Week 8, Semester 2, 2026
Your Weekly Student Newspaper
First Printed 1929
9: FEATURE
It’s Not Easy Being the Greens James Fitzgerald Sice Grounded in progressive middle-class liberalism rather than working-class struggle, the Greens seek to reform capitalism through electoral representation, directing their substantial organisational base primarily towards electoral ends rather than building the collective power necessary to force such reformations, leaving them structurally compelled to accommodate the interests of the ruling class.
13: CAMPUS
Bleats and Heckles: SRC Presidential Debate Honi Soit The annual SRC presidential debate was an underwhelming occasion for answers to actual substantive questions, an overwhelming occasion for your senses, and a good preview to what campaigning in polling days will look like. Flanked on either side of the candidates were their friends and foes, ready to bleat and heckle.
10: ANALYSIS
Can You Get To Class? Sara Al Asfar On 6th January this year, Israeli soldiers drove through the gates of Birzeit University in the occupied West Bank. More than eight thousand students were on campus. Soldiers smashed through the main gate and fired live ammunition, tear gas and stun grenades. At least 41 people were injured, several by gunfire.
Acknowledgment of Country EDITOR-IN-CHIEF James Fitzgerald Sice
EDITORS Madison Burland Anastasia Dale James Fitzgerald Sice
Honi Soit publishes on stolen Gadigal land. Sovereignty was never ceded. The University of Sydney is a colonial institution that upholds Western knowledge as superior to First Nations knowledge systems. We reject this hierarchy. As student journalists, we recognise that mainstream media has been complicit in silencing and misrepresenting
Indigenous voices since invasion. We commit to centring First Nations perspectives in our reporting, to challenging the colonial structures embedded in journalism, and to amplifying the voices of those resisting ongoing dispossession. We pay our respects to Elders past and present, and to all First Nations students and contributors. Always was, and always will be Aboriginal land.
Kuyili Karthik Alastair Panzarino Firdevs Sinik Sebastien Tuzilovic Sophie Wishart Victor Zhang
In This Edition: 4 USyd students reject OpenAI 5 Students strike against Pauline Hanson again
WRITERS Sara Al Asfar Harper Boon Anastasia Dale Sofia Dillon Ryan Dell James Fitzgerald Sice Tara Marocchi Robyn Mazloumian Timothy Pudun Sebastien Tuzilovic Victor Zhang
ARTISTS Yasodara Perera
FRONT COVER
6 Anti-choice abortion bill voted down 7 Students strike against sexual violence 8 Migration clampdown sparks outrage 9–11 FEATURE: It’s Not Easy Being The Greens 12 Can you get to class? 13 Notes from the 2026 Prez Debate 14 A Brief History of Australian Labour 16 Radical Self-Care is Not A $50 Serum
Mickie Quick
19 Who is Terry Pedestrian?
BACK COVER
20–23 SRC Reports/Puzzles/Comedy
Sophie Wishart
Contribute
Do you have a deep-rooted longing to be a contributor but have no idea how to get involved? Apply to be a reporter or artist via the link in our Instagram bio: @honi.soit Or if you have a one-off pitch, tip for a story, complaint, letter to the editors, or more, email us at editors@honisoit.com. Scan the QR code if you'd rather send an anonymous tip. Send mail to Honi Soit at PO Box 974 Broadway NSW 2007. ISSN: 2207-5593. This edition was published on Tuesday 22 September 2026. Disclaimer: Honi Soit is published by the Students’ Representative Council, University of Sydney, Level 1 Wentworth Building, City Road, University of Sydney NSW 2006. The SRC’s operation costs, space and administrative support are financed by the University of Sydney. Honi Soit is printed under the auspices of the SRC’s Directors of Student Publications (DSP): Dongchen Yue, Sholto Mirrlees-Black, Lucy Sullivan, Ying Huang, Damien Lee, Hamish Evans. All expressions are published on the basis that they are not to be regarded as the opinions of the SRC unless specifically stated. The Council accepts no responsibility for the accuracy of any of the opinions or information contained within this newspaper, nor does it endorse any of the advertisements and insertions. Please direct all advertising inquiries to publications.manager@src.usyd.edu.au. Email the editors at editors@honisoit.com.
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Editorial
READ MY FEATURE. THE THEME OF THIS EDITION IS NO REST FOR THE WICKED. APPRECIATE THE COVER BY MICKIE THE GOAT. FLICK THROUGH THE EDITION. HAVE A GOOD DAY TODAY. GO TO BED AT A REASONABLE TIME. VOTE IN THE ELECTION — JFS. What do USyd Students have to say about Wicked
Peter Griffin: What’s Wicked? Is that that new movie coming out where that lady has a husband made from a wicker basket? No? Damn, then I don’t know. Chuckie Chuddleson: I love Wicked. I watched both parts with my friend, Chuddie Chuckleson. It’s our favourite. We watch it once a year on my couch. Not like as a date though. Just two men, hanging out. C. Erivo: That’s my line. OOOOHHHhAAhhhAHHHHHHHHAhhhh
P. Pickle: I think it is a true tale of friendship. It shows the best and the worst of humanity unflinchingly. Pure artwork. Also that guy from Bridgerton is a major smash.
Yuri Meister: It’s a shame they didn’t kiss. In the books they kiss, just once, but that’s not the point. I believe very strongly in bookto-screen adaptations being very true to the book. No other reasons.
Philm B. Rother: Monumental. It really renewed my belief in the film industry. These days, no one knows how to make a movie. Jon M. Chu knows what he is doing. First, Crazy Rich Asians, now this? What can’t he do.
Chuddie Chuckleson: Oh.. You heard about my... Wicked times with Chuckie, huh? What did he tell you? Yeah. It’s a pretty good movie. I don’t have much else to say on this. This is all off the record right?
Honiscopes Aries: Swedish Chef. BONSOIR! You are a delight in the kitchen. Thank you for your contributions to everyones happy tummies. Yippie!
Virgo: Miss Piggy. Stylish. Fantastic. What can’t you do? You’re relaxed, chill even. Maybe start taking things a bit more seriously. Or don’t. What do I care.
What's On 198archie & Sage Dwyer W/ Rhea Sara [DJ] Wednesday 23 September 5pm @ State Library of NSW Ashlea Milinkovic W/ Necko, LUCIDBLOOM Thursday 24 September 9:45pm @ Pleasure Club Off The Decks: SFTCRE W/ Freezy, N!K, PR1SSY, Imili, Bluebird, Green Bean, Ena Friday 25 September 9pm @ Mansions, Potts Point Forum: Stop AI Data Centres! Tech for People, Not Profit Friday 25 September 6pm @ Resistance Centre & Bookshop, Ultimo Glebe speak-out against racism and bigotry Saturday 26 September 11am to 1pm
Libra: Statler. You’ve got something sexy about you. I can’t name it. You ooze confidence and charisma. Call me.
@ Jubliee Fountain, Glebe
Taurus: Waldorf. You’re a bit of a tight ass. Unlike your twinnem Statler, you struggle to find a balance between finesse and fatiguing those around you.
Scorpio: Beaker. I didn’t know that was happening.. I’ve seen it yeah. That’s really powerful.. I didn’t know that was happening. I’ve seen it on a couple posts..
W/ Private Wives, Second Idol, Ponzi Scheme, Hydrangea, Club Halifax, Meow Meow & The Smackouts, Downgirl [DJ]
Gemini: Fozzie. You’re pretty chill and often underestimated and overhated. A calming aura, some might say. I would agree! That dainty little journal of yours is cute. Keep it close.
Sagittarius: Janice. You’re cunty. Kind of tea some may say. Find the line where the tea ends and you begin. Take a break from drama.
Sunday 27 September
Cancer: Rowlf: You’re cuddly. You’re kind. You’re often mistreated by those around you. You deserve justice. Stand up for yourself. Abstain from violence. Leo: Dr Bunsen Honeydew. I don’t trust you. I’m not quite sure why. Theres something off about you. Might be that tie. Might be those glasses. Try out meditation.
Capricorn: Gonzo. I don’t even know what to say about you. You know what you did. Seek forgiveness from those you have wronged. Start with yourself.
She’s All Brat
5pm @ Dead Set, Darlinghurst for more, visit sydneymusic.net
Aquarius: Animal. You’re alarming for a multitude of reasons. You seem to be unable to recognise any social cues. People aren’t holding their noses for no reason. Go shower. Pisces: Kermit. You’re a jolly little fucker. Find some balance. Sometimes your jolly is innapropriate. Read the room. Sometimes consistent joyfulness is not what your peers need.
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| NEWS
USyd students reject AI partnership James Fitzgerald Sice and Victor Zhang report. Days after the University of Sydney officially announced their partnership with OpenAI, students held a snap rally to protest this decision. Despite the strong opposition to this deal, the University stood by the partnership. Students’ Representative Council president Grace Street chaired the rally on Eastern Avenue. “We need to be speaking out about this immediately and trying to get ahead of this multi-year partnership, which otherwise the university is just hoping that we all end up accepting and forgetting about”, Street said. “Despite all of our movement for divestment on campus, getting rid of investments in fossil fuels and arms companies, [the university] still will go ahead with partnerships and working with these unethical companies that are actively destroying our world, destroying our minds, and destroying our futures and our education”. Alma Torlakovic, a professional staff member on the NTEU USyd branch committee, also spoke at the snap rally. “Overwhelmingly, the money funnelled into AI is being used to sack workers, to increase efficiency in killing, to fund the military-industrial complex. It’s destroying human labour, creativity, art, music, and frankly, our collective will to live,” Torlakovic said. Two weeks ago, thousands of staff at USyd went on a 24hour strike. One demand of the union was to place safeguards around AI in the enterprise agreement.
against the proliferation of AI in both secondary and tertiary education. Robin, who is studying to be a teacher, pointed to academic research demonstrating the negative neural and behavioral effects large language model use in learning. “If you are using these tools like ChatGPT, like Claude, then you are not learning,” Robin said. Despite withering criticism of the partnership, the university defended the ChatGPT Edu deal. “As a university, we must give our community the tools, training and support they need to use AI responsibly as we have a duty to prepare our students for the future of work, ensure our researchers have the resources they need to drive discovery, and make our systems and processes work as well as possible,” VicePresident (Operations) Nicole Gower said. “We selected ChatGPT Edu following a robust procurement process, as is appropriate for any contract of this nature. ChatGPT offered the strongest overall combination of capability, usability, institutional scale, governance and value for money. We also know many of our students and staff are already familiar with ChatGPT’s free tool and are using it in their learning and work, with 10 million sessions logged in June this year alone, more than double any other public AI platform.”
Senator Mehreen Faruqi, Greens Deputy Leader and spokesperson for Higher Education, criticised the OpenAI deal at both USyd and UNSW. “Major changes on campus should be decided by the people who actually make up universities: the students and staff. They should not be dictated by managers cutting closed-door deals with mega corporations,” Faruqi said. “The irony of university managers ignoring their academics’ advice to embrace corporations that profit from stolen knowledge isn’t lost on me. Universities must be places of knowledge creation, critical inquiry, democracy, equity, and freedom of speech — all things that are antithetical to AI’s business model.” AI is governed at the University under the Responsible AI Framework, a policy officially launched on 10th June, 2026, and recently noted at the Academic Board meeting on 8th September. “The Responsible AI Framework provides the University’s approach to governing the adoption and use of AI,” the Academic Board paper reads. The framework mandates that “any AI initiative, whether buying, building, or turning on AI capability in an existing system”, must undergo a Responsible AI Review. The review is a four-stage process, checking the tool and intended use against the inventory of
“Workers don’t just have to accept AI. We don’t have to accept that this technology will be widely accepted or widely rolled out in society. “The strike wasn’t just about AI, but it was an important element because it is about the big picture in society… if [management] can get away with replacing our labour, they will try.” UNSW also recently entered into a similar partnership with OpenAI to roll out ChatGPT Edu to their staff and students. UNSW student and organiser for Students Against AI Robin also spoke at the rally warning
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Photography by James Fitzgerald Sice
endorsed tools, confirming that it is aligned with the goals of the university, assessing the risk of the initiative, and a risk management plan for projects deemed “medium risk or higher”. The University said that ChatGPT Edu “underwent the University’s standard procurement process… as well as a Responsible AI review.” The University’s AI green paper, Education in the Age of AI, says that “student partnership has been key to our response to AI”, adding that students should have “ongoing input into design, governance, and evaluation of how AI is deployed for learning and for their broader student experience”. While both the NTEU and the SRC both said they were not consulted about the procurement of ChatGPT Edu, the University said that the tool was selected by an evaluation team that included “stakeholders from across the University, with staff and student representatives participating in demonstration sessions with shortlisted vendors and their feedback considered in the selection process”. The University said that the Responsible AI Framework will govern the roll-out of ChatGPT Edu. Staff will gain access to the tool in October, with students given access in Semester 1, 2027.
