SUSU’s disciplinary committee has today revealed the full punishment of Southampton University Men’s Hockey Club, following which were branded ‘racist’ by students.
The hearing was held on May 7th with Union President David Mendoza-Wolfson presenting the complaint on behalf of the Student Union. SUMHC admitted the charge, and were found guilty by the committee.
SUSU’s statement today confirmed that SUMHC are to “publicly apologise, undergo equality and diversity training and pay a fine”, referring to the incident as “unacceptable and offensive”.
The compulsory diversity training will be required for all members for the next two academic years.
The club have been ordered to pay a £500 fine to SUSU, which will be donated to RAG. They are also now required to run all club emails through the Union’s mass email system, meaning their communications will be more closely monitored by SUSU.
The Union’s disciplinary committee also took the step of banning the club from holding “any socials in The Stag’s until Christmas”.
A club email sent out last night referred to this measure as a ban on “alcohol-based socials in Union facilities”, suggesting that club has been pushed off campus altogether.
The email goes on to ask members to “donate your pint” towards the fine, as the club is “cutting it thin with finances this year … [and we] don’t want to pass on our mistakes to the Wessex Knights to be”.
They clarified that the donation is “completely optional”.
SUMHC have declined to comment to the Soton Tab on the outcome of the disciplinary.
Katie Lightowler, Vice-President Sports Development, said:
The email the Club sent out was a very disappointing read. This decision sends out a clear message that abuse of any kind, whether it is racist, homophobic, sexist or any other form, simply isn’t welcome in our sports clubs or the Student’s Union as a whole.
We want our sports clubs and societies to be a welcoming and fun environment from students from every background – and we know you can do this without also offending students. We’re not trying to stop clubs having fun on nights out, but to send out official club emails with these sort of comments absolutely crossed that line.
We look forward to working with Men’s Hockey Club next year on #SotonSpeakUp, and following several requests, the Union will be working with Clubs to put out guidance on what’s ok and what’s not ok for socials.
What do you think of this outcome? Strong enough action on discrimination from SUSU? Let us know in the comments!
Absolutely ridiculous overreaction, but I expect nothing less from the absolute disgrace that is our student union.
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Actually I think the reaction is totally fine. It’s called learning respect; it’s OK within a group, but when you’re a leader sending out mass emails you must consider everyone that will receive it. It’s part of your basic role while on any committee! Here, SUSU have got it right!
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Oh hush, this is nothing. SUSU could have gone much further in terms of punishment.
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Diversity training? They’re arguably the most ethnically diverse club in the AU. Also funny how the only people who took offence were people not within the club as well, suggestion, if you don’t like it then just don’t join? Or maybe if you did you join you would realise that the remarks were a joke. Not even from hockey but its pretty obvious.
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‘If you don’t like racism.. don’t join the club’… you’ll go far with that logic! Plus, you have to consider the wider audience; if you go round making racist, homophobic or indeed any prejudice remark you will upset people. You may not have meant to target them, but you should consider the repercussions of your actions, especially if you’re the head of one of the biggest societies. On there part, it’s a VERY poor showing.
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If you don’t like it then don’t join? What if people wanted to join so they could play hockey, but are excluded because they don’t like the attitude of the club.
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what a joke!
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The union can work with sports clubs all they like: Sport (proper sport like rugby, rowing, hockey etc) is highly competitive and charged. Only those who are part or have been part of these clubs can know what its like, and we want messy, outrageous, borderline socials. These wants aren’t being imposed from the top down, members are actively asking for this.
In a few short years we shall all toddle off to a lifetime of grey monotony in the workforce, and we’ll look back on these times with fondness as we settle down into the slog. Leave our socials alone, and work with us to improve results in competition, as the more you push against us, the more we shall push back.
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‘messy, outrageous, borderline’ is fine – that doesn’t need to equal racist, prejudice and outright disrespectful!
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Another SUSU circle jerk failing.
Donate to RAG / probably pay for some more self important pricks to attend the grad ball for free.
