“Then they came for the Jews

And I did not speak out

Because I was not a Jew

Then they came for me

And there was no one left

To speak out for me”

-Excerpt from ‘First They Came’ by Pastor Martin Niemöller

I was too mentally exhausted to write this article, but I grew up watching my mother respond to every verbal harassment we faced on the street. When I once told her she could ignore it, she told me that they are relying on stereotypes surrounding Muslim women: they rely on us to be what they want us to be, silent and meek. It is our silence that emboldens them.

My heart dropped when I saw Cherwell’s headline: “Oxford Reform Society registers for Michaelmas”. This comes after Regius Professor Emeritus of Moral and Pastoral Theology at the University of Oxford, Nigel Biggar, defended the use of the N-word, and a few months after the Oxford Union hosted a debate on the motion “This House believes the West is right to be suspicious of Islam”. In the term prior, the former Oxford Union Librarian, Brayden Lee, was recorded making a string of comments targeting ethnic minorities, particularly those from Muslim-majority nations.

It’s clear that anti-Muslim hostility has not only passed the dinner table test, but has further infiltrated our student societies. But even at a time when a mosque in the UK is attacked every five days, I still refuse to make this article about my feelings or the British Muslim community’s fears about Reform UK. I am reminded of Muslim poet Suhaiymah Manzoor-Khan’s poem ‘This is not a humanising poem’, and I too refuse to defend my humanity or plead for empathy before my fellow Oxford students. To see us in this undignified position has been the cause of entertainment for many Oxford students, and has motivated many recent debates about our faith and background at the Oxford Union.

I do argue, however, that the Oxford Reform UK society will invite a breeding ground for anti-Muslim and anti-BME rhetoric on University grounds. Its existence only makes students like myself feel more at risk in our own University. Reform’s record of targeting Muslims and minorities speaks for itself.

In May 2024, Reform leader Nigel Farage said that “a growing number” of British Muslims “do not share British values”. In March 2025, the then-Reform Business and Agriculture Spokesman, Rupert Lowe (who has since been suspended after allegations of bullying and now leads the Restore Party), asked the government whether it would prohibit slaughter without stunning in order to ban halal meat, despite such a prohibition also applying to Kosher slaughter, which he did not call for banning. In January 2026, Sarah Pochin questioned the UK government’s definition of anti-Muslim hostility.

Reform also embraced Lee Anderson in March 2024, who was suspended by the Conservative Party for saying: “I don’t actually believe that the Islamists have got control of our country, but what I do believe is they’ve got control of [Sadiq] Khan and they’ve got control of London.” 

Another Reform candidate, Paul Harrison, backed mass deportations and retweeted an AI-generated caricature of Muslim men with Pakistani flags. A post on candidate Howard Raymond Din’s social media called for the mass shooting of Muslims, and candidate Leo Fruhman adopted the slogan “Every Muslim Out of Europe” under his tweets, which include “don’t f**king bring your barbarism tho or we’ll kick you to where you came from”, and “yes I do have a problem with Muslims”.

Many articles in the national press argue that Reform is racist, misogynistic, and Islamophobic. I need not write to convince you of this. I simply argue that a political party with a record of anti-Muslim hostility should not be active, promoted, and legitimised, least of all at institutions where many Muslims like myself live and study.

Every student has the right to feel safe and welcomed in their university, especially when university grounds are where they call home. It is not unreasonable for a student from any vulnerable group to feel unsafe around other students who openly support a political party that repeatedly targets them. It is also not unreasonable for them to feel unsafe on college grounds that may be hosting a politician for a society event who holds such views.

While unregistered, the Oxon Universities’ Reform Society hosted a Restore/Reform debate as well as inviting David Starkey to give a talk – the very same David Starkey who said “so many damn blacks survived during slavery”.

Reform has had to address extremist views spiralling out of control in its own party. During the 2024 general elections, it was made to remove more than a dozen candidates over their racist comments. This included campaigner Andrew Parker, who described Islam, rather than organised religion in general, as ‘a cult’. He suggested that the army should “F**king just shoot them”, referring to asylum seekers, and said of Rishi Sunak: “I’ve always been a Tory voter, but what annoys me is that f**king [P-word] we’ve got in.”

