Shame of students mocking homeless
STUDENTS have been forced to apologise for mocking homeless people during a ‘tramps night out’.
Undergraduates dirtied up their faces and dressed up in torn clothes before heading out for the annual social event.
Some hung cardboard signs around their necks, bearing jokey messages such as ‘Spare change? Meet me at the bar’ and ‘50p for a bounce on my bed’.
But after being alerted to the event, the students’ union at Liverpool John Moores University launched an investigation.
The university’s trampolining society had announced the night – a play on their name – in a post on social media last week.
It read: ‘This Wednesday after training is tramps night! Be sure to dress as trampy as you can, Primark do cheap shirts if you need to get them!!’
Photos of students in their outfits were also posted but they – and pictures from previous years’ events – have now been removed.
A spokesman for the society said the theme had now been scrapped, adding: ‘We realise now that our annual choice of costume could cause offence and are sorry for any upset, it was never our intention.’
A Liverpool John Moores University Students’ Union spokesman said: ‘We do not endorse fancy dress that could be deemed as offensive or discriminatory.
‘We’ll be working closely with all our clubs and societies to make sure incidents like this do not happen again.’ Joe Anderson, the mayor of Liverpool, where around 65 people sleep rough each night, called the students’ behaviour ‘crass’. He added: ‘It doesn’t sound like they have really thought it through.’ Earlier this year the Leeds University female hockey team had to apologise for a ‘chav’ themed social, with members dressed up in shellsuits swigging Lambrini. And last year Cambridge University student Ronald Coyne caused outrage after he was videoed taunting a homeless man by burning a £20 note in front of him.