This trivia card was not read during the night. / Photo by Sonia Stanger
The investigation concludes that an inappropriate comment was made prompting the old hosts to resign
-UPDATED AS 19/03/15-
According the Owl’s twitter account trivia night is being held today, March 13,2015 at 8 p.m. As soon as we have more information we’ll report.
-UPDATED AS OF 12/03/15 –
URSU released a statement today, March 12, concluding their investigation into the March 5 incidents at the Owl. The hosts have apologized and have resigned from hosting trivia in the future.
The report states that “an inappropriate and offensive remark was made by the hosts” during last weeks trivia night. It also reported that the hosts did in fact behave “aggressively and inappropriately towards patrons.” Though there was no evidence of any physical altercation, or throwing of chairs.
To see the URSU press release click here.
________________________________________________________________________________
Thursday night trivia at the Owl is one of the student union run bar’s most popular events, but after an incident on March 5 trivia will be cancelled for the foreseeable future.
The cancellation comes after comments made by the hosts of the event. Though the exact comments are unknown at this time several accounts describe one of the hosts making a joke about rape.
As trivia night participant Kayla Adams noted, the comments came during the answer portion of the round. “We were on slang words or sayings, and the answer to one of the questions was bite the bullet. The announcer, or trivia guy, said ‘or commonly known today as letting your girlfriend know to bite the pillow,’” said Adams.
Sonia Stanger, a University of Regina student, who was also in attendance, was one of the first people to speak out about the joke on Twitter. “We were a bit shocked because you know, the hosts are the authority figure at trivia,” said Stanger.
Her tweet, which reads “Wouldn’t it be cool if I could attend pub trivia @theowlbar without hearing a rape joke? Gross,” was followed by several other complaints.
The day after the incident the University of Regina Students’ Union (URSU) stated that it was conducting an investigation into what happened. “We saw the allegations on Twitter early Friday morning and upon seeing that, immediately started reaching out to our staff trying to find out what was going on. The investigation started right there,” said URSU President Devon Peters.
There have been issues with trivia night at the Owl before. Regarding homophobia and the offensive nature of some team names.
The investigation will include testimonies, the initial response on Twitter, and camera footage from the Owl. The footage will be used to verify allegations that one of the hosts threw, or kicked a chair. The exact details are unknown at this point.
“Obviously we take the security of our students, especially at our bar, very, very seriously. So we started to reach out to the people on Twitter, that we knew had been there and get statements,” said Peters.
Response from students has been disapproval towards the comments, but at the same time many are upset that trivia night has been cancelled. “It’s unfortunate that he did say that, because people have to be aware that this can trigger people, but at the same time I didn’t feel many people were deeply upset,” said Adams.
“There are often certain taglines and team names and things that are said that are inappropriate but I’ve never personally seen it cross that line. Especially from the host,” said Stanger.
Stanger feels that cancellation could cause some to blame those who spoke out against the comments, rather than being upset with comments themselves.
Regardless, as Peters said “It’s completely unacceptable, we’ll take the measures we need to correct this.”
If you have any information on the incident or were at the trivia night, contact campus security at 306-585-4999 to make a statement.
As the story develops the Carillon will continue to report on the issue.
As someone who has been a frequent attendee of Trivia Night for the last several years, I feel that this was handled very poorly and blame is being greatly misplaced.
Did the Host make a rape joke? Allegedly, despite many people have varying accounts of exactly what happened and the context implied.
Was what the Host said offside? Yes.
Is it the worst thing to have happened at Trivia Night? 10000 PERCENT ABSOLUTELY NOT.
There are several team names such as “Anne Frank’s Hide and Seek Club” that could be considered highly offensive, yet it is read at least 7 times each week. Another team named “Awful Porn Parodies” constantly throws on taglines similar to “Apollo 13 Inches” or “Lawrence of a Labia” which are read repeatedly without regard for how offensive they may be considered.
Again, as I said before, the comment that the Host made was offside and in poor taste, but is that not why we go to Trivia Night? To wind down, answer some rather difficult questions, and say some ridiculous things around our peers? This isn’t Trivia Night at Vacation Bible Camp. We are adults in an adult setting who will say things intended for an adult audience. If we are going to get upset with the Host for cracking a joke that may be INTERPRETED as rape-related and highly inappropriate, then I feel the participants should be held equally accountable for the smut they are writing on their sheets and having announced. Please take your hypocrisy elsewhere and stop ruining our fun.