A 2026 investigation found many more Reform candidates making Islamophobic and racist comments, only some of whom were suspended. Former candidate Caspar Thomas tweeted that we should “kick Muslims out of our country”. He has written that “Black peoples have such a cringe victim complex”, and that “Indians are nasty”. While some of these individuals have been removed by Reform, it begs the question: what is it about Reform’s policies that keeps, time and time again, attracting these circles to begin with? 

If one truly studies Reform beyond the few examples mentioned in this article, they will quickly realise that the party is not truly concerned about immigration, integration, or British values, but only cloaks its moral panics and hostilities against Muslims and ethnic minorities behind these talking points. I do not expect students from different backgrounds to fully understand our experience of life. Non-British Muslims will also never understand the fears that dominate our lives. But it is further isolating to know that nobody will speak up or stand up for us, even outside the Reform event rooms. 

Students at the University of York protested their Restore student society. But I don’t feel confident that Oxford students would react the same way to the newly formed Reform society. It is not only the society that worries me, but also other students’ indifference towards it. I grew up in Britain where an anti-Muslim rally is described as a “an amazing day out with the family” and men who spew hatred against Muslims are called “activists”. Unsurprisingly, I have not always felt safe walking down the road as someone who is visibly Muslim. 

But now, with the new Oxford Reform society, I cannot say that I will always feel safe walking on college grounds, outside my dorm, in the JCR kitchen, or in any other shared space. Muslim and ethnic minority students should not have to navigate these spaces worried that the people close to us feel the same sentiments towards us that the student political society they belong to does.

Oxon Universites’ Reform Society was contacted for comment and told Cherwell that they share “concerns for the safety of all in Oxford”, with reference to a BBC News article from 2020 about grooming gangs in Oxford.

Hollywood has had a tough year so far. That the ‘In Memoriam’ section of the 2026 Academy Awards is going to be a serious tear-jerker was solidified by the passing of Dolly Parton and Tim Curry over two consecutive days. Both legends in their own right, one can scarcely imagine Parton and Curry in the same room, the former a peroxide-blonde, rhinestone-clad country singer and the latter the ultimate black-comedy villain typecast – but their successive deaths have brought to light the many ways in which the two stars embodied the same, distinctive strangeness in the celebrity scene. 

The current cultural landscape requires that every celebrity also be an influencer. Since the start of the millennium, stardom has been undergoing a perhaps uncalled-for yet inevitable co-mingling with the rise of social media. It is no longer possible to be celebrated simply for, say, your acting skills – you must also cultivate a persona with which to engage with your fans. This means that ultimately what celebrities profit off most is normalcy. To appeal to the largest group of people, they must appear quirky whilst actually being anything but. The ‘niches’ they sign their names to are of no use if they are not easily applicable to anybody who has an Instagram account. Hence the mass hysteria surrounding what I term ‘nothing aesthetics’: clean girl. Quiet luxury. No-makeup makeup look. The most sought-after manicure? Funny bunny (milky white), or if that is sold out, bubble bath (pinkish white). Pantone’s colour of the year? Cloud dancer (cloudy…white?). Disturbing political implications aside – we are still living in the aftermath of Sydney Sweeney’s American Eagle ad, after all – we are somehow witnessing the death of both individuality and community formed around unique and marginal traits at the hands of inoffensiveness.

One of the biggest perpetrators of the monochrome and monotone-ification of everything is Kylie Jenner. In an effort to keep up her quirky appearances, she has momentarily set the nude lip-kits aside to start a trend of putting gem stickers on everything – including the lip-kits. She’s so crazy, love her! Since Jenner launched the bedazzled editions of her makeup line, every social media platform has been flooded with images of people covering their journals, bedsheets, and pickle jars with gem stickers, no doubt to be removed as soon as the photo has been taken. It’s both devastating and embarrassing, then, to hear Dolly Parton’s nephew Bryan Seaver announce that before her death Parton told him that she wanted “to rest in a beautiful bed of plush cotton because after a life wearing heavy rhinestones, she finally deserves to be comfortable and have some rest”. Not even the most committed “whimsy-maxxer” will ever get to make such a bittersweet statement.

