What does the whine of the apathetic student sound like? "Do we really care? A talk on what? Yeah, Gaza. The Croatian midfielder. What? Oh, the place - yeah, yeah terrible, I think it was on the news. Can't they just share? What about dinner? Ban Ki-who? Isn't that a Pokemon? Whatever...pub?"
Yes, talking about politics with some students is like keeping a sleep-deprived sloth awake. You can picture the apathetic student pretty easily - Facebook in front of them, booze and sex on the brain, cheap, re-heated pizza in their belly. And how this image tars the rest of us; everything from McCain's student newspaper advert saying "Students Get Back To Doing Nothing Quickly" to this blog, gives an ironic wink to the stereotype of the dosser student. As the Independent columnist Mark Steel wrote last week: "the youth of today - they just don't show no disrespect". It's the "quasi-proverbial, and not wholly undeserved, reputation students have cultivated over the years for extreme political apathy", as Guardian writer Hicham Yezza phrased it.
According to Yezza, even the system is against us: "Many universities have now grown to see their task as that of churning out generic, malleable clones for the consumption of ever more regimental recruiters...they view the very act of students engaging with the wider reality of their world as a subversive phenomenon to be nipped in the bud before it infects the rest of the student population".
No, we don't have the freak banner of a modern day Hendrix, or the geeks and one-eyed midgets of Dylan. "Change" happened in America and the recent Greek student protests happened in, well, Greece. And there are some apathetic dossers out there: "Do we really care?", one student commented on a York University newspaper website article that detailed the amount of money universities invest in the arms trade - "Worst front page ever. So incredibly boring", another student put. And "the vast majority either don't care or support it", one cheerful soul typed on the Campaign Against the Arms Trade York Uni Facebook group. It seems being a student radical is so 1992.
But positive change happens regardless of negative perceptions. In recent months, over 20 universities were occupied by student activists, demanding action over Gaza and uni arms trade investments. The occupation of Queen Mary's, University of London, caused the university to withdraw investments in the arms trade and review it's ethical policy. The School of Oriental and African Studies, Goldsmiths, University of London and Bangor University also have withdrawn investment from arms companies after student pressure.
Of course, sit-ins are one off demonstrations. Nevertheless, at York University at least, there is a healthy political student community. We have model UN, Labour Society, Liberal Democrats Society, Conservative Society, Amnesty International Society, Oxfam Society and Friends of the Earth Society. Then there is all the independent groups like Gig For Gaza and The Campaign Against The Arms Trade. There are regular film showings on everything from The End of Suburbia to The Zionist Story. Both the university newspapers have thriving politics sections, featuring interviews with Nick Clegg, Mozzam Begg, George Galloway and more. There are countless talks, always so popular that everyone from Hilary Benn to The Prince of Jordan enjoys a full house. Oh, and as for the "System", York's large Politics Department and the Centre for Applied Human Rights would have something to say about it's production of "malleable clones".
Why must the student activist always be on the defence against the stereotypes of the student radical and the student apathetic? We don't want either Project Mayhem OR two-for-one drink deals. So what does your average politically active student sound like? "Do we really care? Clubbing tomorrow night instead. And, yeah I'll be going to the talk on Gaza tomorrow, no need to cook, just re-heat some leftover pizza. Send me the link of the Amnesty group over Facebook, I'll see if I can make the meeting. My essay isn’t due in 'till next week, so should be fine. Don't wear a keffiyeh tomorrow, you’ll look like a twat... pub?"