At the end of last year, four SU Executive Officers faced motions of censure in the UGM for a sit-in protest which prevented the controversial future Chair of the LSE’s Council, Peter Sutherland, from delivering a public lecture. A motion of censure acts as a warning and a prelude to a vote of no-confidence against an elected representative.

The issue which emerged at the forefront of the debate surrounding the censures was the separation of private and public spheres in the life of a popularly elected representative. The Executive Officers claimed that they were acting in a personal capacity, while the proponents of the censure argued that an elected representative and even more so, a paid elected representative, cannot simply draw the line between private and public spheres.

One of the proponents of censure argued that George W. Bush is unable to attend a similar protest for fear that he may be seen as misrepresenting the people of the United States.

Yet this is argument does not stand. The failure of this argument is not because the President of the United States is a purer representative. Nor is it because our Executive consists of student politicians and so the bar of judgment is lowered.

It is because it is unreasonable and unwise for us to expect more from our elected representatives than we expect from ourselves. We all have private lives. Why shouldn’t are leaders have them? A fictional US Presidential candidate from a popular TV show once said, “We cling to this fantasy that there’s a perfect life and that our leaders should embody it. But if we expect our leaders to live on some higher moral plane than the rest of us, well we’re just asking to be deceived.”

It is unwise to assume that our leaders are different from us. But further to that, to think that they embody our values which include a separation of private and public spheres of life, is the very essence of a truly representative culture.

Our leaders should be judged in a professional capacity, based on what we elected them to do. We should be proud that we have elected officials who not only hold views, but are willing to express them despite their negative political impact – namely censure.