Is sexual violence part of our uniform?
You sit, wonder, procrastinate. Eventually, you gain the effort to open Minerva and brace yourself for
whatever workload is coming at you next. Amongst the mundanity of modules and timetables and
organisations and the like, you come across a folder your eyes had glazed over.
‘Sexual violence’. The first folder on the Minerva app. Sat right beside the timetable folder. That’s
new… Or is it? Is it so regular that it has become an unrecognisable part of our day to day? Do we
have to pass it, like our other modules? Compulsory. Extra credit if you can distinguish the many
shades of consent. A test few people are truly able to pass.
You start walking home, Woodhouse Moor and its surrounding area is pitch black. You fumble for
your keys, breathless, you peer behind you every ten seconds. You hope no one will notice you as you
pace it back home from university. You came here to learn but on arrival you realise you will have to
take the long way home. When sexual violence is part of your uniform, you cannot afford to cut any
corners.