NEWS |
‘Hanson is not welcome here’: Students strike against Pauline Hanson again Anastasia Dale and James Fitzgerald Sice report. On 17th September at 11:30am, USyd students converged on the Quad Lawns for a speakout ahead of the second National Day of Action against Pauline Hanson. Emma Searle of Socialist Alternative (SAlt) chaired the speakout, with SRC President Grace Street (Grassroots), USyd NTEU member Alma Torlakovic, and SAlt activist Jill McInnes also addressing the crowd. Following the speeches, the USyd contingent marched to St James station where the wider rally was taking place. Hundreds of high school and university students alike turned out for the protest. Charlie, a Year Nine student, spoke first. “I’m an activist because the world around me has been falling apart. I think one of the most pressing issues facing Australia today is the rise of the far right, personified by Pauline Hanson and One Nation, who recently, mind you, received an endorsement from the neoNazis of Australia”, Charlie said. “Pauline Hanson is the resident parasite of Australia. She’s a sexist, racist, homophobic bigot who is determined to destroy our future. Just looking at her voting history proves that she is the useful idiot of a bunch of her billionaire mates.” Charlie then used examples of Hanson’s voting record to illustrate his point, including Hanson’s votes against decreasing the gender pay gap, against mitigating the climate crisis, against increasing funding for schools, and against a ceasefire in Gaza. Charlie stated that “we are all here today to show Pauline Hanson and her supporters that we will not stand for this, and we are going to fight back against her bigoted politics.” Next to speak was Sophia, also in Year Nine, saying: “There is a narrative all over the news that we have no idea what we’re talking about, that we’ve been indoctrinated by our parents, which is laughable. We have not been indoctrinated. Just like many people in this country, we were born with basic decency. We don’t want to see mass
deportations that will turn ugly.” “We want abortion rights. We support queer people, and we refuse to let racists and bigots turn our country into Trump’s America, into a place where people feel unsafe on our streets, where victims of domestic abuse are brushed off because Pauline Hanson deems it a waste of time. Where politicians decide which people deserve basic rights and where discrimination is normal. We want equality. We want safety. And we want a future where people matter more than profit.” Sophia then stated that her generation, despite being labelled as “dumb” and “ignorant” by “far-right news”, “never got the luxury of being ignorant.” Sophia continued that “we’ve grown up in a time where we’ve seen politicians not give two shits about the fact our planet’s burning. We’ve watched genocide live streams on our phones that our prime minister is still funding, AI taking over the planet and draining our oceans. People losing their rights as countries move backwards… No one will defend our future as fiercely as the people who have to live in it.” Izabella Antoniou, Greens candidate for Ashfield, addressed the crowd, saying: “This puppet of the ‘90s has been reanimated by a billionaire and God knows how many millions of dollars to protect fossil fuel oligarchs’ interests. The rest of it is all pageantry. None of this is surprising when we understand that Hanson is backed by a mining magnate and a Saturday morning cartoon villain Gina Rinehart. At all levels, our government has been dropping the ball, continuing to approve coal and gas projects… This nation is attempting to wed us to the Hanson-Rinehart’s fossil fuel donor dreams, which will see everyday people’s power bills go up, food scarcity will increase, grocery bills will rise, and we will be witnessing a mass extinction event. They are trying to make sure that we are left with nothing for future generations, and our young people deserve so much better than that.”
Year 12 student Theo addressed the crowd, saying: “We’re here to make sure that One Nation and Pauline Hanson and the likes of her and our party are extinguished for good from our politics… We see their racism, their sexism, their homophobia, their transphobia. These groups: immigrants, trans people, indigenous peoples, women, students; One Nation is afraid of them. They are threatened by them, and their monocultural drive is driven back by us, who see that it is a question of resistance to fascism or non-existence within fascism… Each and every one of us must do our part to craft a world where equality, freedom, and humanity are at the forefront.” Next to speak was Yasmine Johnson, SAlt member and prominent pro-Palestine activist, who said: “We live in a world where, in country after country, the far right are gaining ground. In some places, they’re coming to power… We are living in a world that is ruled for the rich and powerful who want to make the lives of ordinary people shit so that they can make money out of us. We are living in a world that is organised on the premise of the destruction of our planet, of attacks on the oppressed all around the world, and we know that the fight is not justified against one issue, it’s not just a fight against racism. It is also a fight against sexism. It’s a fight against homophobia and transphobia. It’s a fight for Palestine. It’s a fight for the climate. All of these fights are connected because they’re fights against these fascists who run our world and their billionaire backers like Gina Reinhart.” Jasmine Al-Rawi, convenor of Students for Palestine and NSW Socialists candidate for Auburn, told the crowd: “It’s really important that we stand with our Indigenous brothers and sisters, since Hanson
has said that Indigenous Australians are ‘the most primitive race on earth.’ Shame. This is the kind of disgusting, vile racism that is being promoted by the mainstream. It’s being parroted by our mainstream political parties, and it’s so important that we come out to stand against it. I’m sure people saw Pauline Hanson’s response to our last protest. She said that kids should go protest about why their parents’ wages are going backwards and the cost of living is going up. Well, that’s another reason why we have to protest Pauline Hanson, who has never voted in support of putting our wages up, who has never voted in support of affordable housing”. Al-Rawi criticised the Labor government’s cuts to international student visas and immigration as conceding ground to One Nation. Al-Rawi added that “possibly the worst part of their announcement is that they want to introduce an ICE Gestapo to go around and round up people whose visas have expired, throw them into detention. We know what this looks like. We are seeing this being carried out in the U.S. as we speak. People have been murdered by ICE agents in the U.S. 46 people have died in ICE custody. Four people have been shot by ICE agents in the U.S. in the past years. This is what it means to introduce an ICE-type Gestapo in this country, and we will not stand for it… Hanson has shifted the goalposts of politics. We want to shift the goalpost way back towards the left”. Charlie ended by saying: “Pauline Hanson wants us to think that she isn’t the reason that we’re going to inherit the shittest world possible. She wants to convince us that it’s the fault of migrants and Indigenous people, and we are here to show Pauline Hanson that she does not represent us… We’re going to stand up and fight back against racists.”
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| NEWS
Anti-choice abortion bill defeated in NSW parliament Victor Zhang reports. A private member’s bill restricting access to abortion has been shot down in NSW parliament. Libertarian Party Member of the Legislative Council (MLC) John Ruddick’s Abortion Law Reform Amendment (Sex Selection Prohibition) Bill 2025 sought to criminalise sexselective abortion. The bill proposed to amend the Abortion Law Reform Act 2019 to impose a penalty of $22,000 and/or five-years imprisonment for performing a sex-selective abortion. The legislation also proposed amendments to two other pieces of legislation to categorise sex-selective abortion as professional misconduct and void professional indemnity insurance for a health practitioner if they conducted a sex-selective abortion. A 2020 NSW Health review found that of the 15,973 abortions that occurred between October 2019 and September 2020, only 13 were reported to be for sexselective purposes. However, the report found that 10 of the 13 notifications were likely reporting errors, leaving only less than 0.02 per cent of abortions performed to be for the purposes of sex selection. Ruddick’s bill was voted down, with 16 MLCs voting for the bill and 21 against. The Greens were united in voting against the bill while Labor, the Liberals, and the National allowed their MLCs a conscience vote. Dr Amanda Cohn, NSW Greens MLC and spokesperson for health, said the defeat of Ruddick’s bill “reaffirmed that abortion is legal health care”. Dr Cohn also blasted the bill as a “thinly veiled attempt to incrementally re-criminalise abortion”. “The real impact of the bill would have been to create so much uncertainty and fear around severe criminal penalties that many health professionals would stop providing abortions,” Dr Cohn said. “This is part of an organised campaign that seeks to end safe abortion care, a goal that
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has been articulated clearly publicly by supporters of the bill.” During the second reading debate on 24th June, Dr Cohn spoke against the bill. “There is evidence, though, that criminalising sex‑selective abortion harms women,” Dr Cohn told the NSW Legislative Council. “This bill is one step in a longer strategy to erode abortion access. “It is modelled on the American approach that culminated in the overturning of Roe v Wade. It is not an accident that the South Australian and Queensland parliaments are similarly debating legislation that would incrementally re-criminalise abortion.”
Lawrence, who voted for the second reading of the bill. “Our celebrations of this bill being rejected remain bittersweet, as this will not permanently quell attacks upon reproductive rights, this will only halt them,” McGrath added, warning that the murder of 49 women this year has been ignored by all levels of government. “We cannot become complacent, and must continue to escalate the fight against the far right for feminist justice.”
Legislative Council divided Labor MLC and leader of the Government in the legislative council Penny Sharpe characterised the bill as “the first step in dismantling the framework for ensuring access to reproductive health care for all who need it.
“Our celebrations of this bill being rejected remain “It seeks to put access to bittersweet, as this will not abortion back into the criminal than health framework, permanently quell attacks rather with no direct evidence that upon reproductive rights the problem it purports to Anti-choice campaigners organised a rally on 2nd June, ahead of the second reading debate of the bill. In response, a grassroots coalition of activist and student groups led by the USyd Women’s Collective organised a counterrally. “WoCo worked tirelessly to organise the “Hands off our bodies” counterprotest against the emboldening antichoice movement in NSW led by Joanna Howe,” Women’s Collective convenor Maxine McGrath, one of the organisers of the counter-protest told Honi Soit. “Although this protest was against the attacks upon reproductive rights in NSW, this is part of a larger trend of parliamentary attacks on reproductive rights, as seen in Queensland and South Australia.” McGrath said that while the anti-choice legislation and demonstrations have been promoted by far-right groups, she cautioned that the emergence of far-right politics “can be heavily attributed to the Labor Party’s complacency, and a larger trend of the party shifting rightward”. McGrath also condemned the three Labor MLCs, Greg Donnelly, Courtney Houssos, and Stephen
solve is occurring in New South Wales.” The passage of the Abortion Law Reform Act 2019 decriminalised abortion. Sarah Mitchell, Nationals MLC and shadow health minister voted against the bill. In the second reading debate on 16th September, Mitchell said her opposition to the bill was informed by the opposition of medical practitioner groups such as the Australian Medical Association (NSW), Family Planning Australia, the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, and the NSW Nurses and Midwives’ Association. “Their concern is that this bill creates real risks for practitioners who provide lawful care, for the women who depend on that care, and for the framework of trust that must exist between a doctor and their patient,” Mitchell told the Legislative Council. “They are concerned that this bill once again will criminalise health care. Practitioners may step back from providing termination services altogether, and not because they support sex selection but because they cannot be confident about where the legal line falls.”
Backbenchers blast the bill Labor MLC Cameron Murphy denounced the bill. He said the bill’s “supporters have made it clear that their ultimate goal is a total abortion ban.” “Joanna Howe, the prominent anti-choice campaigner and co-conspirator in this bill, has admitted as much. She has been behind over a dozen pieces of legislation restricting abortion access in Australia in recent years. She said this bill is “just the start”. She said, “Every year we will introduce a bill to protect babies.” This bill is not about sex-selective abortion, and it is not about protecting babies. It is part of a chilling, concerted effort to chip away at women’s autonomy.” Murphy said attempts to restrict bodily autonomy would lead down the slippery slope until “women’s rights resemble those in Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale”. “The right to choose is about the sovereign right of a woman to choose what happens to her body. Any attempts to interrogate the reasons behind a given termination are a violation of this fundamental principle,” Murphy said. Legislative measures to restrict abortion access were introduced in Queensland and South Australia. The Queensland MP Robbie Katter moved a disallowance motion to restrict approved nurses and midwives from prescribing or supplying the abortion medication MS-2 Step. The motion was defeated 85-2. South Australian Independent (now Family First, formerly One Nation) MLC Sarah Game introduced a bill to effectively ban abortion after 25 weeks pregnancy. The bill narrowly passed the upper house 10-9 but was defeated 36-9 in the lower house. SA Labor Premier Peter Malinauskas voted in favour of the bill. Other MLCs that spoke against the bill were Greens members Abigail Boyd and Cate Faehrmann, Labor members Emily Suvaal, Anthony D’Adam, and Sarah Kaine, Liberal members Jacqui Munro and Aileen MacDonald, and National member Scott Barrett.
NEWS |
Students strike against sexual violence
NOTICE FROM THE SRC RETURNING OFFICER
Victor Zhang reports.
Removal of “Globalise The Intifada” materials
Content Warning: This article mentions sexual violence, gender-based violence, and femicide. University and high school students took to the streets on 15th September to take a stand against sexual violence and femicide, at a protest organised by Students Stand Against Sexual Violence. Protesters gathered at Hyde Park before marching to NSW parliament. “We cannot keep waking up to headlines about extreme gender displace and sexual violence, all while our governments, institutions, and legal systems never change,” organiser of the strike and founder of the group Mirabel Somers told the rally. “What is the point of studying, and what is the point of investing in our future if we are likely to end up dead? So many of us are kept in fear, attacked, and traumatised, but we do not accept this as normal, or that this is going to be our future.” On the day of the rally, 49 women and 19 children had lost their lives to violence this year. At the time of publication, this has risen to 52 women and 20 children; these four deaths occurred within 24 hours. The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare estimates that one woman is killed every 11 days by an intimate partner. Somers listed the demands of the organisers which include mandatory genderbased violence education in both secondary and tertiary education, specifically transparent improvements to the national curriculum on consent, and ending the elite system of residential colleges in Universities. Other demands include fully funding social services, including transparent improvements to the national curriculum on consent education; culturally safe and community-led response to domestic and family violence against First Nations people; decriminalising sex work and including sex work in NSW anti-discrimination legislation; and transparency, accountability, and the prioritisation of victim-
survivors over image and prestige in sporting, cultural, and educational institutions Jess Denham, champion athlete and lawyer, who went public with her story in March, 2026, also spoke at the rally. “Silence does not protect victims and survivors. This is not an isolated crisis. This is a systemic crisis, and systemic crises require systemic action,” Denham said. “We do not need another promise delivered at a press conference. We need prevention written into policy. We need safety written into budgets. We need accountability written into law.” Inside the NSW Legislative Assembly, Greens member for Newtown Jenny Leong commended the work of the student strike in a private member’s statement. “Students marched to the front of Parliament as part of the Student Strike Against Sexual Violence. The question has to be asked: How many more generations of women will need to be raped, sexually assaulted, violated, or traumatised and then take to the streets in rage before governments finally act to end violence against women?” Leong told parliament. Ash, the youngest speaker, spoke last at the rally and of her story with sexual violence. “We talk about teaching girls to be careful. Don’t walk home alone. Don’t get too drunk. Don’t accept a drink from a stranger. Share your location. Carry your keys between your fingers. Text someone where you get home. But why are we teaching girls how to survive violence instead of teaching boys not to commit it?” Ash said. “Why is the responsibility placed on the person who is at risk rather than the person who is creating the risk? We tell women to avoid dangerous situations, but we don’t talk enough about the attitudes that create those dangerous situations in the first place.”
