Sex, complaining about the absence of sex and just plain creepiness. No, I’m not talking about the posts on LSELove, but in fact old copies of The Beaver.
With worrying headlines like ‘Netball Look Forward to Sexiest Season Yet’ and ‘Wet T-Shirts Solve Loan Delays’, it is easy to see a problematic, but sometimes funny, narrative emerge from our old issues. A lot of this objectifying talk was, unsurprisingly, found in the sports sections. A caption from under a women’s rugby match report reads: ‘Women’s rugby celebrate their win against the Essex opposition – Essex being the only rugby team in the world to have fifteen hookers in their team’.
Another rather disturbing event that was reported on was Calella Fest ‘04 when the whole of the AU went on tour to Spain. The story was not reported in so many words, but rather multiple pictures of people passed out, drinking, and snogging, even one captioned ‘anything goes at Calella, even incest’. This was not a substitute for Carol however, which was around then too (known as Barrel).
In her last detailed sex column written, where a very open anthropologist wanted to ‘go out with a bang’, The Beaver recounted some of her crazier adventures, including running naked through the library.
Our sexy articles were not totally debouched, we had some useful ones too, like: ‘Top Ten Places To Have Sex at LSE’. Some places, such as ‘the glass bridge between the library and St Clement’s building’ may need updating (and possibly a rethink?).
Even before the 90s, the LSE had a reputation of being a very ‘asexual’ university. These grievances were intimately discussed in an article titled ‘SEX: Yes Please… Oh Sorry, I’m at the LSE’. The postgrad who wrote this amusing article describes her experience at ‘LSE’s new club night: Cultivate’ and blames the School for ‘over-intellectualising sex, empty dance floors, and anti-socially designed halls of residence’. For an article written over 15 years ago, the remarks still ring very true.
In a surprising turn of events, we also had contributors from SU officials, including the old SU treasurer: ‘LSE SU Treasurer Refutes an earlier blink article claiming that LSE students are ‘asexual’’.
If you are interested in reading more old issues then you can find them all in the LSE Library or our media office. We’ve brought back the sex column which you can find in this edition’s social section.
