The Everyday Sexism Project reported this week a disturbing incident of “Slut Dropping” at York University. “Slut Dropping” involves a group of male students driving around town in the early hours of the morning looking out for a girl who they decide looks like a “slut” walking home. They slow down, ask her where she lives and offer her a lift home – what gentlemen. Except that they don’t drive her home. Instead they drive as far as they can in the opposite direction and leave her at the side of the road to walk home alone, filming her as she walks away. It should be noted that there has only been one reported case of “Slut Dropping” in the UK but whilst this can be dismissed as an unacceptable one-off, it is arguably part of a wider culture in British Universities of “slut-shaming”.
The definition of slut is “a person, especially a woman, considered sexually promiscuous” but the insult is used in a much wider context than that. Chances are if you’re a girl reading this article you have, at some point been called a slut, regardless of how many sexual partners you’ve had; slut appears to be a one-size-fits-all insult that can be readily applied to anyone. Admittedly many girls use slut as an affectionate term to describe their friends, but the tone changes when it’s used by guys and as the infamous line in Mean Girls goes “you all have to stop calling each other sluts and whores, it just makes it ok for guys to call you sluts and whores”. But it appears no one’s been listening to the lessons in Mean Girls; insults such as “slut”, “whore”, “slag” and the more retro “wench” are becoming increasingly common place in the language university students’ use.
But it’s not just the language students use to describe girls who engage in sexual relationships which implies more sexist attitudes, it’s the culture which uses and surrounds this language. Student club nights have responded to a harsher economic climate by fiercely promoting sexually explicit events during Fresher’s week. Themed nights including “Pimps and Hoes”, “Geeks and Sluts” and “CEO’s and Corporate Hoes” have surfaced all around the country. Whilst events like these have always been a part of Fresher’s week, they are now playing an increasingly large role meaning that young female fresher’s are confronted with an adversely sexualised university social life. The Daily Mail reported that some 72% of both male and female students have had at least one one-night stand whilst at university, meaning that we are more sexually promiscuous than generations of students before us.
This increased sexualisation of student life isn’t necessarily a bad thing but when coupled with the slut-shaming culture of Facebook groups like UniLad, it paints a confusing picture. On the one hand female students are being encouraged to be promiscuous, to dress in a provocative manner, to engage in casual sex. But on the other they are being criticised and pressured into feeling ashamed for enjoying and engaging in such activities. These conflicting social pressures would be enough to confuse anyone, but they are surely worse for young girls who have just started university and trying to find their way in an already confusing and somewhat overwhelming environment. Of course there are many who would dismiss this culture as “banter”, as guys, and some girls, simply having a laugh. But is this really something to be dismissed so lightly when an NUS survey in 2010 revealed that 68% of female students had been subject to sexual harassment whilst at university? The slut-shaming culture of sites like UniLad creates an environment where this sort of behaviour becomes normalised, where it becomes acceptable to judge a girl on what she chooses to wear or on how many people she decides to sleep with.
So are university students becoming more sexist? On the one hand there is a more liberal attitude towards sex on university campuses than there has been before, which means that female students, as well as male, are freer to experiment and enjoy themselves sexually. On the other hand this freedom isn’t as transparent as it appears, with a social pressure upon students to behave in a “promiscuous” manner whilst the girls who do so are branded “sluts” or “whores”. What do you think?