Issue 1643 Editorial

This is not a token issue

This is not a token issue

It makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside seeing – or rather, being unable to see – the paper around campus on a Monday. It might be that someone is making a life-size papier-mâché replica of Queen’s Tower, or that someone requires A LOT of kindling. But I want to believe that it was you picking up felix, reading our top journalism, getting your news, your science, your culture, your puzzles fixes.

Apparently some of our writing has caused a bit of a stir, but hey, for me that feels like a nice pat on the back – we’re encouraging dialogue. You can hear the buzz of conversation in the library cafe; or maybe it’s just starved postgrads.

This week the union screwed up the autumn elections. They send out a humble email (subject: “We made a mistake”) and apologised Hollywood style, acknowledging their error.

Also Commemoration Day came and passed. There were long queues and that’s it really.

But despite Commemoration Day and the front cover, this issue is dedicated to the black and minority ethnic (BME) members of our community. As we’re approaching the end of October you might not have realised that we’re also nearing the end of Black History Month which, in one form or another, has been around since the 1920’s.

Race has always been a divisive issue and giving a platform to voices from minority cultural backgrounds so that they can be heard loud and clear, is something we as a society (not an Imperial society) are still working on. We worked with the BME officer at Imperial this year to send a message, that part of our mission is to strengthen these voices; we are here to discuss issues that need discussing. We don’t want this to be a token edition, but it depends on you as much as it depends on us. So if you feel that there were issues that we didn’t touch upon this week tell us or even better write for us. We’re only as good as you let us be.