Royal Holloway SU Try To Boycott The Queen

In news from Royal Holloway SU, which for once doesn't concern Sarah Jane Sewell, comes the bizarre story that the loony left and republicans tried to make Royal Holloway SU boycott a visit from the Queen and organise a protest against her.

Does anyone actually respect the actions of SURHUL anymore?

Her Majesty the Queen is set to visit Royal Holloway music department on 14th March as they have won a Regius Professorship. A motion was put forward by LGBT and Academic Officer to the General Council at SURHUL* (Students Union Royal Holloway, University of London) to oppose the Queens visit so that "SURHUL should not take part in the ceremony involving the Queen in March, 2014" and to "To facilitate any protests that students want to organise around the issues of the democratisation and secularisation of the state."

Royal Holloway will soon look forward to a visit from the Queen.

#ThingsElliottSays sources have said that it is "disgusting that this is allowed, and should be put into the public eye." According to this same source when debating this motion  the Union Flag was said to be "for “white middleclass English People”, this was objected by Antonia Jade King RHULCS President". Another believer in the motion rhetorically asked the SU General Meeting "Why are we supporting imperial struggles".

Long May she reign.

Antonia Jade King, leader of Royal Holloway CF, said "the Student unions is Ridiculous and some people just like to get angry. She also said, along with all CF members, "I'm very excited for the queens visit". Three cheers for Antonia Jade.

Antonia Jade excited for the Queens visit.

It is of no surprise that someone when debating the motion stood up to speak and said of the GM and its pointless loony left motions "we sit here and we whine over self righteous indignation. well f*#k that. This is my last GM, I am done. F*#k student politics."

However a wrecking amendment was proposed by the sane students of Royal Holloway which got rid of any republicanism in the motion. New clauses were also added such as a demand "for a flag pole to be erected on the Student Union on which to fly the Union Jack" and "for the National Anthem, Fire of Scotland, Land of My Fathers to be played at the beginning of the general meeting". The amendment also noted "The Queen was once photographed firing a machine gun" and the SU should believed "That the Queen shooting a machine gun is cool".

Neither the motion nor the wrecking amendment was passed. To all those stupid lefties and republicans I say this. To the Tower with you.

To the Tower with the Royal Holloway SU officers.

*This name is far too long as acronym and sounds like a groan of some sort.

Back on the Tab, Comrades

After a fair break #ThingsElliottSays is back on the Tab this time reporting with Alex Page, from Kent University, about the Stalin posters used to advertise the Kent Union's officer elections. I wrote an article about this yesterday which can be seen here.

Late breaking news has come from the LGBT officer of Kent Union saying this:

"Recently Kent union published an image of Joseph Stalin as a way to engage and inform students of the upcoming leadership elections. Whilst we applaud new ways to engage students in the political process we regard this action as somewhat distasteful and odd.

Speaking purely as Representatives of the LGBT+ community we regard the use of Joseph Stalin as extremely distasteful. This is not only a man who killed and murdered millions of his own people; he also persecuted and killed thousands of people based on their sexuality.

We respectfully ask that Kent union removes the poster and we are informed on who agreed to promote such ridiculous promotion. The mistake of our union is fast reaching the national press. We ask for this embarrassment to stop before it damages to good work of those who volunteer and work for Kent union."
It seems like this story is slowly sliding its way into the national press. It has already been in the local news, the Tab previously, the MediaWire and the Huffington Post. Where will it go next? I'm sure there are red faces all around in Kent Union. Here is the Tab article (it has a great header).

Kent SU Back Stalin For Elections

Do you find your SU elections exciting? No, well nobody usually does. However, Kent Union are feeling the heat today after they launched their election season with a poster of Marshall Stalin.

What possessed them to do that? It seems that its ok to a glorify a tyrannical dictator who killed 62 million people, over 40,000 every single week on average. I'm not sure about you but I wouldn't want to celebrate that. Indeed Stalin was the most brutal dictator in all of human history committing mass genocide against Jews, Tartars and many other races. This is the man who without any mercy willingly sacrificed 20 million people to collectivise Russian agriculture. Stalin held captive 4-6 million people in Gulags, most of whom had done nothing wrong except come into the cross hairs of the Soviet state. Stalin destroyed Russia and helped make many people's lives a misery throughout the 20th century.

This begs the question of why Kent Union wished to celebrate such an awful man? Are they trying on that inappropriate left-wing 'coolness' of backing 'revolutionaries'? Perhaps they are sending a propaganda signal to Kent Uni students to follow their dear elitist leaders and vote for the same old left-wing unionists who do nothing but moan about government cuts whilst drinking champagne? Or maybe there are some closet Communists as officers and this is a signal for the revolution?

On another point about this poster why is it telling you to be ready for the 'campus takeover'? The Kent Union elections are not going to be more important than the October Revolution of 1917. I'm not apathetic to voting, I always do take part. But the choice of candidates at any SU elections are poor to say the least. They are all left wing, all wanting to keep the status quo and all just standing to get a well paid sabbatical. Perhaps the SU officers will one day become civil servants who put road blocks to any change and don't care about anyone in the country apart from themselves. Revolution, ha.

Parody of the Kent Union logo may be more like fact, made by @Strawb3rryShort on http://accentofevil.co.uk/.

Anyway I think that Kent Union should take down these offensive posters. Stalin is not cool he's an oppressive dictator and he will never be funny even if you put some googly eyes over him.

We'll keep you updated on what Kent Union has to say.

Update

Well Kent Union have come back with a very weak excuse to put a mass murderer on a poster. They say that the posters were designed 'to promote and spark discussion' about their campus takeover. So essentially they were going out their to spark controversy which sort of shows they have a poor moral compass. Kent Union have admitted however that 'The material is not aimed at aligning the organisation with any particular political campaign or party'.

The poster itself is apparently a mix of  'a Film poster for Red Monarch, depicting an image of Stalin with a tomato squashed against his nose; and also the “New Labour, New Danger” advertising campaign created by M&C Saatchi'.

With the design I can see how these two are mixed together but the reasoning to do that, other than to spark controversy seems rather flimsy. Kent Union says that want 'to set out to profile one of the “Campus Takeover” events – to show the power of cartoons in politics, as the open lecture about The Power of Cartoons relates to (PK008 Medway Campus 1pm-2pm).' Personally I think we can call bullshit on that last part.