Malala campaigns for students’ right to party
Teetotal Taliban victim pledges to reinstate alcohol-fuelled ‘bops’ at Oxford university college
SHE became a household name as a global campaigner for human rights and women’s education, but Malala Yousafzai has now set her sights on improving the lot of her fellow students at Oxford. Miss Yousafzai, who became the youngest-ever Nobel Prize laureate aged 17, is trying to bring back college parties after they were banned by the governing body of Lady Margaret Hall.
Miss Yousafzai was voted in as one of the college’s social secretaries, and vowed in her manifesto to bring back “bops” – college parties with cheap alcohol and fancy dress themes.
It sets her up against Alan Rusbridger, the former Guardian editor who is now principal of the college, who chairs the body that clamped down on the bops in April after a student came dressed as Harvey Weinstein. Another was disciplined after he came to a “dress as your degree” themed party as Prof Stephen Hawking, in a costume including an office chair with wheels.
In an email to students, the college said that there was “a problem within college around responsible drinking and party behaviour”, and banned college parties indefinitely, Cherwell, a weekly student newspaper, reported.
The email was sent by the college’s deans, who are in charge of discipline and were acting on the decision of the governing body, made up of college tutors and senior officials. Oxford Student Union has published extensive guidance on bop themes, advising against those that “intentionally cause offence”, “encourage the mocking of gender presentation” or have “culturally appropriative themes”. But running in a college election with Tiger Akawin, a fellow student, Miss Yousafzai pledged to bring bops back to the hall by overturning the ruling of the college authorities.
The duo promised Bop Liquer and Bop Pizza for future parties, which usually take place in the college and with a student DJ.
Miss Yousafzai, who does not drink alcohol, also called for events for people “who aren’t keen on alcohol, crowds of people or loud music”.
She has not yet begun her new role, but is expected to organise the college social calendar from the beginning of October. After tweeting about her place at Oxford on A-level results day, Miss Yousafzai received a reply from Mr Rusbridger, welcoming her to the college. Since beginning her studies in politics, philosophy and economics in 2017, she has been active in university life, taking the role of spokesman at the Pakistani Society
In March, she returned to her hometown in the Swat Valley in Pakistan for the first time since she was shot there by the Taliban in 2012.