Jessica Sykes
Volume 3, Issue 12, (Originally Published on Monday 27th May 2013)
 
There's a certain kind of poetry to making it to your final year of the JD only to realise that all you want is to become a writer. The kind of poetry that makes you want to stab yourself in the eye- spoken word I'd say.
 
There are two main elements to how bothersome this epiphany is. The first is that it almost seems as though the obscene amount of debt and finely tuned anxiety I've accumulated are somehow not worth it now, given that I don't actually want to use my degree. But perhaps poverty and some whimsical emotional shortcomings will just put me in good stead for a writing career, with the added bonus of now possessing a cynicism far beyond my years.
 
The second is that I'm such a stubborn asshole that I'm going to finish this bastard JD anyway. Most likely I will be the most gloriously overqualified hobo in history; thank God I'm well across squatter's rights.

Yet somehow it is still well worth it. I'll come out of these three years far more logical (which wasn't difficult); more capable of beating friends in arguments (which has been met with mass disappointment in said group); and having been exposed to some of the most incredible people that Melbourne Uni can offer. And whilst the visiting lecturers have been incredible, it's pretty hard to regret studying an obscenely overpriced and incredibly difficult degree that has brought friends of such a high calibre. Although I'm sure others will celebrate their incredible intellectual abilities (yawn), I'm much more impressed to have friends who can cook, hold themselves horizontally from a pole, stir people to within an inch of their lives and deliver easily the best dead pan known to man.
 
Not bad for three years and $100,000.
 
Jessica Sykes

Equity Uncle
Volume 3, Issue 12, (Originally Published on Monday 27th May 2013)
 
Dear Equity Uncle,
 
A friend called me a hipster. They pointed to my black frame glasses, constant use of ironic speech, giving up on bands once they become popular and being a coffee aficionado. My response is that the glasses are very comfortable and soon everyone will be wearing them, and they're prescription. I stop listening to bands when their music is no longer interesting to me; I like coffee: I live in Melbourne. I don't ride a fixie and I don't have a moustache or beard and I don't want to live in Brooklyn or Fitzroy. Am I a hipster, at common law or at equity?
 
Just Sayin’
 
Just Sayin’,
 
It’s not true that cheap wine is bad wine. Equity is not above drinking cheap wine.
 
Equity acts on principle, and that principle is not that cheap wine is bad wine. But sometimes principles conflict with other principles – and maxims like ‘equity treats as done that which ought to have been done’ and ‘don’t miss the editing deadline for the third week in a row’ lead Equity to realise that perhaps, occasionally, cheap wine might be bad wine.
 
OK, your problem.
 
There’s nothing wrong with black frame glasses. Equity is fine with prescription lenses. Speak ironically if you want. It makes you look a boss and Equity won’t judge you for it at all.
 
It seems that this case turns upon your music tastes. Equity has been listening to Daft Punk this week. Like, a lot. Even though, in Equity’s experience, if you have to spend all night looking for luck you’re unlikely to find it. Equity is just saying. Are these masked French boppers too mainstream for you? If yes, then at Equity you might as well order another syphoned vegan espresso and ride a baby-blue bicycle and grow a cheap moustache.
 
Equity Uncle

Nicholas Baum
Volume 3, Issue 12, (Originally Published on Monday 27th May 2013)
 
Students societies play a vital role in providing critical services to students, and building the community atmosphere at the law school more broadly. Run voluntarily by students driven by a combination of selflessness and aspiration, they give students social events, access to career pathways, help with studies and an outlet for creative energies. But with limited time, money and talent available, are there too many?
 
This is a question that probably doesn’t cross the mind of the vast majority of students, who are more concerned with what they get, rather than who organises it, but it has been a recurring issue for successive student administrations. In 2011, the LSS and the GLSA briefly ‘merged’, with the GLSA President holding a non-voting position on the LSS committee and continuing to run an independent operation. This structure was removed in constitutional changes pushed through last year.
 
Simon Breheny, the 2011 LSS President, said the reasons for the merger were numerous - avoiding duplication, confusion, and competition for talent and sponsorship, while taking advantage of efficiencies and removing the overlap of careers events and resources. “Traditionally, the domestic market has been captured exclusively by the LSS while the Hong kong market has been monopolized by the GLSA,” said Breheny. “This division is not always respected, by either entity, and this inevitably leads to a situation where two bodies that represent the same group of students find themselves in competition for sponsorship from the same group of firms.”
 
The LSS, which carries the greatest burden in providing student equity and educational services, must cross-subsidise these by charging more for their careers events. Other organisations can sell their events more cheaply, dedicating the money to those events only.
 
Antony Freeman, the 2012 LSS President, said the two societies had agreed to revert to the existing structure because the constitutional change instituting it was ambiguous and unhelpful. “Practically, the organisations were trying to work together most of the time, and we felt like the sections didn’t add anything to it,” Freeman said. He echoed Breheny’s concerns about the division of service provision between the two organisations. “I wasn’t really sure where the scope of the GLSA started and ended, as most things at Melbourne Law School inherently have an international flavour to them.”
 