[…] school newspaper has reported on the story and told us all that Trivia night is cancelled pending an investigation. I don’t know who […]
Hello above “trivia player.” While I agree that Anne Frank jokes are unacceptable, concerned students have every right to oust a University of Regina employee who tells them to go fuck themselves after they approach him to say they found mockery of rape offensive. t’s not acceptable and I LOVE that the U of R stood up for antirape. Guaranteed they will get a lot of resistance from small town students and other students who don’t understand these issues so it was brave but really the only correct, ethical course of action. There is also a difference between a bit of raunchy pub humour and violently stripping someone of their autonomy and right to life through sexual aggression. I am sure that you agree that not being able to play trivia for a few sessions only is more tolerable than promoting casual hate speech and forcing the women & queer people who experienced the said violence to leave, because of course we want a campus that values the safety of its students and growth above all else
All you trivia lovers better lay down and bite the pillow, because we just got concentually fucked in the ass hole.
I would also tell someone to “Fuck Off” if they had sent up a super offensive and harassing scorecard like they did.
They should have gone to him after the show, and told him WITHOUT harassing him via paper in between.
They conducted themselves in an incredibly immature manner. And should not expect to have been treated with kindness and dignity if they didn’t do that themselves in the first place.
Chas:
Why would the U of R get resistance from “small town students”? Small towns are not intrinsically racist, sexist, violent, or homophobic. When Tisdale promotes itself as the “Land of rape and honey,” they’re referring to rapeseed. And where are you writing this from, New York City? Or Regina, Saskatchewan, pop. 179,000? Come to think of it, what difference would it make?
Whatever was said hasn’t been published, but I can’t imagine the joke being so awful it had the effect of “violently stripping someone of their autonomy and right to life.”
Trivia night has always been in bad taste and I imagine the main reason most people go is to participate in the bawdiness. Everyone’s trying to be funny, trying to push boundaries. If a joke crosses the line it’s met with silence, which is punishment enough. It’s pretty democratic.
Chas, you might appreciate it if I described Trivia Night as ‘carnivalesque’. The people who are going to be offended, at least to the point of outrage, shouldn’t be there. Offending one another is part of the idea. You’ve read Bahktin, you know what I’m talking about.
Also — and this might add nothing to the discussion — I can think of two outspoken comedians who proudly advocated clean, inoffensive comedy: Bill Cosby and convicted serial rapist Vince Champ.
“Pillow biting” has nothing to do with rape. Pillow biting is what a person – usually a woman – does to stifle her (or his) orgasmic moans. Pillow biting is all about pleasurable sex. Rape culture is real and serious; this is ridiculous.
Trivia at the owl was always about tough trivia questions and trash talk, rivalries, and borderline team names and tag lines. All of the people playing seemed to be smart and mature enough to realize that and could have a laugh at the obscene things teams would come up with.
At the end of every round score cards are handed up and it could have been a great time to express one’s concern. Instead it looks like the team got angry, called the hosts ‘assholes’ on twitter, sent up a sheet with ‘fuck you’, and I’ve heard they also defaced a table at the owl. Then after all that they confront the hosts.
It feels like some of the people in attendance were looking for an opportunity to be outraged for personal satisfaction and gain.
Also the allegation of throwing a chair (now down graded to kicking a chair) seems like a weak attempt at trying to tack something extra onto the hosts in hope that it sticks.
Wouldn’t have remembered the joke from that night if I didn’t read it in this article. Didn’t feel like raping anyone afterwards.
The first time I played Trivia at the Owl, it was following a Burlesque show.
I kept going back because it was the most fun I’ve had in a bar, because usually bars are a place to feel lost in the crowd, while I found most people at Trivia in The Owl to be welcoming and easy to get along with.
It’s a shame it’s been ruined for this year, and I hope those involved think about the amount of work and risk that went into making it possible. Hopefully those who complained will step up and offer their time to build a new event they and others can feel safe in and others can enjoy too.
Update: This article is still in the carillon breaking news ticker, but has no update stating that trivia is back up and running tonight. nowhere on this website does it say this. you are not keeping people informed.
[…] *UPDATED Owl trivia night is back […]
I wish that this had been approached differently.
I understand being offended but sending a scorecard up and calling someone an asshole isn’t explaining to them (nor going to make them want to listen) to why what they said was inappropriate. I just really wish that in the future we think harder about how to achieve the right outcome in situations like this. Is the goal to educate and encourage someone to understand, or are we trying to make someone pay form something because it bothered us? And if our goal is to have the person understand their wrong doing, then what is the best route to achieving this? It probably isn’t going to be name calling, no matter how pissed off we might be…