The University of Sydney have removed some campaign materials for the Globalise The Intifada SRC Representatives to Council ticket. The stated reason is a belief that these materials present a risk of psychosocial harm. This risks creating an uneven playing field, as other tickets have not faced restrictions of this sort. As a remedy, I am using this notice to remind the electorate of the existence of this ticket. Their policy statement and candidate details are available in the previous elections edition of Honi Soit, p35–37.
Impact for Women ticket The Impact for Women ticket initially nominated using another name. Before the ballot draw, they requested a change to their name, due to an assessment that the new name was more transgender inclusive, which I accepted.
However, the policy statement was not updated before being printed in the elections edition of Honi Soit . The corrected opening line should have been: “Women make up the majority of the USYD cohort, so we believe the SRC should properly represent us and take real action to support women and fight for our collective liberation”.
Penta for Viva candidate Gigi Lin The ballot paper for Representatives to Council incorrectly refers to the Penta for Viva candidate, Gigi Lin as Gigi Chi, due to differences between Chinese and Western naming orders. The candidate submitted their nomination using a single preferred name and this required appending a last name, but as the nomination used the Chinese naming order, the last name was not the familial name. Voters intending to vote for Gigi Lin should mark their preferences in the box indicating Gigi Chi.
FREE CONDOMS!
Available FREE on Sydney Uni campus! Collect from the box in the reception area of the SRC office, open Tuesday–Thursday, 9am–5pm. No questions asked. contact a caseworker bit.ly/contact-a-caseworker
srcusyd.net.au 02 9660 5222
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| NEWS
Tony Burke’s visa crackdown sparks outrage Victor Zhang reports. Home affairs and immigration minister Tony Burke revealed at the National Press Club on 17th September the government’s plan to bring net overseas migration down to 225,000 by 2028.
you want to come to Australia permanently, apply for a permanent visa, and if you no longer have a valid visa, you should leave Australia,” Burke told the National Press Club.
“If the minister doesn’t want these policies to be compared to ICE, he should One of these measures is to bar international students from not behave like ICE,” bringing family to Australia. PhD students and students from some south-east Asian and Pacific countries are exempt from this measure. 45,000 secondary visas were granted last year.
Other measures to clamp down on international student numbers include barring socalled “visa hopping” by only awarding continued student visas if they move onto a higher qualification after their first degree. Worker holidaymakers are also targeted and will enter a ballot system for their second and third year of stay. There will be a limit of 45,000 spots granted for year two, and 5,000 for year three. The government will also introduce a “no further stay” condition to visitor visas and reintroduce immigration detention for visa overstayers. “If you want to come on a temporary basis to Australia, apply for a temporary visa. If
Greens Senator David Shoebridge said the reintroduction of a detention centre for visa overstayers was a “Donald Trump twist” to immigration policy. “If the minister doesn’t want these policies to be compared to ICE, he should not behave like ICE,” Shoebridge said. In 2025, the private prison company Management and Training Corporation’s subsidiary Secure Journeys was awarded a $2.3 billion contract to run onshore immigration detention. MTC is a private firm that operates US ICE detention facilities. MTC’s operations in Australia have been marked with a string of poor conditions and human rights abuses. Student visa refusal rates are at an all time high with the figure reaching 33.1 per cent for all student visa types including both primary and secondary
applicants. Higher education visa refusal rates sit at 29.2 per cent. In March 2026, the government quietly doubled the cost of the subclass 485 temporary graduate visa. The cost of the visa for primary applicants rose from $2,300 to $4,600. The International Student Representative Council (ISRC) deemed this change as particularly pernicious as it was passed just before many student visas expired on 31st March, leaving many graduates with no option but to foot the cost of the sudden hike. “The additional $2,300 is not a price signal. It is a cost imposed on people who have no meaningful alternative but to absorb it,” the ISRC’s statement read. “This is not a routine policy adjustment. It is a fundamental change to the cost structure of a pathway that students have already entered and largely completed.” The ISRC also called on the Australian government to genuinely consult international students and the university community before announcing such a change. “Australia’s standing as a destination for international education has been built over decades on a reputation for stability, fairness, and predictability. That reputation
is a genuine national asset — one that prospective students and their families rely on when making major financial and life decisions,” the ISRC’s statement continued. “Every no-notice, noconsultation rule change erodes it. The people who make these decisions will not be the ones who pay the long-term cost of that erosion.” Months later, the government announced a hike to the cost of the student visas from $2,000 to $2,500 and a hike to the temporary graduate visa from $4,600 to $5,750. In 2025, the student visa cost rose from $1,600 to $2,000. Australia’s student visas were already some of the most expensive worldwide. Weihong Liang, President of the ISRC and PhD candidate at USyd, said the more fundamental question was who benefits from international student tuition, writing in a piece for FutureCampus. Liang proposed universities publish a detailed breakdown of how international student tuition income is utilised including the “full cost of educating those students, and how the contribution beyond that cost supports the university’s wider work”. “Keeping this account would also help universities confront their dependence on international fee income. Today’s revenue is no guarantee of tomorrow’s. “My hope is that the next time someone asks who really benefits, a university can point to a building, a sports facility or a classroom, say who uses it, and acknowledge who helped pay for it. Whether a university has managed this contribution well cannot be judged by how much came in. It has to be judged by what it leaves behind.”
“Keeping this account would also help universities confront their dependence on international fee income. Today’s revenue is no guarantee of tomorrow’s.
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It’s Not Easy Being The Greens During the process of writing this feature, I unexpectedly got the opportunity to talk with the founder of the Australian Greens, Bob Brown, the night before the piece was due for the paper. I have selected a few interesting quotes from our conversation for this article. The interview is available to read right now online at honisoit.com.
On 10th September 1996, two political figures delivered their maiden parliamentary speeches across the building of Parliament House, articulating competing visions for a country entering a new era of politics. Greens Senator Bob Brown laid out a global, ecological, and egalitarian program, warning of environmental collapse and wealth inequality. In the House of Representatives, disendorsed Liberal candidate Pauline Hanson talked about how Australia was being “swamped by Asians”, launching a far right attack on multiculturalism, foreign aid, and “political elites”. 30 years later, as the primary votes of the major parties decline, the political fortunes of these two forces have dramatically decoupled. While One Nation and right-wing independents have successfully channelled some downwardly mobile grievances into major electoral breakthroughs in outer-suburban and regional seats, the Greens appear to have hit an electoral ceiling. Around the world, the collapse of the political centre has opened space for insurgents on both flanks. No one has taken better advantage of this situation than the right. However, some leftwing parties have also been able to electorally capitalise on this growing discontent. In New York, Democratic Socialist Zohran Mamdani won the mayoralty campaigning on rent, free childcare, public transport, and other measures aimed squarely at the cost-of-living crisis as part of a wave of DSA-backed wins in the US. In the UK, the Green Party won a record four seats at the 2024 general election and 6.7 per cent of the combined Green vote, its strongest parliamentary result to date.
The Australian Greens have had a more sustained electoral success over the years compared to their counterparts in the UK. However, despite their progressive policy agenda and comprehensive cost-of-living measures, it is undeniable that the Australian Greens are failing to capture the hearts and minds of working class Australians under the pump. But why?
Representatives collapse from four to one. Meanwhile, One Nation’s electoral support has surged. Roy Morgan polling had the party on 25 per cent nationally in September, compared with 16 per cent for the Greens. One Nation has reached as high as 31.5 per cent in the same poll this year, while Green’s support has generally remained in the low-tomid teens. Despite growing cost-
Brown’s comments reflect the Greens’ selfunderstanding as a political force representing those excluded from the economic and political mainstream. He also described the broader political conflict as “neoliberal politics versus the Greens at the moment”, arguing that debates over whether the party serves “the middle class, or the rich, or the very poor” miss the point. Grounded in progressive middleclass liberalism rather than working-class struggle, the Greens seek to reform capitalism through electoral representation, directing their substantial organisational base primarily towards electoral ends rather than building the collective power necessary to force such reformations, leaving them structurally compelled to accommodate the interests of the ruling class. For many people in Australia, the Greens have historically been a gateway to progressive politics. From the climate crisis, to cost-ofliving, to Israel’s genocide of the Palestinian people, they seem to be the only mainstream political party fighting for a better future on the parliamentary floor. Their consistent support of grassroots activism has cultivated an image of the Greens as the parliamentary voice of progressive social movements in Australia. However, the Greens gained support as leaders of protest. In their move from protesters to politicians, it’s plain to see they’ve swung the pendulum too far in the wrong direction. The Greens received 12.2 per cent of the national primary vote at the last federal election, virtually unchanged from 2022, yet saw their seats in the House of
of-living and climate crises, the Greens have struggled to expand beyond the electorate they have already built. When discussing the surge in popularity of One Nation among working class Australians, Bob Brown told Honi Soit that the Greens “stand for the poor”, while One Nation “stands for the rich, but of course they’re saying they’re standing for the ordinary working class”. He went further, arguing that Pauline Hanson “is a Gina Rinehart subject”, stating that her funding comes from “the extreme right” and that it “is never going to translate into a fair go for workers or people who don’t have a job, or students, or people living on the streets.” Brown’s comments reflect the Greens’ self-understanding as a political force representing those excluded from the economic and political mainstream. He also described the broader political conflict as “neoliberal politics versus the Greens at the moment”, arguing that debates over whether the party serves “the middle class, or the rich, or the
James Fitzgerald Sice Greens out. very poor” miss the point. Yet this framing raises a more difficult question for the Greens. Electorally representing economically marginalised people is not the same as building the social forces capable of changing the conditions that produce that marginalisation. The distinction between political representation and working-class organisation is central to understanding the limits of a solely parliamentary strategy. The most attention the Greens have received from the media lately has been over their decision to support a carbon-credit scheme tied to the creation of the Great Koala National Park, a move that prompted three Greens senators to cross the floor in opposition. As a university educated inner-city white student with progressive political values, I fall squarely into the Greens’ primary demographic. I have voted for them, and in many electorates they remain the best option on the ballot for anyone who wants to vote in the interest of the working class. However, it is decisions like this Koala debacle which demand greater scrutiny of the contradiction between the Greens’ progressive policy agenda and the political compromises required to pursue it through parliament. If the Greens claim to offer an alternative to the major parties, why have they struggled to turn growing political and economic discontent into a broader working class constituency? While the concentration of mainstream media certainly plays a role, it does not explain this, particularly when you consider the success of other progressive parties or candidates who use social media to get their message out there.
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Why have the Greens been unable to seize this opportunity? Is it a branding problem, or something more structural? A dunderheaded Labor hack would tell you their problem is obstructionism. Larissa Waters herself, to a certain degree, resonates with this sentiment. After replacing Adam Bandt as leader of the party, Waters said “people are fed up with the shoutiness” and that “we will be firm but constructive.” It seems the Greens have learnt the incorrect lesson. The government will not be swayed if the Greens master the art of “constructive” burewaucratic co-operation. They must be forced. Recall the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS) saga, when the Greens used their Senate numbers to help vote down Labor’s CPRS in 2009, arguing it was too weak to meaningfully cut emissions and offered excessive concessions to major polluters. Chris Bowen recently warned the Greens not to create another “CPRS moment” with the Koala Park. However, as The Australia Institute’s Richard Dennis notes, after the CPRS moment, the Greens “went on to win a record share of the vote, a record number of seats, and enough seats in Parliament to force the new Prime Minister Julia Gillard to rework her party’s old plans into a new and successful compromise.” While the effectiveness of marketbased solutions to the climate crisis is questionable to say the least, the point still stands that obstructionism and shoutiness are not political weaknesses. Bob Brown highlighted this institutional squeeze when discussing the Koala Park controversy in his Honi Soit interview. He argued that while “the Greens need to be defiant of the politics of injustice and environmental destruction,” the party must also confront a Labor Party that has “morphed into what the Liberal Party used to be” due to its “capture by corporate interests”. Pointing to state and federal Labor leaders funneling handouts to timber and carbon interests, Brown noted that parliamentary institutions inevitably put progressive MPs “on the rack,” leaving “the Greens caught in the middle, split” over whether to accept flawed legislation. Yet, by framing floor-crossing as an exercise of individual conscience, Brown overlooks how, without the support of a mobilised base, operating within a state captured by capital routinely forces progressive parties to choose between legislative capitulation and organisational rupture.