Freeman and 2012 GLSA President Sahil Sondhi instituted a dialogue about how best to deal with this, and this has continued this year, with the two organisations working closely together to represent the interests of international students. Faculty is setting up a new Student Organisations Representative Council to further this process.
 
However, many argue that the LSS is too amorphous to be effective in delivering the services currently provided by the groups such as the GLSA, Melbourne Chinese Law Society and Later Law Students Network, with a 50+ member committee and an enormous set of obligations already. These smaller groups are tightly run, more focused on specific groups, and able to deliver niche events that the LSS is too overburdened to handle.
 
“These organisations should not detract from the exceptional work of the LSS as the key representative student body,” said current GLSA President Tim Hamilton, “but I also believe that it is not so much about who puts on the events or runs certain activities so long as someone is doing it and so long as those events and activities are pertinent to the needs, issues and interests of students.” Hamilton, who also noted that issues of overlap could be addressed by better coordination and communication, said he “would like to see further efforts to realise a framework within which we can co-exist more effectively and efficiently.”

The LSS runs elections open to all students, and is directly accountable to those students. For all the imperfections of elected committees, they have a mandate from the student body, and responsibilities to the student body. This is significant where both elected and non-elected societies receive university funds directly. The LSS should not see itself as the sole source of all things good in the student community, and should encourage and support independent student initiatives and societies. Practically speaking, having smaller, more focused societies may deliver a more diverse range of programs and publications. But a single overarching organisation to represent student interests and run key events and programs would be more democratic.
 
Nicholas Baum

Tessa Sidnam
Volume 3, Issue 12, (Originally Published on Monday 27th May 2013)
 
Last Thursday, the LSS Careers Officers launched the publication of the Careers Guide 2013.
 
The Guidebook provides much insight into many of the career options law students may consider pursuing after graduating from law school.
 
The lunchtime launch was largely successful, with many students showing up to steal some lollies and instagram the helium balloons.
 
On closer inspection, things weren’t as bright and cheery as the guidebook and gummy bears suggested.
 
The dark side of the launch party was the revelation that it was in fact an antifeminist brainwashing attempt, cleverly hidden under the guise of an event which would attract a large proportion of the student body.
 
A statistical analysis of the balloons on level 1 showed that there were more male-coloured balloons than female-coloured balloons at the event, bringing to light the subversive and reactive nature of the society.
 
Gender debate has been prevalent among the more vocal law students in the past few weeks. The proposal to name a 9pm snack stall ‘TSS’ to stand for ‘Tasty Study Snacks’ was rejected because it might spark thoughts of Toxic Shock Syndrome. While TSS is a syndrome that could affect persons of any gender or age, it is strongly associated with menstruating women.
 
Everyone refused to comment on the balloons, but De Minimis thinks that further discussion is necessary to figure out which gender actually runs the law school.
 
Tessa Sidnam

Dean R. P. Edwards
Volume 3, Issue 12, (Originally Published on Monday 27th May 2013)
 
In today’s age of seemingly unprecedented international efforts, Sydney University Professor of International History Glenda Sluga contends that the intellectual and political climate around the mid-20th century were as much, if not more, ‘an apogee of internationalism’.
 
Sluga orated on the history of one of internationalism’s golden ages during her insightful public lecture last Wednesday at Melbourne Law School, co-hosted by the Institute for International Law and the Humanities and the School of Historical and Philosophical Studies (SHPS).
 
Sluga was a graduate of the University of Melbourne, and continued her studies at Sussex University and through a number of fellowships across the world. Her most recent publication is Internationalism in the Age of Nationalism, published this year by UPenn Press.
 
Following a glowing introduction from SHPS Prof Marilyn Lake, Sluga delved into an hour-long narrative of the figures and ideas that dominated the optimistic postwar conversation about the future of global development, which gradually gave way to the pessimism and Realpolitik of the Cold War in the 1950s.
 
One such figure was the 1940s American thinker Edith Wynner, author of Searchlight on Peace Plans, who said that “the establishment of a modern, practical Federalized World Government is the Unfinished Business of [the 20th] Century”. (Sluga used slides during the presentation and noted that the capitalization was Wynner’s.) Wynner had called for a ‘self-consciously inclusive’ internationalism, which would not be a ‘diplomats’ club’ like the defunct League of Nations.
 
Sluga pointed out that her view was characteristic of the ‘New Deal’ mindset prevalent in the postwar years.
 
Sluga also highlighted the utopianesque aspirations of Australian Frank Lidgett McDougall, who contributed to plans for a postwar world government, with much of international economic and social planning organised top-down.
 
Throughout her lecture, Sluga emphasised the importance of understanding international history, which has become an emerging field of study in recent years.
 
To drive home her point, Sluga referred to a ‘knowledge awareness’ gap in the world today, with a United Nations study showing that populations in English-speaking nations rank among the least knowledgeable about international organisations.
 
Conversely, the Nordic nations ranked toward the top, with Jordanians the most aware, according to the study.
 
Dean R. P. Edwards