Personal Statement Flashcards
Can you please tell me more about Eve was Framed and your opinion of it?
So there are 2 things which I found really fascinating with the book.
-The first is how there is a hypocrisy within our societal perceptions of women as caregivers and subservient mothers. So if they commit a crime, since women are expected to be more docile and obedient, they are often punished more severely than a man who commits the same crime, but also there isn’t enough support for women in the judicial and prison system to maintain that motherhood role in the sense that since women are more likely to be sent to prison, this has an economic and emotional toll on the children. see pg80
-The second is Kennedy’s exploration of the psychological effect of abuse and rape and how trauma appears different to everyone which impacts the victim’s statement in a courtroom which is particularly important when the issue of rape cases is credibility. One example that stood out to me was the case of Christopher Meah who received £47,500 for sustaining personality changing brain injuries but the two women he raped only received £7000 and £10,000.
So when you talk about gender stereotypes, how do you think we can solve this issue?
I think on one hand we need to look at the judiciary, especially higher up. Women only take about a third of court judges and if the people making decisions on cases to do with the public aren’t representative of the public then you can’t expect it to be fair for minorities such as women or black people.
Tell me about R v Emery
So Sally Emery was accused of failing to protect her baby from her abusive partner. She claimed she was acting in duress as a result of her own experience of abuse leading to battered woman’s syndrome and even with expert evidence the jury still found her guilty. What this highlighted to me that there seems to be a lack of understanding from the public of trauma because the judge allowed the evidence to be called in from the defence and the jury didn’t seem to be fully convinced by it, but also I think that even though parental responsibility should be enforced by law, there needs to be more compassion to the effects that abuse brings to a courtroom.
What makes you say that there is an unconscious gender bias in a patriarchal legal system?
Well, I think it’s a patriarchal legal system because the it has been inherently written by men for men. Even now in the judiciary system, we have only just appointed our first Lady Chief Justice last month in 2023 even though the position has been in place for the past 800 years.
Can you please tell me more about The Rule of Law by Tom Bingham and your opinion of it?
I think what I learnt or found most fascinating was how the rule of law is so necessary in society because it makes sure that everyone is kept in their place. It means that on all levels there is some sort of collective restriction to benefit everyone. but also the fact because of this, there is always conflict with that principle and parliament sovereignty such as the prorogation of Parliament. But also the rule of law on a wider international scale and how upholding the Rule of Law is so important for trade and immigration
Can you tell me some of your findings from you EPQ?
One thing that I found out was there seems to be a disconnect between music perspective vs a law perspective (HARMONIZING MUSIC THEORY AND MUSIC LAW BY PETER Nichols)
ther thing I found out (NEGOTIATING PLATFORMISATION BY ALLAN WATSON AND ANDREW LEYSHON) was that because of the changing in the commercialisation of music, production companies are now unable to control the revenue that they once could, preventing smaller record labels to create copyrights out of fear.
Ceo of an AI music start-up couldn’t secure the necessary rights because they didn’t exist
Tell me more about the articles you found on rape cases
Rape Crisis figures show that less than two in 100 rapes recorded by the police in 2022 ended in a charge, or a conviction.
in the year to December 2021, the police recorded 67,125 rape offences. And yet the charity Rape Crisis says five in six women who are raped don’t report it.
I also found that there was some controversy surrounding the Crown Prosecution Service guidance in May 2022 in regards to therapy and how it could potentially dissuade rape victims from accessing therapy because notes can be used
Can you tell me what you learnt from you Oxford Brookes virtual work experience?
What is you opinion of the law as the response or the driver to social change?
I think you can argue it both ways.
Law can be the driver of social change in the sense that it can normalise a behaviour. For example, when smoking in private places became illegal or when seatbelts were a legal requirement in 1983 people’s entire attitudes were changed afterwards.
Law is also the response to social change because once a society changes, you need laws to make decision. Like when New York protesters called for a repeal of New York Civil Rights Law Section 50-A, which has kept police disciplinary records hidden from the public for over 40 years. On June 9, the New York State Legislature passed a bill to repeal 50-A. Repealing this law allows for more transparency between the public and police department in New York
Can you tell me where you have seen the abuse of the rule of law and why do you think it is important to society?
-Rwanda
-Hitler’s invasion
-Ukraine invasion
-Uk and US invasion of Iraq
You talk about the historical significance of English law in your presentation of A Modest Proposal. Can you tell me more about that?
Yeah so the Penal laws were introduced by the Anglican Protestants to essentially limit the power that the Irish Catholic had in their own country in regards to property, increased taxes, restriction of faith so practice of Catholicism or the use of Gaelic was banned and Swift’s response to that was through satire to prove the ludicrousness of it all. And I think it’s significant because it’s an example of abuse of law and using the law not as something transcendent but using it for political gain.
What have you learnt from your experiences at debate club?
The most important thing I learnt from debate club is to be able to think on my feet and to discuss current topics in the media at length with my peers. I remember the first time I debated, I was so lost because I wasn’t used to being under pressure but I had to remember that the opposition weren’t attacking me, they were attacking the flaws in my argument.
Can you tell me the significance of your volunteering at Citizens Advice in regards to law?
Well, from a more administrative perspective, I had to be conscious of following things like GDPR and collecting consent, but generally I found that I was constantly applying legislation in order to give advice to other people. For example, I remember I had to give advice to this one person who had to attend a disciplinary and I had to provide him with a step-by-step guide on how to approach what happened, making sure his company was following employment laws and how to make sure he was doing everything he could to get the best outcome he could.
Tell me about the law’s role for social justice in society and its ‘setbacks’ as you have put it? Can you give me any examples of its ‘setbacks and progress’?
When you say that people seem to have such little access to the law, what do you mean by that and how do you think we can solve it?
When I said that people have such little access to the law, I meant that I seemed to observe there was such a disconnect between the public and their understanding or access to support of the law, even though 64% of people needed legal help at some point between 2016-2020. It’s one of those things that are rooted in class and the class divide, which is why it’s important to have things such as Citizens’ Advice, Trade Unions and I think education in schools to older students will be beneficial for the people to have a basic understanding of their rights and how to protect them.