This strategic question is reflected in competing interpretations of the Greens’ 2025 electoral defeat. Max Chandler-Mather, who lost his seat in the last election, blames the party’s decision to shift towards a more constructive tone, arguing “it tied us to a political establishment, and turned voting for the Greens into just voting for Labor effectively.” ChandlerMather believes the party’s aspiration should be to “replace the Labor Party”, combining bold transformational politics with a direct economic message aimed at working people. Chandler-Mather’s criticism identifies the central tension, but it does not fully explain why the Greens repeatedly encounter the same problems. It cannot simply be reduced to a change in leadership, an ineffective communications strategy, or an excessive willingness to compromise. Nor is the answer necessarily that the Greens must become more confrontational in every parliamentary dispute. The more fundamental issue is what kind of political organisation have the Greens become, which social forces sustain it, and what constraints are imposed by its reliance on electoral representation. Brown’s comments reveal the contradiction clearly. He argues that the Greens must remain defiant, while also describing them as an essential parliamentary force capable of negotiating social and environmental outcomes. A party can oppose injustice within parliament without necessarily possessing the mass organisation required to transform the conditions that produce it. If the Greens’ primary means of political action remains parliamentary representation, their capacity to pursue structural change will continue to be mediated by the institutions and interests that parliament itself represents.
Historical and Ideological Foundations of the Greens The historical foundation of the Greens is rooted in the social movements of the 1970s and a fragmented tapestry of statebased politics. Unlike the Labor Party, which developed directly out of trade unions, the early green movement emerged from environmental, anti-nuclear, antiwar activism without structural
ties to organised labour.
ideological.
The Greens’ initial parliamentary expression first occurred during the 1972 campaign against damming Tasmania’s Lake Pedder, where activists formed the United Tasmania Group (UTG), establishing one of the world’s first green political parties. The party’s foundational charter, The New Ethic, articulated an ecocentric philosophy that rejected humans’ right to exploit nature. It called for a global movement for survival and the creation of symbiosis between human structures and the natural landscape.
This class composition was evident from the party’s embryonic years in Tasmania as the UTG. Geoff Holloway, the UTG’s first secretary, observed that members were characterised by “high educational achievement, professional occupations, [and] high social mobility”. When the UTG contested the electorate of Denison in 1972, this class divide was captured in the polling data. The UTG polled up to 12.5 per cent in booths across the affluent, university-adjacent southern suburbs of Sandy Bay and Taroona, but received just 3.1 per cent in the working-class inner north of Moonah.
This ecological framework established an important political departure from traditional classbased movements. In its moral appeal for humanity to adopt a new relationship to nature, the charter contained no account of who within humanity actually does the exploiting, who profits from environmental destruction, or which humans are exploited alongside nature. The movement framed environmental destruction as a failure of moral values and mistaken ideas rather than a structural product of capitalist exploitation and accumulation. This attempt to transcend class politics reached its clearest articulation during the national party’s formation. In their 1996 manifesto The Greens, Bob Brown and philosopher Peter Singer described the ecocentric and postmaterialist philosophy of the party as “neither left, nor right, but forward”. Reflecting on this slogan 30 years later, Brown told Honi: “Whatever we said then… it was because there was, on both left and right of politics, no environmental energy. We’re now in a situation where the Greens are to the left of all the other representative parties in the Parliament, and therefore are the progressive voice for Australians who believe in the Australian motto, which John Howard almost extinguished, which is a fair go.” Brown’s retrospective justification framing the party’s current leftward stance as a defence of the “fair go” illustrates how the Greens came to occupy the space vacated by Labor’s rightward shift without ever adopting a classconscious foundation. By defining “the left” in terms of moral empathy and progressive values rather than a structural critique of capital, and allowing “the left” to be defined by the movement of other parties, Brown’s reflection highlights how the party’s shift was positional rather than
As Paddy Manning observes in Inside the Greens, this divide between affluent university precincts and working-class suburbs was “already evident in 1972” and remains “still reflected in the Greens’ vote almost 50 years later”. In late 1972, UTG co-founder Kevin Kiernan wrote privately to Milo Dunphy that “the very middle class nature of the conservation movement generally is giving [Jones] trouble with the labor bods”. This middle-class orientation was not inevitable, nor does it mean environmental politics is inherently divorced from working-class struggle. On the contrary, militant urban environmentalism exercised at the point of production originally gave the movement its name, through the Builders Labourers Federation’s (BLF) “Green Bans” led by communist union leader Jack Mundey in 1973. The Green Bans demonstrated how workers could withdraw their labour to halt developer destruction, creating a model of industrial leverage that inspired green parties globally. However, as environmental politics institutionalised, it bypassed this union base. Addressing an early Greens meeting in 1989, Mundey warned that the fundamental “weakness of ecologically oriented people is [their] failure to develop economic policy alternatives”. Lacking a structural connection to the organised labour movement, the emerging Greens evolved as a professional middle-class project rather than an extension of working-class economic power. Though early direct-action campaigns like the Franklin River blockade launched figures like Bob Brown into national prominence, the formal establishment of the Australian Greens occurred on 29th August,
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1992, when delegates from state organisations adopted a national charter and federated constitution. The party’s formal establishment codified a shift away from the politics of protest and toward parliamentary representation. In his discussion with Honi, Brown explicitly locates the party’s institutional purpose in the legislature, viewing the Greens as “a bloc who can negotiate... good social and environmental outcomes” within the balance of power. However, prioritising balance-of-power negotiations inherently subordinates direct movement power to statecraft and legislative bargaining. The party’s national footprint expanded significantly during the 2001 federal election, where principled opposition to major-party bipartisanship over the Tampa crisis and the invasion of Afghanistan saw the Greens’ national Senate vote double to nearly 5 per cent. This breakthrough occurred amid a broader crisis of majorparty legitimacy, where antiestablishment discontent polarised between right-wing populism, channeled through the emerging One Nation and absorbed by John Howard’s border security rhetoric, and the left-wing, anti-war alternative represented by the Greens. Under Brown’s leadership, this electoral growth culminated in the 2010 federal election breakthrough, where the Greens achieved a record 13 per cent national vote, won nine Senate seats, and secured their first lower house seat of Melbourne with Adam Bandt. However, by channeling their unprecedented leverage into a formal agreement to stabilise Julia Gillard’s minority Labor government, the Greens bound themselves to managing the capitalist state, ultimately providing a veil of progressive legitimacy to an administration that enforced fiscal austerity, single-parent welfare cuts, and offshore refugee detention.
Balance or capitulation? The central strategic objective of the Australian Greens has long been to win and exercise the balance of power in parliamentary chambers, particularly under minority Labor governments. This strategy rests on a liberal theory of state power wherein parliament is a neutral arena that can be occupied by progressive representatives to pass humane
legislation and constrain the worst excesses of capitalism. However, because the capitalist state exists to manage and maintain the system of capital accumulation rather than dismantle it, a party whose primary orientation is parliamentary representation finds itself structurally compelled to adapt to the constraints of governance. Rather than forcing the state to concede structural reforms, the Greens repeatedly face intense pressure from major parties and the media to prove themselves “responsible” managers, inevitably trading away core principles for minor legislative concessions. This pattern of parliamentary accommodation is not a recent development, but was established in the party’s earliest experiences with state governance. Following the 1989 Tasmanian election, five Green Independents won the balance of power and signed the historic Labor-Green Accord with Premier Michael Field. When the incoming government confronted an unexpected budget deficit, the Greens propped up an administration that enacted sweeping public sector austerity. As Christine Milne recalled, the period was marked by “cuts, everywhere cuts,” including plans to close 28 rural schools. Reflecting on this period to the National Press Club in 2004, Bob Brown explicitly praised the party’s willingness to administer austerity, saying that despite “savage budget cuts” and angry protests outside Greens offices, “we Greens held the line”. A similar dynamic unfolded in 1996, when the Tasmanian Greens under Milne entered a working arrangement with Tony Rundle’s minority Liberal government. While securing progressive civil liberties victories such as gun reform and the decriminalisation of homosexuality, the party demonstrated their comfort operating within a conservative macroeconomic framework. At the federal level, the Greens have repeatedly pointed to minority government agreements as the pinnacle of their strategic achievements. In particular, the party frequently cites the 2010 Gillard minority government as a “golden era of progressive reform” proving what can be accomplished when the Greens hold the balance of power. The Gillard government implemented punitive cuts to single-parent welfare payments, slashed university funding, reopened offshore refugee detention centres, and continued the broader neoliberal trajectory of Australian governance.
While the Greens nominally opposed many of these measures, their commitment to maintaining the minority government agreement forced them into the role of stabilising a right-wing Labor administration while failing to halt its anti-working-class policies. This structural compulsion to compromise has been re-enacted in recent parliamentary battles over housing and climate policy. Following their breakthrough at the 2022 federal election, where the Greens held the balance of power in the Senate over the Albanese Labor government, the party initially mounted strong opposition to Labor’s flagship Housing Australia Future Fund (HAFF). The Greens rightly exposed the HAFF as a marketbased gambling mechanism that fails to invest directly in public housing or provide immediate relief for struggling renters, demanding billions in direct social housing funding and a national rent freeze. This blockade successfully shifted public discourse, with polling showing greater support for rent controls. However, when subjected to a relentless media and Labor campaign accusing them of being obstructionists who let the “perfect become the enemy of the good,” the Greens ultimately folded. In exchange for a modest $3 billion in oneoff spending and $500 million annually, with no protections for renters, the Greens passed the bill. As former MP Max ChandlerMather had himself warned prior to the capitulation, passing the legislation immediately relieved political pressure on Labor, dissipated the momentum for rent controls, and reinforced the establishment narrative that the left must ultimately accept whatever Labor gives them.
What is to be done? As Australia’s major party duopoly continues to decay, the central question facing progressive politics is no longer whether the political system is in crisis, but who will inherit its ruins. Decades of neoliberal governance have eroded living standards, fueling widespread disaffection among working-class communities. Yet, while right-wing fear mongering has successfully mobilised antiestablishment anger into electoral momentum, the Australian Greens remain stuck at an electoral impasse. When asked for any final reflections at the conclusion of our interview, Brown said “it’s up
to the Australian people” and that it’s “no good at pointing fingers at the politicians. If we’re voting for people backed by billionaires, and for environmental destruction, and this obscene gap between billionaires and people living on the streets, then the nation gets what it deserves... People should think very carefully about how they vote because it does make a difference. We are a democracy, and what we vote for is what we get, and we shouldn’t complain about that. It’s up to us as voters.” Yet, as sincere as this faith in voter enlightenment remains, it also epitomises the strategic ceiling of liberalism, no matter how progressive. By treating political outcomes as a matter resting on individual voters rather than the product of structural class power, Brown’s reflection illustrates the worldview of a professional middle class. As Marx observed, the middle class “imagines himself elevated above class antagonism generally” because “the interests of two classes are simultaneously mutually blunted”. By viewing parliament as a neutral arena and elections as a test of democratic values, the Greens obscure how capitalist state institutions and corporate media structures actively shape political consciousness and enforce the parameters of the permissible. If the Greens cannot reconcile this foundational contradiction, their political trajectory is clear. Retreating into Larissa Waters’ “firm but constructive” managerialism will not break their electoral ceiling; it will reduce the party to a minor parliamentary regulator, offering “responsible” cover for Labor’s neoliberal austerity while allowing far-right figures to monopolise the rhetoric of anti-establishment change. If the Greens are to challenge the establishment and win over the working-class voters currently fleeing the major parties, they must look beyond parliamentary seats and moral appeals. Genuine political transformation requires grounding progressive politics in collective economic leverage, rebuilding power at the point of production, and organising alongside working people. Until the Greens transcend their progressive liberal origins and embrace sustained class struggle, they will remain prisoners of the very system they seek to reform.
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Can You Get to Class? Sara Al Asfar votes yes in the referendum. On 6th January this year, Israeli soldiers drove through the gates of Birzeit University in the occupied West Bank.
imprisonment without charge or trial, on secret evidence, under orders that can be repeatedly renewed.
More than eight thousand students were on campus. Soldiers smashed through the main gate and fired live ammunition, tear gas and stun grenades. At least 41 people were injured, several by gunfire.
And Elyaa is not an exception.
The day before, Israeli military officials had contacted the university demanding it cancel a student rally in solidarity with Palestinian prisoners. The students held it anyway. Two weeks later, UN experts described Israel’s continuing assaults on Birzeit as an “attack on education itself” pointing to military raids, arrests, intimidation and the criminalisation of student life. I am a Palestinian student from the West Bank. I once studied at Birzeit University, and I am now finishing my degree at the University of Sydney (USyd) and when we talk here about academic freedom, I keep thinking about how differently that phrase works where I come from.
Between October 2023 and December 2025, UN experts recorded 463 Palestinian university students and 27 higher-education staff detained in the West Bank. 148 students were from Birzeit alone. Most were held in administrative detention. During the same period, 37 West Bank university students were killed and 259 injured. Today, 84 Palestinian schools are under Israeli demolition or stopwork orders, affecting almost 13,000 students. Another 10 schools have been abandoned after the Palestinian communities they served were displaced following repeated settler attacks and access restrictions.
