All 2 entries tagged Hot Topics

Blimin smokers!

Every time I go out, I seem to come back with another scar on my poor, battered body.

Ok so sometimes it's from tripping over and falling down some stairs like the drunken buffoon that I am, but usually it's caused by cigarette burns.

Obviously it's the individual's choice whether they choose to reduce their life expectancy by smoking these cancer sticks (which personally I believe we should ban in public, but that's a whole other blog's worth of ranting), but I wish they'd show some consideration and watch what they're doing with the bloody things.

Surely common sense would dictate that if you hold the fag down by your side in a crowded club/bar/whatever, someone's going to brush past you and burn themself? But no, to hold it up so that people can see its evil little glowing cherry and avoid the surrounding area would be too clever!

Our union should at least have a ban on smoking on the dance floor (and if it already does, they need to enforce it). This is an area which is particularly perilous, and I once very nearly got into trouble when dutch courage told me to start on a big fat skin-head because he burned(burnt?burned?hm) me with his offensive weapon!! (No not that silly, his cigarette.)

So this is a message for smokers: please, for the love of God, have some compassion for us of the clear lungs. If you must contaminate our air with your poisonous gases, at least hold the fag in an obviously visible position and don't flick the ash on my Geigers!!

Thanks :D

: 31 Oct 2004 22:24 |  Tags: Hot Topics |  Comments (39) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Tension mounts in the struggle between the BA and the BSc…

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!

Am I alone in the cruel world that is the Bachelor of Arts degree in getting TOTALLY AND UTTERLY EXASPERATED by science students undermining our courses?!

I do Sociology and upon informing people of this they generally roll their eyes, snigger and then say 'Oh, a mickey mouse degree then'. This is particularly evident in the pub where I work during uni vacations, where the typical clientele are hardly what one might call intelligent. Now in these cases I just laugh and mentally stab myself in the eye with a blunt-ended pencil a few times, before reminding myself that the furthest they're going in life is the public loos of High Wycombe.

However, when fellow students disrespect my studies, I begin to become…vexed, shall we say. In my house we have three BA students (two doing Sociology and one doing Philosophy and Psychology), and three BSc students (two doing biological sciences and one doing biochemistry.)

Obviously, the scientists have more contact hours and therefore spend more time on campus. I must admit, my nine hours look pretty measly in comparison. But hello, we're paying the same amount of money to be here are we not?! Aren't we all working towards the same level degree?? Surely this says something – namely that us social scientists (yes, this is a serious discipline too) may get less contact hours but the time we spend on our own doing independent study is…dare I say it…equally as important!!!

Studying Sociology is not just a matter of reading a bit. For starters, we have to actually understand the stuff we're doing. It seems to be taken for granted that science in the traditional sense of the word is incredibly difficult (which I would not dispute). However, I would love to see a bio student take a chapter of my Crime and Deviance reading (ooh that sounds interesting, it must be well easy), and then give a comprehensive presentation on exactly what they had understood from what I'd given them.

I don't want to rant too much, God knows I do that enough already, but when will they understand that we are all working just as hard, it's just that different subject areas operate in different ways. Sociology is not a natural science and therefore there are far less situations when there is a 'right' or 'wrong' answer.

This means that we have to use our brains in different ways: we have to be willing to think more critically and develop our own analyses of the core texts we have to read (which, incidentally, takes bloody ages – a lot longer than a six hour lab!!!)

Don't get me wrong, I have full respect for what my natural science-studying peers do. But please don't knock us 'dossers', because in actual fact we are doing just as much.

Ok I'm getting off the soap box now.

: 19 Oct 2004 19:45 |  Tags: Hot Topics |  Comments (40) |  Close comments |  Report a problem