Stephen Smith writes for Imperial’s Felix on sexism at his and other universities:

Not here, surely? Sexism is everywhere: in the media, in politics, in the arts, but at universities? The centres of liberal thought and tolerance? Where everyone is open-minded and friendly and – above all – extremely egalitarian? If there were ever a place where sexism shouldn’t exist, it is here. And yet it persists like an ugly, cunning mouse peskily dodging the hungry cat of equality.

 In lectures, (in most of them, in fact) I listen to the irritating chorus of male voices in the rows behind me discussing the sexual attractiveness of the women in the audience. Life for these boys (they can hardly be called men) is black and white: the girls are divided neatly into fuckable and unfuckable, hot and ugly, those who are “fit” and those who are “wastegash”.

In a slightly less provocative example earlier this year, a mathematics professor instructed his male students to get girlfriends. His hope was that their newfound loves could write up their coursework for them, while the boys got on with the serious business of mathematical study.

Full article here.