And in Gaza, the question has become even more basic: Does your university still exist? On 19 March 2025, USyd students heard this reality directly from Palestinian student Elyaa Abu Hijleh, who spoke over Zoom about studying at Birzeit and being imprisoned by Israel after her student activism. Israeli forces first arrested Elyaa in July 2020, when she was 21. Her case centred on her student and union activity at Birzeit and her work on an academic committee. She was sentenced to 11 months. She was not alone. Layan Kayed, 23, and Ruba Asi, 21, were arrested from the same university around the same period. In 2021, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention examined the three cases and found their detention arbitrary. Elyaa was released. Then, in 2024, Israeli forces came to her family home and arrested her again. This time she was placed in administrative detention:
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And six UNRWA schools in East Jerusalem remain closed. Thousands of refugee students displaced from Jenin and Tulkarm camps have also had their regular schooling disrupted. Control the land. Control movement across it. Control who can teach. Then control what the next generation learns about that land. And in Gaza, the classroom itself is gone. UN experts have used a word most of us had rarely heard before events in Gaza: scholasticide; the systematic destruction of an education system. UNESCO reports that 97.5 per cent of schools in Gaza have been damaged or destroyed, leaving more than 637 thousand children without normal schooling. 95 per cent of higher-education campuses have been affected, including 22 completely destroyed and 14 severely damaged, disrupting the education of around 90 thousand university students. Among the academics killed was Dr. Sufian Tayeh, president of the Islamic University of Gaza. He was a physicist, UNESCO Chair for Physical and Astrophysical Sciences in Palestine and had been ranked among the top two per cent of researchers globally.
For Palestinian students, academic freedom begins with a much smaller question: Can you get to class? Can you reach campus without a military gate closing? Can you get to school without settlers blocking the road? Can you organise without being arrested? Can you finish your degree without soldiers coming through the university gates?
more than 45,000 Palestinian students in East Jerusalem.
In Umm al-Khair, near Hebron, settlers erected a barbed-wire fence across the route children used to reach school. Families responded by sitting beside it and turning the ground into an outdoor classroom. Movement is not separate from education. It is one of the things determining whether education is possible. A Palestinian student can wake up for a 9am lecture without knowing whether the military gate between home and university will open. A 20-minute journey becomes one hour. Then two. Then: not today. We build our timetables around lectures and tutorials. Palestinian students build theirs around an occupation. In Jerusalem, the occupation enters the classroom This academic year began with Palestinian schools striking as Israel blocked entry permits for West Bank teachers. Israel has also passed a law barring graduates of Palestinian universities from teaching in East Jerusalem schools. At the same time, the Israeli curriculum is being forced upon
He was educated in UN refugee schools. In December 2023, an Israeli airstrike killed him and members of his family. His university was devastated too. Its central library held hundreds of thousands of books and thousands of masters and doctoral theses. After its destruction, displaced Palestinians sheltering among the ruins reportedly burned books to keep warm. A university library reduced to firewood. And still, Palestinian students keep trying to study. Some apply overseas. Some win scholarships. Then they discover that surviving Gaza and winning a university place still does not mean they can leave. This year, 31 of 59 Palestinian students with fully or partially funded scholarships in Ireland were refused study visas. One refusal cited insufficient finances even though the student’s scholarship covered their expenses. Students appealing refusals were required to send original documents by post from Gaza, where there is no functioning international postal service. Why does education matter so much? Because for Palestinians, education
has never been simply about getting a degree. It has been one of the ways we survive displacement. One of the ways knowledge and memory travel when people are forced from their land. It is one of the ways Palestinians have refused to disappear. And this is where the story comes back to Sydney. Because while Palestinian students study under raids, arrests and checkpoints, the USyd maintains exchange relationships with Tel Aviv University, Technion and the Hebrew University. A Palestinian student at Birzeit can be arrested and held without trial. Meanwhile, at Hebrew University sits a programme training officers for Israeli Military Intelligence. Cadets complete a university degree alongside military and intelligence training before entering officer roles. The programme itself describes this structure. One student experiences the military inside their university. The other studies at university as part of that military. And our university chooses to maintain an institutional relationship with it. That is why this debate cannot be reduced to whether boycotts threaten “academic freedom.” We have to ask a much more uncomfortable question: Whose academic freedom? What academic freedom exists for the students imprisoned without charge in the Westbank? For the child whose school is under a demolition order? For the Jerusalem student whose teacher cannot reach the classroom? For the student in Gaza whose university is rubble? For the scholarship student who cannot leave? From 22nd to 24th September, eligible USyd students will vote in an SRC referendum on whether the University should end exchange relationships with Israeli universities and end research partnerships with weapons companies supplying Israel. This is about institutional relationships, not boycotting individual Israeli students or academics. And those relationships are not permanent. USyd already chose not to renew its exchange with Bezalel Academy. UTS allowed its Technion partnership to lapse. Curtin ended its relationship with Ben-Gurion University. When we have the power to act, choosing to do nothing is still a choice. This referendum gives us a chance to take a stand against these institutional ties and vote YES to cut them.
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Bleats and Heckles: Notes from the 2026 Prez Debate Honi Soit goes to the zoo. The annual SRC presidential debate was an underwhelming occasion for answers to actual substantive questions, an overwhelming occasion for your senses, and a good preview to what campaigning in polling days will look like. The four presidential candidates, Vieve Carnsew (Solidarity), Grace Street (Grassroots), Ava Cavalerie (NLS), and Emma Searle (SAlt), were seated at the front of the Quadrangle Professorial Board Room, ever-so-slightly below the exasperated editors moderating. Flanked on either side were their friends and foes, ready to bleat and heckle.
Opening statements Street spoke to her extensive credentials. “Students need and deserve an SRC president who is principled, left wing, socialist, doing the work and getting shit done… I’ve been doing that this year as your president.” Searle said the “university is run like the corporate mega corporation, and I think students and staff have the power to take the fight to them”. She platformed policies of “immediate cost-ofliving relief” and the activist fight for a free Palestine and against Pauline Hanson. Carnsew also spoke to their activist credentials: “It has been activists on my ticket who have led the campaign to cut ties with Bezalel, which is the Israeli Art Academy. We no longer have that tie because of the fight we waged alongside students and staff at Sydney College of the Arts to break that tie.” Cavalerie contrasted her campaign to her opponents, who she said “explicitly view the SRC as a purely macro political vehicle” while she says “robust welfare is the absolute prerequisite for student power” and the SRC should “become a body of legitimacy: legitimate to students, to management, and to government.”
Deals & horses In answer to a question regarding her biggest criticism of her Presidency this year, Street said her biggest weakness was not “whipping” the executive of the
SRC to do their jobs. This was not a very self-reflective response, as was loudly noted by the other factions in the room. A notable moment of the night was when Emma Searle, talking about Cavalerie, said that it was shameful to be “a member of the Labor Party three years into the Gaza genocide”, and a member of Unity applauded. The room fell silent in disbelief while the Unity member hid his face and those around him hid their laughter. In Honi’s opinion this was pretty disgusting, even for Labor Right. Cavalerie re-iterated the Labor Left “change from within” motto, saying that there was “nothing about being in the Labor Party” that prevented her from advocating for Palestine. When questioned on the political reasoning behind their preelection deals, Street said that PENTA is a “left-wing” force in the SRC, drawing ire from SAlt, and Cavalerie said Unity was “prounion”, drawing heckles from most of the room. Searle justified the deal SAlt made with the SDA-aligned Labor Right at the University of Melbourne, saying “the reason why we do any dealing is… to get as many socialist activists into activist positions” before being drowned out by incredulous shouting from several factions. Both Cavalerie and Street spoke about the need to expand $5 meal provisions and the need for protecting the rights of workers operating the canteens. Street said that the canteens should be expanded to other campuses. Cavalerie said that $5 meals should be available for “lunches and dinners” (they already are) and brushed off “fear mongering” about horse meat. Carnsew said the SRC needs a “fighting strategy” to avoid these situations. “I don’t believe that anyone here wanted an unethical company that serves horse meat,” they said. Searle said that Left Action is campaigning for free canteens. “The university has the funding and the capacity to do that.”
Socialism in our time As each presidential-hopeful is a self-described socialist, Honi
asked the candidates to outline what that means to them, and which socialist figure they find the most inspirational. Cavalerie answered that she is a democratic socialist, and named Gough Whitlam as the socialist figure she finds most inspirational. Street explained that, to her, socialism means “liberation for all” through “grassroots movements” which are “bottom-up and communityled” and as such there was “not a single person I find most inspirational because I believe in community”. Searle said she is a “revolutionary socialist” and “if you think there’s anything redeemable about capitalism there’s something wrong with you”. To Searle, socialism to her means “working class people taking the reins”, saying “I find ordinary working class people the most inspirational”. Searle labelled Rosa Luxemburg her most inspirational socialist figure. Carnsew outlined how socialism interconnects struggles for Indigenous rights, womens’ rights, and queer rights, saying that “at the core of socialism is fighting for a better world in every sense, fighting the whole system”. They named Vladimir Lenin and Karl Marx as their biggest socialist inspirations. Socialist Alternative also took issue with Street being supported by the ‘Free from Exclusion’ ticket who unfurled a banner on the campaign trail with the quote “Serve the People” and “为人民服 务”. According to SAlt, this was an endorsement of Maoism and Stalinism. Street replied saying “I’m not a Stalinist” and that “it’s a simple slogan” and “identifiable by Chinese students” and not necessarily tied to the CCP. This was not the only time Street stood accused of being a Stalinist. Both Searle and Street are members of the NSW Socialists. Searle claimed that Street was a member of the Bread and Roses Caucus, which Searle said was “Stalinist”. The editors asked Street if she is or was ever a member of the caucus, to which she answered in the negative. Searle also attacked Carnsew for being part of Solidarity, who have advocated for pro-Palestine Labor MPs such as Anthony D’Adam to speak at rallies, deeming this incongruous to an effective
strategy to fight for Palestine. Carnsew defended Solidarity, saying “If there are people in the Labor Party who are willing to attack Albanese, if there are people getting kicked out of the Labor conference for holding up Palestine flags, I’m not going to say no. I say, yeah, join the rally. You should be fighting against Albanese.”
Who won? You decide Emma Searle and Grace Street performed well in the debate, both giving clear answers which responded to the substance of each question, whether it be addressing practicalities or politics. Searle’s style was typical of Socialist Alternative, at times standing, projecting her voice, and not backing away from a fight. Street’s performance was generally more measured, at times coming across less impassioned than Searle, other times coming across more logical. Street did, notably, have more gaffes than Searle. In the middle of the group was Vieve Carnsew, who managed to speak eloquently on their track record as an activist, and their political views, particularly regarding socialism, Palestine, and freedom of speech. Carnsew did, however, generally fail to answer more practical questions relating to the SRC, and at times re-tread similar ground when answering questions. In contrast to the other speakers, who had to be reminded of the time limit, Ava Cavalerie often spoke for under 40 seconds in response to questions. At times, Cavalerie took prolonged pauses before answering, which was especially awkward when she was asked about how she reconciles advocating for Palestine while representing the Labor Party. Cavalerie generally backed down in the face of heckling, ceasing to speak and directing us to move on, and generally declined her right of reply when named by other candidates. While overall a somewhat passable showing from Cavalerie, she paled in comparison to her debate-ready opponents, and some noted that by the end of the night Labor hecklers may have had more speaking time than their candidate.
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| OPINION
A Concise History of Trade Unions and Class Struggle in Australia Tara Marocchi is on strike. The union movement in Australia can trace much of its history to the formation of the Australian Labor Party in 1891. Though the Labor Party has claimed many union wins throughout Australia’s history, an analysis of this history shows that the ALP and many of its members have consistently attempted to stagnate radical politics espoused by far left-wing figures within the union movement. Examples of this are littered throughout Australian history, from the Party’s response to the Great Depression of the 1930s to the recent suspension of the construction division of CFMEU. But why is this? The construction of the colony of New South Wales first began with the violent dispossession of First Nations’ land and resources. This dispossession resulted in the construction of a penal settlement that was reliant on an imported convict labour force. This coerced labour would go on to construct much of the colony’s infrastructure, while the colony’s overseeing military officers and early settlers would soon cement themselves as the colony’s pastoralists, landowners and businessmen. These became the “native bourgeoisie” of colonial Australia. The colony itself was compact in its structure, and methods of brutality and coercion were routinely enforced by the colonial state. Marxist historian Tom O’Lincoln writes that early forms of resistance taken up by convicts often took on “individual and sometimes anarchic forms.” Surviving records also show that as early as 1791, convict workers had taken up industrial action demanding daily instead of weekly rations. The first organised groups bearing some resemblance to modern trade unions were formed during repeated wheat harvesting in 1795. Strike action became commonplace in the first half of the 19th century. Sometimes “busts of prosperity” would allow convict workers, often isolated and fragmented within their small shops, to use “pressure short of strike action” to seek some advancement of pay. Groups like the whalers and seamen union were usually most engaged with struggle in the workplace. Other unions that followed this example in
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the colony’s early years include the Boots and Shoemakers Union who struck for an advanced payment in 1831 and the Cabinet Makers Society in 1833. Levels of industrial militancy only fluctuated within New South Wales in the first Depression of the 1840s, though strike action did occur over this decade. The following decade saw the stonemasons struggle and eventually win in securing the eight-hourworkday in 1856. The Shearers Strike of 1891 is one of the most prominent and earliest examples of organised trade unionism in Australia. The strike led to the formation of the Labor Party in Australia, and the establishment of what became the Australian Workers’ Union. The exportation of wool had long been profitable in the colony since the 1830s. By the 1890s, wool made up half of Australia’s global exports, but this prosperity was soon to end. The 1890s also saw the beginnings of a large economic crisis in which the prices of commodities like wool declined. Subsequently, employers reacted to the failing economy by cutting wages and tensions between unionised shearers and the employers soon became apparent. The unionised shearers had previously declared that they were not to work with non-union labour, and in response to this, the employers introduced “non-union” labour that had the backing of the police. In January 1891, the shearers began their strike at the Logan Downs in Clermont after an employer had signed a contract which would reduce the shearers’ wages and decrease the influence of the union. Subsequently, over 3,000 workers took strike action, and the strike spread across several towns in Central Queensland. The strike lasted over several months but was ultimately unsuccessful after many of the unionists could not afford to fund the strike. The thirteen main leaders of the strike were also arrested in March 1891 and charged with conspiracy and treason against the British Crown. Newspapers of the day made no concessions to the shearers and their struggle: “It is to be hoped that many years will go by before the scenes of the first half of 1891 are repeated in Queensland.” The Great Depression of the
1930s shows one of the many examples of the Labor Party’s conservative approach in the case of economic crises in Australia. In August 1930, the Scullin Government sought out the advice of Sir Otto Niemeyer to advise on Australia’s economic policy going forward. Niemeyer suggested combatting rising unemployment by increasing tariffs to bolster revenue and slashing wages by 20 per cent. This plan became known as the ‘Melbourne Agreement’ (later adopted as the Premiers Plan). The plan was at first accepted by most members of the Labor Party as well as three Labor State Premiers as a “harsh medicine” which “had to be swallowed.” However, “The Premiers Plan” soon divided the Labor Party in 1931 when Cabinet member Joseph Lyons left the Party in January of that year (later forming the United Australia Party), and New South Wales Premier Jack Lang refused to pay austerity measures to the British Government, beginning the formation of the ‘Lang Labor caucus’ in NSW.
