by a right-wing government. There are those that argue that vaccination ought to be a choice, and this has been brought into focus by the requirements for health workers and those in the care profession to be vaccinated in this country. And we’ve heard arguments from industry against vaccination passports which would allow people to get into large venues and a consistent drip-drip effect of how damaging the covid rules are to the leisure industry and aviation, as well as the young people in society.
So, would it have been far more acceptable to have no rules at all around Covid? Should we have simply carried on and hoped that eventually herd immunity would kick in? Let’s not forget of course that the health service would have been so overwhelmed that many people will have died from illnesses other than Covid (they undoubtedly have to some extent anyway). The fittest will have survived and of course, the richest or most resourceful. Businesses will have been on their knees as workers failed to turn up for work, either because they were too ill or have moved on from this life and few customers will have thought about quaffing pints, clubbing, or venturing off to some faraway sunny place (not that they’d be particularly welcome there coming from plague island). It would have felt more like some Darwinian evolutionary experiment than civilised society.
It seems that making some rules for the good of society is necessary. Of course, there will be those that break the rules and as a society, we struggle to determine what is to be done with them. Fines are too harsh, inappropriate, draconian. Being caring, educating, works for some but let’s be honest, there are those that will break the rules regardless. Whilst we can argue about what should be done with those that break the rules, about the impact they have on society, about victims and crimes, perhaps the most pressing argument is about equality of justice. The rest of us, those that didn’t break the rules, might question how draconian the rules were (are) and we might question the punishments meted out to those that broke the rules. But what really hurts, where we really feel hard done by, let down, angry is to see that those that made the rules, broke the rules and for them we don’t get to consider whether the punishment is draconian or too soft. There are no consequences for the rule makers even when they are rule breakers. It seems a lamentable fact that we have a system of governance, be that situated in politics or business, that advocates a ‘do as I say’ rather than ‘do as I do’ mentality. The moral compass of those in power seems to be seriously misaligned. As the MP David Davis calls for the resignation of Boris Johnson and says that he has to go, he should look around and he might realise, they all need to go. This is not a case of one rotten apple, the whole crop is off, and it stinks to high heaven.
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Black History Month: A Final Thought
As we come to the end of Black History Month it is important to shine a light on the Black Lives Matters Movement and highlight the historical significance to the problematic discourse of racialisation.
Black history month is an opportunity for people from the various pockets of the Black community to learn about our own history and educate those who are not from the Black community, in order to decolonise our institutions and our society. As Black people we have our own history formed by systemic oppressions and great triumphs. While it is easy (and lazy) for institutions to use terms such as BAME and People of Colour (POC) these problematic uses of language oppress blackness. We are not a monolith of coloured people. Different racialised groups have and will experience, and uphold difference, harms and achievements within society. Furthermore, it would be naïve to ignore the narrative of anti-blackness that people from racialised groups uphold. Therefore, it is important for us and people that look like us, to continue to have the space to talk about our history and our experiences.
For many people in the UK and indeed around the world BLM became a mainstream topic for discussion and debate following the murder of George Floyd. While the term BLACK LIVES MATTER is provocative and creates a need for debate, it signifies the historical ideology that black lives haven’t mattered in historical and in many ways, contemporary terms.
While it is easy to fall into the trap of describing the Black experience as an experience of victimhood, Black history months allows us to look deep at all our history and understand why and where we are as a society.
The UK is one of the most diverse places in the world, yet we continue to fall prey to the Eurocentric ideology of history. And while it is important to always remember our history, the negativity of only understanding black history from the perspective of enslavement needs to be questioned. Furthermore, the history of enslavement is not just about the history of Black people, we need to acknowledge that this was the history of the most affluent within our society. Of course, to glaze over the triangle trade is problematic as it allows us to understand how and why our institutions are problematic, but it is redundant to only look at Black history from a place of oppression. There are many great Black historical figures that have contributed to the rich history of Britain, we should be introducing our youth to John Edmonstone, Stuart Hall, Mary Prince and Olive Morris (to name a few). We should also be celebrating prominent Black figures that still grace this earth to encourage the youth of today to embrace positive Black role models.
Black history for us, is not just about the 1st-31st of October. We are all here because of history we need to start integrating all our history into our institutions, to empower, educate and to essentially make sense of our society.
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Meet the Team: Stephanie Richards, Associate Lecturer in Criminology
A Warm Welcome
Hello all! I would like to introduce myself. My name is Stephanie Richards and I am your Student Success Mentor (SSM). Some of the criminology and criminal justice students would have already had the opportunity to meet me, as I was their Student Success Mentor previously. So, it will be great to touch base with you all and it would also be great for the new cohorts to say hi when you see me on campus.
It is that time of the year when we see new students and our existing students getting ready to tackle the trials of higher education. Being a SSM I am fully aware of the challenges that you will face, and I am here to support you throughout your time at UON. As a previous student I can testify that studying at university is incredibly challenging. The leap from school/ college can be daunting at first. A new building that seems like a maze or the idea of being surrounded by strangers that you probably think you have nothing in common with can be enough to encourage you to run for the hills….stepping into a workshop for the first time can give you a stomach flip, but once you take that first seat in class you will come to realise it does get easier.
Upon reflection of my experience as a new undergraduate student I would have to be honest and express the difficulties that I suffered adjusting to my new way of life. I could not keep my head above the masses of reading, and when I did manage to get some of the seminar prep completed, most of the time I struggled with the new questions and concepts that were posed to me. This will be the experience of most, if not all the new students starting out on their university education. This is part of the complex journey of academia. My advice would be to pace yourself, time management is key, if you struggle to understand the work that has been set, ask for clarity and develop positive relationships with your peers and the staff at UON…………..being part of a strong community will get you through a lot!
My role is not just about assisting the new students that have started their university journey, I am also here to help UONs existing students. Getting back into the swing of studying can be daunting after the summer break. Adjusting to face-to-face education can be an overwhelming process but one that should be embraced. We will all miss our pyjama bottoms and slippers but being back on campus and getting some normality back in your day is worth the sacrifice.
The team of SSM’s are here to support you throughout your journey so please get in touch if you require our assistance. We never want you to feel alone in this journey and we want to assist you the best ways we can. We want you to progress and meet your full learning potential, and to get the most out of your university experience.
Thoughts from the criminology team 