16/02/2021
Regarding The Actions of St Peters in Handling Antisemitism After the Invitation of Ken Loach
We condemn in the strongest terms the decision of St Peter’s College and its Master regarding the invitation of Ken Loach and the handling of concerns raised by Jewish Students at St Peter’s. We abhor the failure to contextualise the speaker that was invited, recognise his known antisemitic comments, as well as the decision to disregard the welfare of St Peter’s College Jewish students in favour of preventing a PR disaster. We wholeheartedly support the response of St Peter’s JCR to this event and echo its belief that ‘it is impossible to separate Ken Loach’s filmmaking from his views, including his history of antisemitic remarks’. Furthermore, we recognise that ‘a free and open academic community is mutually exclusive with the platforming of individuals whose bigoted views cause active harm to others on account of their protected characteristics’. We support the right for St Peter’s College students to challenge antisemitism and believe that in failing to acknowledge the harm that hosting this event has caused, St Peter’s College leadership has failed in its duty of care to its Jewish students.
Jesus College JCR will always stand with victims of discrimination and protect the welfare of students in Oxford; we firmly believe that antisemitism must not be tolerated at the University of Oxford and in wider society. We recognise that the erroneous actions of St Peter’s College leadership has led to an exorbitant amount of antisemitic abuse targeted at Oxford University Jewish Society’s social media pages, resulting in students being threatened for condemning antisemitism, and forcing many of them to read and moderate these comments themselves. We urge everyone to read their statement on the matter.
We do not feel that this statement is enough, and so in addition to pledging our active support to all Jewish students who have been let down by St Peter’s College and by the university, we are obtaining antisemitism awareness sessions for our JCR so that we can better support our Jewish students.
We stand in solidarity with the Jewish students at St Peter’s and at Oxford in the face of endemic antisemitism.
Signed, The Jesus College JCR