The Great Depression of the 1930s shows one of the many examples of the Labor Party’s conservative approach in the case of economic crises in Australia. Though this split did have implications for the Party in the years going forward, the responses from both factional splits of the Labor Party still remained economically conservative in its approach to a crisis that saw one in three Australian workers unemployed. In comparison, the Communist Party of Australia had also grown in membership in response to the increasing economic hardship of the Depression, and they were able to exert newfound influence through rank and file union organising through the Militant Minority Movement and the Unemployed Workers Movement, each of which advocated for expansion of welfare and protections for the unemployed. Following World War II, the union movement continued to grow. In the 1950s, two out of every three workers belonged to a trade union. Nevertheless, the political affiliations of trade unions and their officials were
not homogeneous. While the end of World War II saw many activists in the Communist Party of Australia become trade union officials, most officials lost their influence in the unions by the early ‘50s. Many Labor Party members instead emerged in the places of these Communist militants, entrenching themselves in the union’s bureaucracy and taking a conservative approach to their position. The latter half of the 20th century also saw the beginning of the weakening of the industrial power of trade unions. Again, the Labor Party played a large role throughout this process, beginning with the Prices and Incomes Accords of 1983. The Accords forced unions to trade their bargaining powers for wages indexed by the Arbitration Commission and eventually through the patchwork system of enterprise agreements, and though it was met with some resistance by the Builders Labourers Federation and the Nurses and Midwives’ Union, its implementation was steadfast and catastrophic for the movement. The rest of the 1980s saw the loss of real wages and an increase in profit share. Throughout the ‘90s, organising in the workplace decreased and industries collapsed, leaving the union movement to become virtually non-existent throughout the 2000s. In today’s climate, trade unions are continuing to face increasing attacks on their right to operate by the Labor Party and other conservative outlets like the Murdoch media. It is a testament to the inner militancy of unions like the CFMEU and the Retail and Fast-Food Workers Union (RAFFWU) that continue to push back against the inner bureaucracy of the political establishment. The trade union movement must completely separate themselves from the forces that would rather see them falter and instead take a leaf from the politics espoused by the movement’s left-wing workers and members. Only then can unions push towards a new chapter of its history in Australia.
OPINION |
A ‘good, sensible’ curriculum: our education system is failing women Sofia Dillon feminises the education system. With overworked teachers facing the lion’s share of responsibility, our education systems cannot meaningfully tackle young boys’ behaviour. Neither should young girls be expected to both put up with it and remain emotionally regulated themselves. It seems National’s leader Matt Canavan would disagree. Earlier this month, Canavan argued that the “feminisation” of curriculums was driving sexual violence in young men. In a statement released to Channel Nine, Canavan acknowledged how “toxic” online environments contribute to gendered violence. However, he blamed modern education models as driving boys towards this content: “They’re sick and tired of getting lectured about how bad men are at school,” he said. Angus Taylor followed suit a few days later. On ABC Breakfast, he was asked if consent should be taught in schools. He danced around the question for a moment, saying that men should grow up to be “good, sensible Australians”. After being pressed further for his opinion on consent education specifically, he responded that agendas were “being run by some teachers” and the curriculum was unbalanced. At a time of many high profile sexual assault cases, it is inevitable that both politicians would have to face the growing concern around adolescent gendered violence. However, the Coalition’s decision to pin blame on education systems is unusual when almost all other sources point primarily to manosphere influencers. On examining the curriculums, it seems most of these criticisms are targeted at the Respectful Relationships Education (RRE) framework. Approved in 2022, it aims to teach consent, healthy relationship skills, and emotional regulation strategies from years K-10. Here is where, Canavan would say, education systems are making men feel bad about themselves. The culprit of bad behaviour seems to be curriculums teaching kindergarteners to “express and describe emotions”, or a year five student to “identify gender norms”, or perhaps a year nine student to “communicate assertively and respectfully when seeking, giving or denying consent”. The idea that consent education is to blame for rising adolescent violence is, of course, paradoxical.
Teaching young boys about consent does not make them resent women. The Australian Government’s yearly domestic, family, and sexual violence commission, released on 9th September, urges the curriculum to further integrate consent education into the curriculum,
and has done so consistently for years. “Early intervention” is one of its key recommendations, especially within our education system. At a time when we have attained our highest family domestic violence offender rate in 2024–2025 since 2019, the recommendations made in the commission become integral. In 2026, this has highlighted yet again that our education system needs to do more.
Attempts to align consent education with increased gendered violence are hard to read as anything but a deflective ploy to retain the support of right-leaning voters, which the centre-right has so clearly lost to One Nation. It seems that rather than offering alternatives, major political parties have decided to try and beat Pauline at her own game, a mystifying decision.The NSW Government education information page highlights a few policies. It states that staff’s main priority is maintaining the wellbeing of all students, including those accused of perpetuating violence. Ultimately however, the requirements for teachers or staff are relatively limited in the case of sexual violence. Pointing out these limited requirements in no way means more responsibility should be placed on teachers. A shrinking public education sector and increasing staff burnout means putting outsized blame on staff is unfair. In fact, many teachers themselves report being subjected to misogynistic harassment and violence. The Monash University Duty of Care study found that 77 per cent of teachers report that misogynistic behaviour has had a negative impact on their wellbeing. With an education system largely dominated by female teachers (76 per cent according to teacher workforce polls) most of our public sector educators are now dealing with the influence of the manosphere.
Trauma-informed Practice in Schools Explainer indicates that students experiencing trauma may be prone to difficulty with concentration and emotional stability, resulting in behavior deemed as acting out. Educators are not adequately provided with the resources to deal with these behaviourwws, leaving both female staff and students to deal with the ramifications of misogynistic behaviour alone. This is why Teachers are pushing against these soft-touch policy approaches. The 2026 Monash university found that teachers would prefer whole-school integrated responses to misogyny, rather than isolated policy. This came at odds with the 40 per cent of schools which had no clear policy. The Commission recommends increased support for essential staff on the frontlines of sexual violence response, earlier intervention for violent behaviour, and better overall training for staff.
The underpaying and understaffing of the teaching sector is a part of this puzzle that cannot go unaddressed. What remains is a necessity to provide better resources for our teachers. Earlier and more explicit education surrounding consent is also recommended by the Commission. We must therefore reform our education systems, just not in the ways Canavan or Taylor might prefer— and reform is certainly not done by leaving the work to teachers and girls.
With staff turnover already so high, manosphere-influenced misogyny is becoming more and more detrimental to quality education. It is not only female teachers facing the brunt of manosphere influence — 24 per cent of female students in the Tomorrow Women Report said they felt unsafe at school, with 22 per cent reporting physical abuse from male peers, and 21 per cent reporting sexual abuse. Verbal bullying and harassment took up the largest amount of misogynistic behaviour affecting young girls’ education. 43 per cent polled reported verbal harassment with 36 per cent stating they felt classroom dynamics had become hostile. In terms of young girls experiencing gendered violence in relationships, the
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| OPINION
Radical Self-Care is Not A $50 Serum Robyn Mazloumian takes self care back to its roots.
When Audre Lorde first wrote about self-care in her 1988 essay collection A Burst of Light, she proclaimed, “I had to examine, in my dreams as well as in my immune-function tests, the devastating effects of overextension. Overextending myself is not stretching myself. I had to accept how difficult it is to monitor the difference. Necessary for me as cutting down on sugar. Crucial. Physically. Psychically. Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is selfpreservation, and that is an act of political warfare.” At this time, the activist and poet was battling cancer, comparing her experience to that of fighting racism and social discrimination. Discrimination can be experienced as an attack on the body, one’s immune system, creating a deep and abyssal fatigue. A world which opposes what you put out into it can often feel akin to your body denying you health. Within Audre Lorde’s statement is an acknowledgement that there are systems in the world which are designed with the intent to cause harm. Consequently, self-care is then a radical defence of survival in a hostile environment: when you are not supposed to live as you are, survival thus becomes a radical act of refusing to submit. Caring for yourself to ensure your preservation is a revolutionary act. Engaging in self-care in the face of such a world enables you to then responsibly engage in activism without overextending yourself to the point of danger. However, somewhere in the pigmented gloss of social media and advertising,
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self-care has become a performance which serves to perpetuate the survival of corporations. Self-care, taking time ultimately to better tackle systemic social inequality has transformed into a commodityfocused ‘wellness’ industry, marked by overconsumption of goods which perpetuate the very confining and oppressive social structures we aim to overthrow. It is impossible for self-care to be an act of political warfare if the battle is against lovehandles and wrinkles; if the tools for selfcare must be marketed, bought, and sold by a corporation. What we see is an oversaturation of ‘retail therapy’, encouraging effortless and temporary solutions to perpetual problems with systemic causes.
Fatigue from work, living under capitalism, engaging in activism, and driving communities, cannot be unwinded by lavender facial cleansers. With the drive towards aesthetics and what visually impresses, we have come to emphasise the appearance of things rather than the connection we hold with them and the influence they can have. Effectively, people thus fixate on the display of their commodities, producing a cycle of impulsive and emotionally charged purchases, ironically antithetical to the mental sustenance and support which is pivotal to true self-care. What Karl Marx coined ‘commodity fetishism’ marks this shift from revolutionary self-care. In Capital, he states that the cultural and psychological impact of living within a capitalist system is shown by consumers treating
commodities as somewhat mystical products, removed from the exploitation of the workers who produce them. Rather than turning to the things which can truly enrich, we turn to new products, a far easier and simplistic form of care. The version of self-care promoted through commodity fetishism is intrinsically synonymous with spending copious amounts of money to feel temporarily relieved from stress. The problem lies in the fundamental associations of self-care; it is far too capitalistically driven, rather than motivated by nurturing the collective. The deep irony in this is that self-care no longer associates itself with those marginalised groups which need the care most. Rather, these communities cannot even access the products and lifestyles which are flung towards us in the name of a consumerist luxury. What sits at the core of the shifting attitudes towards self-care is the focus from collectivism to individualism. Where the concept was pioneered by those who had community in mind, it was coopted and bastardised by those who already wielded the power — the heads of our capitalist system which thrives on selfreliance and competition.
Thus, the monetisation of self-care has taught us to prioritise personal ‘peace’ or ‘relaxation’, ultimately forming a further sense of alienation and isolation. Consequently, the capitalist ‘self-care’ that dominates is a means of disconnecting from the responsibility of
caring for our peers, removing ourselves from a collective which nurtures us and upholds our mutual care, and placing a price barrier on ‘wellness’ — so we may feel grateful, at least, that we earn enough to purchase something that will make us well. Purchasing consumerist luxuries are merely quick, superficial solutions to deep systemic issues. Rather than confronting the causes of these concerns — poor working rights, psychological effects of discrimination and/or capitalism, a flawed healthcare system, the cost of living crisis — we are provided with fast fixes which ultimately benefit the corporations that uphold and profit from these oppressive structures. What is required is a deep consideration of when and how to care for oneself. As activists, it is difficult to take a break from our screaming when we know the voices we have are already far too limited. Yet, it is impossible to continue our efforts when our throats have become hoarse. Additionally, activists not noticing or caring for symptoms of overextension can negatively impact a community, despite best intentions. Self-care is crucial; physically, psychically. As overextension wears us thin, we must understand the causes of self preservation, thus conserving the movements we live and fight for. Sleep. Eat home cooked meals. Take days away from responsibilities to sit in a park. Meet friends and family over dinner. Focusing only on all the ways the capitalist system breaks you down, focusing on this all day every day, may actually help it to break you down. Radical self-care works against this. We must begin to reclaim self-care, and practice it, for ourselves and our communities.
