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Varsity Banter: Gone too Far?
Varsity has been and gone for another year with the usual host of rivalries between UKC and Christchurch and inevitably the banter.
Banter can be defined in two ways; either by its original meaning from the eighteenth-century a type of vicious bullying or its preferred use nowadays as good-humoured teasing between friends and team mates. It has become the paradigm of sports clubs’ conversation and banter seems to be a way of establishing ones self in a group as up for a laugh and having the thick skin to be able to take it and dish it out. The group that was set up on Facebook for this year’s Varsity, ‘UKC Christchurch Varsity Banter’ was supposedly created for the two university’s to partake in amusing light-hearted banter in support of their sports teams.
However, this description is questionable when you look at the majority of the posts on the wall written before any of the events had even taken place. They ranged from racism and sexism to raising the issue of a class-divide between the two university’s, marking us as the elite who would go on to employ many of the Christchurch students.
I am not somebody who it can be said appreciates banter, I believe there’s a very fine line between something that when done well can be amusing and bullying; while I agree that most people who take part in it are as willing to receive it as they are to give it out, I have witnessed many occasions where it is questionable whether certain people are given much choice in becoming victims of it. Ross Lapham, 21, is in his final year of a BA in Politics and International Relations, he is also a rugby player. He has never seen banter turn into a physical fight off the pitch, and points out that it is ostensibly about “good humour and wit; anything with such unlimited boundaries is bound to be taken too far by a select few, of course when taken too far it turns from banter into abuse”.
This famously happens outside of the confines of university sports events, take for example football hooliganism; while the majority of people go to a match to enjoy the thrill of watching the game, an unhinged minority go with the sole purpose of starting a fight. David Beckham shocked fans by giving the crowd the finger after their anger turned into personal offence aimed at him and his family when England lost to Portugal during Euro 2000.
The media took Beckham’s side, condemning the fans for their deliberately personal, mindless abuse, which had clearly proven to be more than just harmless fun. A natural sense of team rivalry and pressure to perform from the fans is undeniably a good thing and adds to the drive the players have to defeat their rivals. While Ross disputes the idea that the rivalry promoted between the two universities carries on past varsity, it has to be said that the highly unimaginative songs both universities are guilty of creating can be heard being sung loudly and obscenely on nights out in Canterbury throughout the year.
True, this is usually from a select few who aim to aggravate rivalries between us and with two prominent universities situated in such close proximity to each other some degree of rivalry is inevitable. It just becomes a problem when the banter becomes puerile, racist and about a class divide. Banter is inevitable, but I don’t agree that the entire student body should be tainted by the insult of antiquated prejudices about a supposed divide in wealth that this group provokes.
It is easily denied that it affects the universities’ relationship as whole, it is less easily proven that this is actually the case and on reading the ‘UKC Christchurch Varsity Banter’ Facebook page it is a vicious division that is the prominent reasoning behind the rivalry not light-hearted banter.