Offensive posters for sale at freshers' week

[ImJustMadAboutSaffron]

I'm a university lecturer. I have been out and about on freshers' week to different buildings and come across a poster sale that is on for a few days. There are several options for sale, Harry Styles, Blink 182, Stranger Things, Billie Eilish, Mabel, lots of different ones. But three I find really offensive, and I imagine some students would, too:

A Buddha with the wording "Don't be a Ct"
A poster with "Fk Off" in different coloured fonts
Another with the same words taking up the whole poster

Asterisks mine. Think I am repressed if you like, I don't care!

The Buddha poster is going to be offensive to Buddhists (there have been campaigns about not using the likeness).

You're not unreasonable to find them offensive. But then, the whole point of these posters is that some people (e.g., lecturers, parents) find them offensive! 😉

You would be unreasonable to think people shouldn't be allowed such posters, though.

I wouldn't want such words used in front of my children, because they lack the maturity to use them in appropriate contexts and others might judge them (and me) if they use them inappropriately. But really, are they inherently offensive or do they only have power to offend because society decided they are "naughty words"?

At the end of the day, displaying words people find taboo isn't really offensive in a way that matters much, is it? Much better something like this than something genuinely offensive, misogynistic, exploitative or borderline pornographic like some posters you'd have found on student walls in the past.

I think Katherine Stock has had a different experience when trying to remind students of the biological realities of life.

Sounds normal to me. If you find them offensive then you don't have to look at them.

I doubt that the students will be buying them to put up in your office or any of the lecture or seminar rooms. They are for their own entertainment in their own bedrooms.

You know generalising about an entire group of people is a bit of a dick thing to do, right?

Her experience was different because she did something different, and with different people. Different people are allowed to react differently in situations which are fundamentally different. What's your point?

Why do you think something with the word 'fuck' or 'cunt' on it shouldn't be for sale? They're not objectifying anyone or anything, and they're not attacking any group of people. They're being sold at a fresher's fair so they're not going to be seen by children. You know you can walk into a branch of Scribbler and see those words on greetings cards, right?

What about books with those words in them? Or films? students saying those words in conversation? Should that be banned on campus? Should students be allowed to attend an on-campus screening of, eg, Reservoir Dogs?

My views on them as something to hang on the wall - they're not my thing because I think they're immature and daft. My views on them as something that is on sale for other people to buy: perfectly fine.

Oh my god unclench.

Well did students object to her misgendering students and did she apologise for doing it? I didn't. I'm mildly GC (I think biology is important and wont put pronouns in my signature) but will also respect other people's pronouns. Also Kathleen Stock had the full support of her University and chose to quit. But anyway, I know a narrative where students are NOT snowflakes, are in fact kind and progressive and open to learning and not rabid about gender ideology is not one that appeals to MN.

What an odd post. I'm also a Lecturer and posters like these have been a staple of uni life for as long as I can remember. The multi-coloured F Off one in particular - I can picture the exact poster and have seen it on many a common room wall.

We definitely had this in the 90s. I went to uni in 1996 and had the Trainspotting Choose Life poster on proud display, along with a womble smoking a joint, and the ubiquitous Tarantino posters, so that's swearing, drugs and guns for a starting point.

Mind you, I also tried putting up the Choose Life poster in my bedroom at home and my mum went ballistic.

Sounds pretty tame to me! My memories of student days in the 90s are clearly very different to yours!

Sounds fine to me. I wouldn’t bat an eyelid at this.

I also miss being young enough to get away with posters on my wall.

Yes, because those magazines were (at least in their latter years) full of misogynist language and grossly objectifying of women (and had essentially become borderline top-shelf magazines). The argument for campuses ceasing to stock them in uni-subsidised shops was essentially that it was akin to stocking either racist or homophobic material or pornography. That isn't remotely the same as campaigning to ban a poster because you don't like the word 'fuck'.

Sorry I meant 'I did'.

Like I said, my students are in this first week homesick, struggling to budget, discovering how to use their washing machines, enjoying their freedom from home, and are bright eyed and bushy tailed in the classroom. Over the next few years they will do and say stupid things, make mistakes, have their hearts broken, learn about themselves, change their minds, some will become more radicalised, some will become moderate. They will get drunk, party, learn how to write and think critically. They'll write brilliant papers and appalling ones. Unfortunately, a lot of my female students will be subjected to unwanted sexual advances and assault. I just can't get worked up over a bunch of T-shirts at a Fresher's fair and I refuse to tarnish an entire group of heterogenous people I am about to teach on the basis of it.

I know I am generalising most students are fairly open minded, just working at an educational institution I am so sick of walking on eggshells not to offend the activist 1% of students who can make staff members lives sheer hell.

Its ok to be offended you know!!!

You dont die or burst into flames or something!! - are you an adult or not?

Is this the first time youve been allowed outside alone?

Interesting article about student poster sales here https://wonkhe.com/blogs/secrets-of-the-university-poster-sale/.

You're newly 18 and living away from home, you want to seem cool and edgy, you pick a risqué/sweary poster.

Fuck Off is less annoying than that 80s one of the tennis player scratching her arse.

@Novemberish Haha, the Choose Life poster! I can picture it so vividly. We used to have one blu-tacked up above our mantelpiece when I lived in a shared house.

I was also a student back in the 1990's OP. The posters you mention aren't to my taste, but then I'm 53 so I'm not the target audience so tbh honest it doesn't really bother me either way.

I wouldn't like it but it wouldn't offend me...it's bad taste but not hateful. I don't know what Buddhists might make of it, though.

You are a university lecturer who both has the time to browse the poster stall in the freshers fair and is upset by posters saying Fuck Off?

Ha Ha, that is a 'classic' from my youth. My (older) cousin had that on his bedroom wall and it always makes me think of him, fondly I might add 😂

Fucking hell, you are amazingly uptight. As long as you aren't being forced to display these posters in your front garden, I really can't imagine why you're so "offended." Don't buy them, problem solved.

TBH I thought you were going to say you had seen some posters saying "Kill The Terf" or similar, given the way many students/universities are going.

I'm OK with a Fuck Off, they'll grow out of it.