Students’ Representative Council, University of Sydney 2026 Elections
VOTE!
2026 SRC Elections & Referendum
2026 SRC Elections & Referendum will take place on 22, 23 & 24 September The 2026 referendum question is as follows:
‘The University must adopt an academic boycott policy against Israeli institutions complicit in apartheid and genocide and immediately end all exchange relationships with Israeli universities including Tel Aviv University, Technion and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The University must also end all research partnerships with weapons companies supplying Israel. The SRC will pursue this policy and support the struggle for Palestinian freedom.’ POLLING
TUE 22ND
WED 23RD
THURS 24TH
LOCATION
SEPT 2026
SEPT 2026
SEPT 2026
Jane Foss Russell
8:45 – 17:15
8:45 – 17:15
8:45 – 17:15
Fisher Library
No polling
8:45 – 17:15
8:45 – 17:15
Manning House
No polling
10:45 – 15:15
No polling
Conservatorium of Music
No polling
10:30 – 15:30
No polling
Susan Wakil Health Building
No polling
No polling
10:45 – 15:15
Peter Nicol Russell Building
No polling
No polling
10:45 – 15:15
All Sydney University undergraduate students who are currently enrolled are eligible to vote in the upcoming 2026 SRC Elections. For more info see: bit.ly/SRC-elections Authorised by K. Latty, 2026 Electoral Officer, Students’ Representative Council, University of Sydney p: 02 9660 5222 | w: bit.ly/SRC-elections
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| CULTURE
Introducing John Berger Few authors of the past century match the scope, scale and sensitivity with which John Berger wrote. Known most notably for his 1972 book (and concurrent BBC Programme) Ways of Seeing, the London native contributed extensively to the style and substance of non-fiction and fiction across his career, penning novels, essays, poems, screenplays, art criticism, as well as works impossible to categorise. And while it is out of the scope of this essay to merit all of his work, I wanted to give some recommendations. But first, the briefest of introductions. John Berger was born in Stoke Newington, London in 1926. After serving in WWII (1944-1946), Berger studied and taught painting and drawing, with some London exhibitions. He published his first book A Painter of Our Time in 1958. He died in his Paris home in 2017.
Ways of Seeing (1972) Ways of Seeing is Berger’s most culturally significant work. His seven essays (three entirely pictorial) reproduce a history of Western Art, and posit that western phenomena of ownership, exploitation and consumerism define the form. Chapter Three is regarded as the first published conception of the ‘male gaze’, wherein the production of images in the Western Artistic tradition serves a decidedly male spectator/owner of the image.
In Berger’s analysis of European Oil painting, he notes the contorted, hairless unreality with which the nude woman is depicted, an unreality uniquely suited to Europe’s patriarchal sociality. Berger writes: “You painted a naked woman because you enjoyed looking at her, you put a mirror in her hand and you called the painting Vanity, thus morally condemning the woman whose nakedness you had depicted for your own pleasure.” - Chapter 3, Ways of Seeing All essays from Ways of Seeing are freely accessible from ways-of-seeing.com.
Understanding a Photograph (2013) If I could recommend one essay from Berger, it is Image of Imperialism (1967-8), the first from his 2013 publication Understanding a Photograph, edited and introduced by Geoff Dyer. The collection of essays opens on a photograph of Ernesto “Che” Guevara, one taken shortly after his assasination. My own description bows to Berger’s, whose symposium of visual references drew from this flat image the reincarnated motifs I thought were new. In his vision, the man unshaven and lifeless is not only Guevara, he is also the punctured, deflated martyr in Mantegna’s The Dead Christ. This exercise of relational viewing allows for deeper interrogations on what is painted and captured and why, and it is here that I first experienced it.
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The broadening of this image to its semiotic family is coupled with an equally broad contemplation of emancipation and rebellion. In the global orchestra of Imperialist exploitation, Berger dissects the writings of French revolutionary SaintJust and Russian Anarchist Voinarovsky to attempt to answer what Guevara’s dead body has been asking all along: how does one live and die a revolutionary? As he wrote, the Vietnam War reaffirmed the brutality of the American Regime. A staunch Marxist, and vocal supporter of the Vietnamese resistance, Berger’s essay is summarised best on page 15; “The world is not intolerable until the possibility of transforming it exists but is denied.” The rest of the collection features correspondence with Susan Sontag, two works on Henri Cartier-Bresson, and a myriad of fax messages, interviews and writings. For those enthused by the metaphysical analysis of images in Ways of Seeing, you will like Appearances (1982), Stories (1982) and the titular essay Understanding a Photograph (1968).
G. (1972) G. (1972) reads as less of a novel and more of an oratory, told by the senior gentleman waiting for the same bus as you, heading away as opposed to towards. Set across the lifespan of its mono-lettered protagonist ‘G’, the story details a sexual and political condensation, as the Don Giovanni archetype is confronted by the truth of Europe’s turbulence in the early 1900s. Across this central story, Berger digresses, sketches pictures of genitals with eyes, details the Macbeth-like impotence of the Boers in South Africa, the Icarian fall of Geo Chavez over the Alps. It won the Booker Prize, the Guardian Fiction Prize, and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction. In his Booker Prize Speech for G., Berger made the conscious decision to critique the 130-year history of exploitation in the Caribbean at the behest of Booker McConnell. The fallout of this impoverishment led to the mass exodus of West Indians to Europe, where they took on the least desirable of work. Half of the prize sum was put towards Berger’s next work, which would focus on documenting and dignifying these workers. The other half, Berger donated to the LondonBased Black Panther Movement, in solidarity with their cause. The full speech can be found in the 2020 publication Steps Towards a Small Theory of the Visible. In it, one can also find his incredible essay on the phenomenological differences in consumption across class boundaries The Eaters and the Eaten.
John Berger reads ‘Letter From Gaza’ (2008/2024) The short story Letter from Gaza (1955) is not Berger’s, instead written by the Palestinian author Ghassan Kanafani, whom the Mossad assassinated in 1972. Published on Youtube by the Palestine
Tim Pudun gets radicalised. Festival of Literature in its inaugural year, Berger’s contribution of his living voice fans the unkillable fire of Kanafani.
By the end, Berger is visibly shaken, taking off his glasses, hands pleading for the front of his face. This recitation is where I would actually start with Berger. I was walking across Barangaroo to somewhere. I started playing this, and put my earphones in and my phone deep in my jacket pocket. I could not see the photographs interspersed with the reading, nor his expression as he hunted for the next line. There comes a point in the story where walking ceases to be possible. At that reveal, I had stopped my stride briefly and looked up past the wharf to where the sun had keeled over, leaking red into the water.
I felt incredible, living, pain, like the pain of that sun that had refused to die, that crawled with its wounded light across the world ceaselessly. Berger’s talent lies in the absolute restlessness with which he sought out the best examples of art, the best living artists and fighters and thinkers. If we can follow his example, if we can seek out and uplift the voices most worthy and muffled, we will have given his work the honour it deserves.
Art by Yasodara Perera
CULTURE |
Finding “Terry Pedestrian”: Unmasking the most prolific and mysterious musician in Sydney Ryan Dell drives his car every day. Grant Denyer / drives his car every day Grant drives to work where he stays / Grant drives home where he plays He drives here! He drives there! Grant Denyer / drives his car everywhere! When you open up Apple Music or Spotify and search for Grant Denyer, nestled right underneath two of Denyer’s singles is the song “Grant Denyer”, from the album More Celebrity Driving Songs by the band Terry Pedestrian & the Crossing. For just one minute and nineteen seconds, Terry sings a cheerful ditty about driving into town and driving to the shops that ends with, “Grant Denyer! Here is your driving song!” Over the past twelve years, Terry has released 400 of these ‘driving songs’ across eight albums. But, as anyone who finds Terry’s music quickly learns, every single one of his songs is completely identical. The only difference is that, on every track, Terry swaps out the name and pronouns to sing about a different celebrity. While the list of names is eclectic and includes some historical figures like Genghis Khan and Vlad the Impaler, the vast majority of the songs are about contemporary Australian celebrities and comedians — who have spent more than a decade privately sharing Terry’s songs with each other, both amused and confused. “I genuinely thought, oh, I guess I’m famous,” laughs actor and comedian Cameron James, most recently seen onscreen in ABC’s Bad Company. Back in 2014, a listener to Cameron’s Blank Slate Movie Podcast sent him a link to his personalised song. Talking to Honi, Cameron remembered his initial excitement well: “Oh my god, this guy’s written a bespoke song for me. How amazing… And then I listened to, like, four others.” James Colley, television producer and current head writer for Gruen, was also caught off-guard when he listened to his personalised song for the first time. “My initial reaction was fight or flight. Then, I listened again and had to hand it to him. I do drive my car every day. I’d be a fool to deny it.” In interviews, Honi asked everyone they talked to to offer up a theory about why Terry was recording and releasing his songs. Marcel Blanche-de Wilt, comedian and improv teacher, suspected at first that it was a strange form of cyberbullying. He recalled that his first reaction to hearing his song was: “Am I being made fun of or something?” But he quickly came around: “I was able to determine pretty quickly that it was a good natured comedy fan doing something weird and hilarious.” Cameron James offered up a different theory, comparing Terry’s work to Matt Farley, the American comedian who lives off of the streaming proceeds of the 26,000
highly-specific songs he’s uploaded to Spotify. “I think his endgame was to get money. You get paid 3 cents per stream.” And when Honi interviewed Grant Denyer, he wasn’t sure either. “He’s either really got to love the medium, or… he’s batshit crazy, or it’s a joke.” As an earnest question, every celebrity and comedian interviewed for this piece was asked if they had ever actually listened to their song while driving. They all said no. Except Denyer. “My kids play it all the time when I’m driving them to school, and it just makes them laugh and laugh. For whatever reason, they just can’t play it once. So I was worried about what others would think at the traffic lights. Oh my god, he’s listening to his song about himself.” When asked if he has any knowledge about Terry Pedestrian’s real identity, Denyer shakes his head. “I don’t know anyone committed to their art enough to bother making 400 songs about dickhead celebrities. This is one of my life’s greatest questions. Who the fuck is this guy? It’s the music version of Banksy.” But Honi is proud to report that, after weeks of sorting through audio file metadata, combing through podcast transcripts for mentions of driving songs, and a single blind message sent to a stranger using a LinkedIn Premium free trial, we’ve tracked down the real Terry Pedestrian — musician, father, and USYD alumnus.
Meet Oli Harris In an interview with Honi, Oliver “Oli” Harris has confirmed that he was the artist behind all 400 Terry Pedestrian songs — as well as The Surname Rockers, The Belated Birthday Anthems, and almost a dozen other artists whose work is available to stream. “The names always just suited whatever the topic I chose was.” After graduating from the Sydney Conservatorium of Music in 2003 with a Bachelor of Music in Performance (major in tuba), Oli moved to Bathurst. “I was volunteering at 2MCE, which was the community radio station attached to Charles Sturt University. I had an interest in script writing at the time, and I was staying back after my radio show to write and record Monty Python style skits.” Oli says that the release of these tracks, published online under the alias Channel Surf, allowed him to meet other underground artists, including Matt Farley. “I got talking to [Matt] about what it’s like, singing songs in that fashion, and he told me about Spotify.” The novelty — and potential income stream — intrigued Oli. “I thought I would satisfy my curiosity, and be ahead of a curve.” Just like Farley, Oli started recording Terry
Pedestrian songs en masse and uploading them to CD Baby, an American distribution aggregator service that publishes songs across 150+ platforms simultaneously for only $9.99 USD per album. When asked how he selected who to devote the driving songs to, Oli explained that he started making his Terry Pedestrian songs “with either Mel Gibson or Paul Hogan, and I think the whole first album was people of that calibre of fame.” Eventually, as he started to run out of names, he realized that the more songs he made, the more interesting the list was. Out of curiosity, he decided to put out an album exclusively namedropping podcasters and comedians. “I kind of felt they’d see and wonder what was going on, and they did.” After about thirteen years of streams, Oli estimates that his total earnings from all of his CD Baby uploads are about $3,800 USD — a figure that accounts for the IRS taxing his earnings, since they were generated through an American business. Oli estimates about a third of this total is solely from the Terry Pedestrian tracks, with the rest being accumulated by his other songs due to strategically picked keywords in the titles like “audiobook” or “Olympics”. Oli stopped publishing Terry Pedestrian tracks in 2017. He gave two reasons why: “I moved from Bathurst to Port Macquarie so I lost the access and time I had in a studio, and I haven’t found a replacement here yet.” Also, during this time, Oli became a parent. “My children were very young. Raising them, along with work, has meant less time for hobbies.” When asked whether there’ll be any Terry Pedestrian comeback in the future, Oli hedged. “The more independent [my children] become, the more likely I’ll be to find some time to put music out again.” “In whatever form, I’m not sure.”
| SRC OFFICEBEARERS’ REPORTS
President Grace Street (Grassroots) communications to come about proposed changes to academic integrity policies, special cons, replacement exams, the use of AI, your choice of courses, and much more…
This week was a big one I helped organised and spoke at the Students Stand Against Sexual Violence rally on Tuesday, chaired the Students Oppose the OpenAI deal on Wednesday, and spoke at the USyd leg of the Students Say NO to Hanson rally on Thursday all while elections are happening! The grind doesn’t stop, and neither do attacks from the University. Keep an eye out for
Make sure to get out and vote in the elections this week! Importantly, we have a referendum on USyd cutting ties with Israeli institutions complicit in genocide (like Tel Aviv Uni, the Technion, and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem) - we need 3,000 students to vote for it to be valid, and at least 2,000 students to vote YES for it to pass! Find out more information on the SRC website about the referendum or in the Week 6/Election edition of Honi Soit. Good luck to all those with mid-sems remaining! In solidarity, Grace Street
Kayla Hill (Grassroots) and Remy Lebreton (Grassroots)
Here are some of the things we’ve gotten up to for DIM: Kayla helped deliver a masterclass for educators on Universal Design Learning in assessment design. An article on the Teaching@Sydney website recounts this session. Kayla appeared on a panel organised by SULS about accessing disability support in the law school. DisCo is also currently organising a panel about disability and student advocacy for next Monday 28th September.