Largely acknowledged as the most universally beloved public figure, dead or alive, Dolly Parton spent much of the first few decades of her 70-year career facing ridicule for the way she presented herself. Infamously modeling her look after the ‘town tramp’, Parton sported blonde wigs piled up to the high heavens, blood-red acrylic nails, and tight, rhinestone-studded clothes that accented her figure all the way until her final public appearance. “I’ve often made the statement that I would never stoop so low as to be fashionable”, she said in a 1977 interview with Barbara Walters, where she also acknowledged that many people’s initial reaction to “the ridiculous way I look” was either shock or mockery. However, she knew that the real joke was always on those who made fun of her: “I know exactly what I’m doing, and I can change it at any time.” Hers was a costume that was designed to be abnormal, and she chose to put it on every day. She reveled in the caricature that she made of herself, and by never once folding under the pressures of those who thought her ‘trashy’, she eventually brought everybody over to her side. 

Though even Donald Trump joined in on the national mourning period, Parton lived as a decided non-conformist until the end. She never had children; she never made public appearances with her husband, and often talked about how their relationship thrived because she was often away from home and free to do whatever she wanted; she supported LGBTQ+ causes, and even went on record many times to say that if she were born a man, she would have been a drag queen. Indeed, many of her queer fans think of her as the first cisgender woman to do drag on the global stage on account of her campy, ultra-feminine persona, performance skills, and witty, self-effacing humour. Beyond her branding, her philanthropy was also consistently aimed at enabling social and cultural progress. She supported new artists, both financially and morally; she started one of the biggest and most successful literacy programmes in history with her Imagination Library; she funded COVID-19 vaccine research, and offered herself up for their trial. She used the glitz and glamour which once made her strange, different, and alienated her from her people to foster happiness, mobility, and freedom in communities like her own. 

Unlike Parton, Tim Curry revealed little to nothing about his personal life throughout his lengthy career on both screen and stage. He also didn’t have a consistent persona like Parton’s, rather walking through a revolving door of increasingly freakish and subversive characters. Similar to Parton, though, his embrace of the caricature was a force that created community, even in the absence of any discernible shared traits. Best known for his performance as Dr. Frank-N-Furter in The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975) – described by Peter Bradshaw as a “sonorous and feline… vampirically queer alien sex god” – Curry’s lasting influence in the role is showcased by the millions who attend showings of the film in full costume every year. A self-proclaimed “sweet transvestite”, Dr. Frank is a figure of unintelligible sexuality and gender who violates both scientific and ethical codes to satisfy his desires. He is also not altogether human, hailing from the planet “Transsexual” in the galaxy of “Transylvania”. By playing into these stereotypes about queer people, Curry’s performance emphasises their ridiculousness and forces the audience to reckon with the rigidity with which they treat those unlike them, and how their bigotry ultimately reflects on how they govern themselves. For 50 years, Curry’s Frank-N-Furter has brought people together and allowed them to leave the binaries that rule their lives at home. That is the power of kitsch: it invites you to laugh with, not at, the strange and unfamiliar.  

We are living through a watershed period of conservatism and regression. What conservatism does, as well as actively infringe on our rights and livelihoods, is inspire fear and shame surrounding behaviours that might provoke those in charge to infringe on our rights and livelihoods. It also turns us against people who are in truth no different from us, but we see them as stepping over some arbitrary line we have drawn, fearing that it might endanger us too. The weekly ‘cancellation’ of Chappell Roan, who is more like both Parton and Curry than not, proves it. The definition of ‘normal’ is becoming narrower by the day, and even if you currently believe yourself safe, come tomorrow you too might be strange and dangerous in the eyes of the law. Though their deaths have dimmed the sun in my world as well as many others, I rest easy knowing that Parton and Curry never once compromised the things that made them happy in fear of being perceived as strange, and the art that they have left behind means that they will be remembered forever. Few of us will get to be so lucky.

CW: Eating disorders.

We’re sitting at a makeshift dining table at the foothills of the Pyrenees, the mystic beauty of the mountains enveloping our little group. Stretched out before us is rich tomato pasta, savoury soups, cold chicken, and crusty baguette from the best bakery in Tournefeuille. A ‘quick lunch’ in the midst of a busy choir tour. An impossibility in the French mind. The main course is naturally followed by a litany of post-lunch titbits: cheese, compote, coffee. I enjoy my food without anxiety – the mountains have made me hungry, and I relish each bite.