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free grad ball tickets don’t come out of the grad ball budget, they come out of the shared sabb budget, which gets used for all sorts.
nice troll attempt though, well done on being ignorant
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I can assure you that when RAG receives the money it will go in it’s entirety to 3 very worthy causes that the students voted in. Though we were unaware of this decision before this article was published, I will personally be checking we receive the fine.
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This “banter” shit is a large proportion of university life, and I’m glad action is taken to keep it within boundaries.
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given the rumour was they’d lose their BUCS and funding for next year, seems pretty fair to me. endorsing an anti-sexual harassment campaign and having to pay a small fine is a better long term outcome than not being allowed to access coaching and such next year!
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Maybe now the club can focus on hockey and not getting relegated again.
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Digging up old skeletons which have now been dealt with. Just let them get on with it.
Either way, I’m sure some of the other sports teams are just as bad.
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Has SUSU take any action against the guy who flagged the hockey club up initially? The guy who was inherently racist about the hockey club on SUSUs public Facebook page?
If SUSU is going to clamp down on their conceived view of racism and discrimination, consistency should be preserved.
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Him calling you “male, pale and privileged” is hardly ‘inherently racist’
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It no more racist than what hockey supposedly said?
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you’re a disgrace
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explain your logic? theres difference between being racist and making a comment deemed to be racist.
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It still astounds me that SUMHC would send out this email in the first place – just be like every other team/society ever.
More importantly, a ban from the Stags until Christmas? I can imagine hockey are distraught..
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Whether or not you think the comments in question are inappropriate (which I do), the entire attitude presented in the email is disgusting (the link in the top paragraph has a copy-paste in its comments). I get that established members of the committee may see this as banter and can dish out as much as they get, but telling freshers to ‘sort your boring miserable lives out’ because they weren’t able to perform at their cider-hands (whatever that means) is, I think, incredibly intimidating. Ok perhaps by this stage in the year most of them have become acquainted with the club’s style and aren’t fazed by it, but I wonder how many potential players are put off in the first few weeks of each year by this sort of peer pressure. I thought playing for a team was about being good at the sport, not about how much you can drink afterwards.
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Being told to sort your ‘boring miserable life out’ is intimidating, but charging around a field with 21 other guys in a form of weaponised rugby isn’t?
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Maybe it is, but it’s the nature of the sport, and the sport is what people sign up for.
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if you want to go for the sport go for the sport? not everyone goes on socials
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The email sure made it seem like not going on socials opened you up to a lot of ‘banter’ or as the rest of the world know it, bullying.
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Yes no one has to attend socials, but part of the email was criticising team members for not being able to drink to the required standard on the bus back from a game. In any case, I still don’t think it’s ok for some members to feel excluded from team socials because they don’t enjoy the drinking culture.
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They weren’t forced to drink on the bus. They weren’t strapped down and force feed it. As a hockey member myself, it is more than easy to say no, and people respect that. Believe it or not.
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When you lose as often as Men’s Hockey does, you gotta drink to get through the pain.
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An appalling clampdown on freedom of speech.
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This isn’t about freedom of speech. The person who wrote the email is perfectly entitled to say that some people ‘aren’t worth a Jew’s foreskin’ as well as any other opinion they might have. The reason the club was fined is because the email came from the committee account didn’t acknowledge the responsibilities that come with holding a committee position. For example, something that might be controversial but allowed on your own Twitter account may well get you fired if you post it from your company’s profile.
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oh no, no hockey socials in the stags until christmas! whatever will wessex do. I hear there is a new bar in town called clowns? might have to give that a try
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Or maybe the hockey teams should drink less and train more, then they’d be less of an embarrassment on the pitch as well as off it.
Here’s to the 1sts finishing below Exeter 5ths this year!
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The hockey club is full of bell ends anyway, good riddance to bad rubbish I say.
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Who would want a social in the stags. #Jtown
And it wasn’t actually racist if you read it all.
And if SUSU want £500 can’t they just not have put on an unnesscary training day. If such bigotism (not a word but) in the club that’s not the way to change attitudes.
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not like hockey is a real sport anyway
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