The far right continues to rise and remains a threat to the safety of all people and marginalised groups. We cannot take it lying down and we need to fight back against the threat of Pauline Hanson, and the likes of antichoice ‘activists’ Joanna Howe and her vile husband that represent a strain of misogynistic and patriarchal political thought that threatens to drag us back to the medieval period. It’s also been horrifying to observe the Labor party capitulate on the debate on refugees and asylum seekers, with Tony Burke promising sweeping changes that use international students and migrants as political footballs. Make no mistake, this IS racist, and only fuel to the fire of an increasingly white nationalist tendency in our multicultural country.
Ava Cavalerie (Labor Left) Vince Tafea (Grassroots) We unequivocally condemn the University’s partnership with OpenAI which was rammed through with no consultation with the NTEU, and during a bargaining period in which a key demand of our teachers and staff at the university has been protections against AI. Students don’t want AI chat bots as their teachers, and they certainly don’t want our university to contribute to the collapse of the climate and world. Honestly there is so much more that we can’t include in this short report, that’s how fucked the world is at the moment, but we need to fight. Do you want to be a part of the student movement that fights back against fascism? Get involved in the SRC. In Solidarity, Vince & Ava
Ethnocultural Officers
Imane Lattab (Grassroots) and Pimala Leo (Grassroots)
Disabilities & Carers Officers It’s currently Disability Inclusion Month, or DIM (according to the University of Sydney anyway). Disability inclusion hardly feels attainable when disabled students are denied their adjustments and forced to face the exhaustion of ableist university policy.
General Secretary
Several students have recently reported issues with their Academic Plans as well as applying for Simple Extensions and Special Considerations. Kayla also had a meeting with the SRC Casework and Policy team about out-ofdate accessibility information on University websites. We will be following up on these matters at the Q3 DIAP Meeting. We are horrified about the news that Covid vaccines will no longer be free for many people. Go get your booster shot before 1 October and remember to mask up and test regularly!
Vice President
Members of the Autonomous Collective Against Racism (ACAR) attended the consultation session run by the University of Sydney Union (USU) on August 31 to seek community opinions on their partnerships. Although we welcome the USU taking the initiative to collaborate with the USyd community which they aim to serve, we urge the new USU board to take immediate action in condemning the genocide of the Palestinian people undertaken by the Zionist entity. It is particularly disappointing to see the recent establishment of Game Square USYD, which the USU has created in collaboration with the University, due to their use of Alienware computers for the gaming hub. Alienware is a computer hardware company, specialising in gaming tech, which is a subsidiary brand of Dell Technologies. Dell
supplies servers, services, and other equipment to the IDF. Furthermore, they conduct research and development activity in the National Cyber Park, which aims to strengthen illegal settlements in Naqab, the home of indigenous Bedouin Palestinians. Scan the QR code below to join ACAR, keep up with updates and event announcements, and follow our socials! ACAR is open to anyone who identifies as Bla(c) k, First Nations, a ‘person of colour’, or an ethnic identity that is otherwise marginalised by white supremacy.
Social Justice Officers
Shovan Bhattarai (SAlt) and Bohao Zhang (PENTA)
Jaseena Al-Helo (Grassroots), April Howison (NLS) Emma Searle (SAlt), Eva Sutherland (SAlt)
The Vice-Presidents did not submit a report for this week.
The Social Justice Officers did not submit a report for this week.
20
SRC RESOURCES |
Tenancy Tips: Completing an accurate condition report for your rental property
Ask AskAbe Abe SRC Caseworker Help Q&A
Centrelink payments and your savings Dear Abe, Someone told me I couldn’t get Centrelink because I had some savings. That doesn’t seem fair to me. Is that correct? Save me
Dear Save me, If you successfully apply for a Centrelink payment, they will begin paying you based on your “liquid assets”, Tenancy Tips: The Condition Report When you move into a rental property, you should be given a “condition report” completed by the landlord or agent. This lists each room in the house and states whether things are clean and working, e.g., carpets, lights, and oven. Most real estate agents are lazy and sometimes a bit dishonest when it comes to the condition report and will say that everything is clean and working. The condition report can be used as evidence at the end of your tenancy if there is a dispute over returning your bond. Completing your report You have seven days to complete your condition report and return a copy to the agent/landlord: this is your opportunity to make any corrections and create a record of anything that is damaged, broken or dirty. If it is at all possible, complete your condition report before you move your things in. Test every power point, every light, and the stove/oven. Check that the underside of the blinds, inside of the oven, and light covers are clean. If something is damaged or dirty, note it in the report even if you don’t care whether it is clean or working. If you do not state that something was dirty or broken in your condition report, the landlord/agent can hold you responsible for getting it cleaned or fixed when you move out. If the landlord/agent doesn’t give you a condition report, you can write your own report listing anything that is dirty or broken and email this to
which includes money you have saved, stocks and shares, etc. You need to wait one week for every $500 (rounded down) over $5,000 (single person with no dependent children), to a maximum wait time of 13 weeks. It is possible that your liquid assets can be reduced for educational expenses, e.g., a laptop, HECS-HELP payments, up-front course fees, text books, etc. Abe
the landlord/agent. This is better than using social media messages, as it is clearly timestamped, and viewed by the tribunal as being a written form of communication.
For more information on how savings affects Centrelink payments, scan the QR code to read the article online.
Photos might save a lot of money! Take photos. Lots of photos. This will help you to prove what you have said in your condition report or email. Everything that is dirty or broken should be photographed. Email those photos to yourself, even if your phone gives a timestamp. If you need to go to the tribunal to claim back your bond, you will have irrefutable proof of the condition the property when you moved in. Moving out and getting your bond back After you move out, take lots of photos showing that you have left the property in a clean state. Include photos of the floors, walls, windows, lights, stovetop/oven, bathtub, toilet, sinks, cupboards, lawn, garden beds, etc. Again, email them to yourself so that they are timestamped. That way, if the property is dirtied or something breaks after you have left, you will not need to pay for that damage. Need help? If you have any questions about getting your bond/deposit returned, or any other accommodation question, ask an SRC Caseworker, We’re happy to help.
If you need advice from a SRC Caseworker, start an enquiry by filling out the contact form. Scan the QR code, or bit.ly/contact-a-caseworker
Do you need to apply for Special Consideration for illness, injury or misadventure? SRC Caseworkers can provide advice on applying for Special Consideration & appealing rejected applications.
contact a caseworker bit.ly/contact-a-caseworker
srcusyd.net.au 02 9660 5222
21
| PUZZLES
Themed Crossword
Crossword by Harper Boon
Dusting Off The Cobwebs
Across:
1. Maybe robots will stop us having to work if this Sci-Fi legend gets his way… then again, maybe not (6) 5. Descriptor of productivity, especially fertility (6) 10. Assessment due tomorrow? Time to pull one of these (7) 11. Give a false appearance, or faking it until you make it (7) 12. 2022 American sports comedy-drama film starring Adam Sandler (6) 14. Dolly Parton’s working hours, with “Five” (4, 2) 15. Wanting to do even better than someone else (7) 17. Foolish or gullible people (4) 18. Places with heavy metal? 19. Equilibrium between work and life (7) 20. What you might catch to work (4) 22. Serve up meat, perhaps, as a portion? (4) 25. Torment oneself over a Greek competition? (7) 27. An Italian fruit whose name is given to a type of study routine (6) 28. I hope these find you well (6) 31. Sick of the “rent”? Maybe move to this place and open up a restaurant (5, 2) 32. Winning this might not be so great if you’re Shirley Jackson (7) 33. South Korean director whose 2019 magnum opus explored economic inequality (4, 2) 34. ____ hard? Now it’s time to play hard (6)
Down:
2. Enlists or enrols (5, 2) 3. Steel yourself? (6) 4. Grammar’s action hero (4) 5. A work pattern for miners, abbr. (4) 6. Critical situation or emergency (6) 7. Stay away from corruption! Get thee to one of these! (7) 8. Makes slow progress (6) 9. Extremely unpleasant (6) 13. Official ban on trade (7) 14. Patrick Bateman, in a nutshell? (7) 16. Wise up (5) 20. Assess again after failure (6) 21. A day of rest, in Spain (7) 23. Palantir’s sinister stare (4, 3) 24. Tries, in France (6) 25. To reach one’s goal (6) 26. Be cautious if you’re one of these, in Latin (6) 29. Office note, briefly (4) 30. Way to take yourself to the top, alternatively a certain Get Smart villain (4)
The People Want Answers! Here are the answers for all previous crosswords from this semester.
SRC ticket profile from 1993.
Honi Soit 1966
Ad for The Co-op Bookshop in a 2001 Honi
Quiz 1. Who is the founder of the Greens? 2. How old is Gina Rinehart? 3. What did Macklemore say at Ed Sheeran’s concert that led to him being removed from the tour? 3. Where was Pauline Hanson born? 4. Why was Hanson expelled from the Liberal Party? 5. Who needs to be awoken in In the Night Garden? Answers: 1. Bob Brown, 2. 72, 3. Free Palestine, 3. Brisbane, 4. She called for the ‘abolition’ of government assistance for Aboriginal Australians, 5. Iggle Piggle
22
UNETHICAL SATIRE SINCE 1929
Libel
Slander
Defamation
Proudly hateful
Dividing the USyd student community
ED SHEERAN SAYS “GOOD PEOPLE ON BOTH SIDES” OF HORSEMEAT ISSUE
COUPLE MAKING OUT IN FISHER LIBRARY ANNOUNCES PLANS TO Ryan Dell reports. RELOCATE
Ed Sheeran has come under fire recently for his maintenance of a “neutral” perspective on all matters, including war crimes, genocide, intentional starvation, and colonisation.
Sheeran recently attempted to take the focus off that controversy by bringing up the recent USyd x Compass Group partnership, saying: “There’s good people on both sides of this horsemeat thing. There’s good animals on both sides, frankly. And who’s to say people shouldn’t be fed horsemeat against their will? That’s certainly not for me to decide.” The attempt at deflection has not worked.
At a press conference yesterday evening on the Cadigal Green, second-year law students Andy Doinkler and Samantha Doinkler (no relation) confirmed their plans to vacate the Fisher Library permanently. “Our conduct was disrespectful, unnecessary, and — if I’m being honest — quite performative,” confessed a stoic Mr. Doinkler. “It was the wrong time, and the wrong place”, asserted Mrs. Doinkler as she gently pried the microphone out of Mr Doinkler’s hands. In response to questioning, Mrs. Doinkler confirmed rumors that their change of heart was prompted by the intervention of a kind stranger. “As we were passionately making out in front of the Print Studio — and, although I shudder as I recall this, right as Andy’s hand rubbed against my cheekbone — this svelte gentleman, no older than 27 by my eye, walked past us. He politely and subtly muttered under his breath: Jesus, get a room next time.” “We heard every single barely-audible word that he said. It was the wake-up call we needed”, confirmed Mr. Doinkler. Mr. and Mrs. Doinkler were last seen waving goodbye to the press, as they crawled into an Uber Black and requested the fastest possible route to the Capsule Hotel on George Street.
In Next Week’s Edition... A Handie’s
My Mother and the Whore that Fathered M e Freak Bob sp eaks
Tale: How H andjobs Te a
ch Repress io Emily E. lets
go.
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nographicism Towards an Interpretation of Pseudolexico JFS works toward a general theory.
.
Fuck you Mark x2.
stujocon ‘26 Saturday 10th October
10–11am Event registration and opening 11am–1pm Unfucking Australian Media: Michael West, Lamestream, and Antoun Issa in Conversation 1–3pm Lunch 3–4pm Protecting Journalism in the Age of AI: Shona Martyn & the MEAA 4–5pm Literature, Art, and the Critic: Geordie Williamson and Neha Kale 5–6pm Tigest Girma, author of ‘Immortal Dark’ 6–7pm Comics, Caricatures, Political Cartoons: A workshop 7–8pm Trivia with #editors
Sunday 11th October 10–11am Antony Green: The ABCs of Psephology 11am–12pm Journalism in Conflict: Patricia Garcia and Jake Lynch 12am–1pm Amy Remeikis: The “Incivility” of Political Journalism 1–2pm Lunch 2–3pm Violet CoCo on Protest & Liberation for All 3–4pm Purplepingers on the State of AusPol 4–5pm Vogue to Van Gogh: Arts Journalism with Gladys Lai and Megha Kapoor 5–6pm How to write a poem: a Voiceworks workshop 6–7pm Make your own Zine