Well, this has just been a cracking week for gender relations at the University of Sydney’s Wesley College.
Just one day after a rabidly slut-shaming journal composed by students of the residential college tumbled out of the cloisters of frattish uni life and into the public eye, a letter from the students has emerged, apologising for threatening the privacy of workers in a nearby “massage parlour.”
Management told the group, who were wearing Wesley attire, to GTFO. While it’s generally poor form to invade a workplace and disrupt business to take selfies, sex workers can suffer very real and equally shitty consequences if their identities are compromised.
Speaking to the SMH, a manager at the facility said the “threat their ignorance poses to the protection of our workers’ anonymity is a real one”. Another worker said “those pictures could be circulated. They could destroy someone’s life.”
“We should have assessed the particular damage that these actions and this list would create by furthering negative and false stereotypes and judgmental attitudes within the community.”
A 2013 article from the uni’s own Honi Soit noted the make-up of the parlour’s staff. It cited a review which claimed workers were “just students and travelers looking to make a bit of extra money.”
Source: Sydney Morning Herald.