I have not always felt so liberated in my enjoyment of food as I did that day in the Pyrenees. I never really considered our relationship to be damaged – it was just the natural suspicion of something which might affect my weight, and thus my worth. Calories occupied my thoughts, but I had never restricted myself so much as to cause a physical problem, which meant that there was no problem.

As someone who developed at a young age and towered over primary school friends, I found it hard not to be conscious of the space I took up. At secondary school, while other fears crept in, that one, the one about my body, seemed to fade out. Yet almost immediately after starting my first year at Oxford, I felt it return, this time stronger than before and reinforced with a healthy dose of imposter syndrome.

My academic and social status felt newly intertwined with how my body looked. I remember excruciating conversations at formals – the declaration of the confident maxim that “everyone here is skinny!” – and feeling my stomach drop, thinking that I was not included in this “everyone”. Looking back, such thoughts were paranoid and irrational, and the decision to only very occasionally eat breakfast during first year made me tired and unhappy at a time when my tutorial essays were exhausting enough.

Something began to shift in my second year. Having faced down Prelims, I had a greater confidence in my academic ability and started exercising regularly, which necessitated eating more food. I also started going out with someone who loves cooking and eating as much as I do, and I’m happy to say that the enjoyment of delicious food continues to be a core part of our relationship. Despite this, food still played on my mind. I enjoyed a regular breakfast, but fears of calories loomed and I only allotted myself one sweet treat every two days (or often every three, or four).

Enter the year abroad. On my second day in Toulouse, where I would study for one semester, we lunched with family friends at a food market that could be classed as one of the ‘Seven Wonders of the Modern World’. Stalls sold glossily sheened and butter-enriched pastries, every cut of meat imaginable, and an exotic variety of fish, including sea urchins. All this wonderment preceded a long lunch upstairs, which observed the restaurant’s formule (a concept I came to know extremely well). Naturally, the meal started with an apéritif, followed by crusty bread and two courses. Though at this first, emblematic encounter I instinctively wanted to excuse my indulgence with thoughts of “it’s okay to eat like this because I’m technically on holiday”, I would soon come to break this pattern of thinking – my delight in French cuisine had only just begun.

In French culture, dining is about conversation as much as food. I quickly noticed that Toulousains often sat for hours, chatting, over meals. A combination of reasonably priced restaurant menus – free from the shackles of calories (thanks, Boris!) – the travesty of my student accommodation prison kitchen, and a rapidly formed friend group of fellow Erasmus students, quickly allowed me to assimilate into this alluring way of life.

Of course, my student lifestyle in Toulouse did afford me much more time than I ever had in Oxford. Post-Brideshead Revisited, most of us rarely have time for a three hour long lunch in between lectures and tutorials. However, even working 9am to 5pm for six months in Paris, I found space to regularly enjoy an apero with my friends and relish a superb sandwich from my favourite boulangerie. I was fortunate to live in an unusual student residence in Paris which offered a daily breakfast of tartines to all inhabitants, a practice which both saved me money and facilitated some of the most interesting conversations I had during my time in France.

My relationship with food had changed without me realising it. I no longer limited my intake of sweet things to twice or thrice weekly, instead relying on my own intuition. Sometimes that final course doesn’t seem appealing at a restaurant, but equally one sometimes must acknowledge the futility of denying oneself a particularly appealing patisserie. The year abroad was transformative for me in so many ways – not only did my relationship with food begin to heal, but I also had the luxury of time to reflect on how I was changing as a person, which, in turn, motivated me to maintain these positive changes.

I do not mean to say that diet culture and eating disorders do not exist in France – of course they do. Through conversations with French friends and colleagues, I learnt that fatphobia is also rampant, as is the favourite French appetite suppressant: the cigarette. Nor is French culture unique in granting the dining table a hallowed status – I recently learnt that in the Antioquian culture of Colombia, it is customary to spend the first hour of dinner discussing the quality of the food.

I am reluctant to claim that my relationship with food is completely healed. Like learning a language, the process has been a non-linear one – some days are worse than others. There is no doubt, however, that my time in France has irretrievably altered this crucial relationship for the better, and I expect to continue this healing process as I rejoin Oxford life.