Opinions
October 28, 1999
3
Tradition be damned: Mascot change is positive for Elon
Carrie Lancos
The Pendulum
Iancc7a0@elon.edu
The Fightin’ Christian, the
ever ambiguous, ever politically
incorrect and ever oxymoronic Elon
College mascot, has been pink-
slipped.
On Oct. 13, during their Fall
meeting, Elon’s Board of Trustees
voted unanimously to change the
athletic identity of the college to
something that is, according to Presi
dent Leo Lambert, “more inclusive
and easily understood on a national
basis.”
The goal is to have the new
mascot in place by Fall of 2000 to
coincide with Elon’s second full
season as a NCAA- Division I
school and the construction of the
new, on-campus Rhodes Stadium.
It’s about time this happened.
Now, now there, loyal
Fightin’ C. I can see you glaring at
through your maroon-and-gold
face paint as you sneak away from
the football game at halftime.
“It’s tradition!” you protest,
I ve cheered for the Fightin’Chris
tians for years and I’ve been a
Pightin’ Christian for years. Should
I stop now just because it’s a bad
n^arketing image?”
Yes, you should. Because
odds are good that you have hon
estly seen so little of this “bad mar
keting image” that you wouldn’t
know a Fightin ’ Christian if it keyed
your Jeep Cherokee.
Think back to your first tour
of Elon’ s campus. How many of
you were actually told what the
niascot was without asking the tour
guide yourself? Of that percentage
of you that were told by the tour
guide without specifically asking,
how many noticed the sheepish grin
when they said “Fightin’ Christian”
or had them suffix the revelation
with “Yeah, I know, it’s an oxymo
ron”?
I personally was not told what
the mascot here was while on my
first tour. My father inquired near
the end of the tour and, upon being
told by the guide, wondered aloud if
the “Turn-The-Other-Cheek Chris
tians” wasn’t more appropriate.
Now, take a moment to
browse through your vast store of
Elon College merchandise. T-shirts,
sweatshirts, hats, novelty boxer
shorts, whatever. How much of it
has “Fightin’ Christians” on it?
In my Elon Pride closet, I
have four t-shirts, five long-sleeve
t-shirts, a sweatshirt and a hat, none
of which make any mention of the
Fightin’ Christian.
By contrast, my old Duke
sweatshirt has a huge Blue Devil on
it, while my old Maryland sweatshirt
has a scowling Terrapin.
Ever notice Elon’s athletes
walking around campus in their
warm-ups or in their jerseys before
game day? From soccer to tennis,
from football to golf, from softball
to cross-country, how many of their
uniforms have the Fightin’ Chris
tian on it?
Many of our club teams are
missing the “Christian” too. You’re
likely to find Elon Men’s and
Women ’ s Rugby and Elon Lacrosse
playing on the weekend, but how
often do you hear about “Fightin’
Christians Roller Hockey”^ or
“Fightin’ Christians Swimming?”
We simply are not proud of
our Fightin’ Christian.
School spirit is in as much of
a slump as the Aggies’ defense in
the Elon versus N.C. A&T football
game. Sporting events are poorly
attended, athletes go unrecognized
for their accomplishments and apa
thy runs high among students when
it comes to taking
pride in their school.
The gentle
men from Hook
called the Elon
SuperFans are so
limited in number
that they couldn’t
spell out all of “Go
Fightin’ Christians”
on their chests if they
tried.
The Fightin’
Christians are sim
ply not who we are,
so maybe getting a
new identity will
raise awareness in
our athletics and in
our school and give spirit a much
needed boost.
Despite the college’s appar
ent lack of pride in the Fightin’
Christian, the argument still stands
that dropping the tried-and-true col
lege mascot goes against tradition.
Alumni in particular are vocal about
this aspect. There are, however, a
number of interesting holes in this
argument.
First, the Fightin’ Christian
as a mascot has only been around
since the 1970s. The “Christians”
nickname is a bit older, dating back
to a football game in the 1920s;
however, it was just one of many
that Elon picked up from sports
reporters over the years.
I suppose “the Maroon and
Gold Machine” just wasn ’ t as catchy
to our predecessors as “Fightin’
Christians.”
Regardless, the Fightin’
Christian was never adopted by the
Board of Trustees to be the official
mascot; it was just picked up by the
athletic department to
make team nomencla
ture a little easier.
Speaking of the
Board of Trustees,
therein lies the second
argument against tra
dition. The unanimous
decision to change the
mascot was made by
them, yet among their
number are many Elon
College alumni.
One would hope
that the Trustees would
take as much, if not
more pride in the
school and its identity
than any of us would. And yet they
are the ones who chose to change
the mascot.
The Fightin’ Christian is a
shaky, uninspiring tradition to say
the least, and it’s one that no longer
represents the school.
Elon College is changing rap
idly. We are diversifying and grow
ing in ways unimaginable just a few
years ago.
Athletics achievements aside,
we are a much different college
than we were fifty years, thirty years
or even a decade ago.
The campus, the academics
and athletics, and most of all the
people are constantly changing the
personality and image of this school.
We need a mascot that re
flects this change while still honor
ing our heritage, our achievements
and our identity, past, present and
future.
The Fightin’ Christian, de
spite its honorable roots as a repre
sentative of our ties to the United
Church of Christ and to the Chris
tian ideals of community, fellow
ship and helping one’s neighbors, is
really just a witty quip on ESPN
Sportscenter waiting to happen.
There are other ways to re
spect our Christian heritage with
out alienating those who find the
Fightin’ Christian to be dated, con
tradictory or even offensive. We do
it every day in our commitment to
volunteerism, good citizenship and
friendship.
I am excited to be taking part
in the mascot change. We could be
called the Oaks or the Acorns to
give respect to the “Elon” name, the
Crusaders or Cardinals to further
recognize our Christian roots, the
Flames or the Phoenix to pay hom
age to the fire that destroyed the
campus in the 1920s and the
college’s subsequent and ongoing
rebirth, or even the Elon College
Fighting Squirrels. The choice is
ours.
Whatever our new name, we
should just take pride in the fact that
we have a school with such strong
Christian ideals to be tolerant and
accepting of those different from us
while still giving respect to our heri
tage.
Go Elon.
Getting away from it all with tobacco and naps
Chuck Buckley
The Pendulum
bucka5c0@elon.edu
You are a college student.
You are a person who is constantly
overworked and underappreciated.
You are all alone in the world. No
one understands you. Yf)u are cold
and Wet and tired. Come inside little
Timmy, come inside. I can take the
pain away.
Many of you out there are
Joggling such heavy class loads and
extracurricular activities that you
ave almost no time to relax. I’m so
s'vamped that I’m forced to con-
sider the few seconds I get watching
^ new episode of Dragon Ball Z the
"‘Shlight of my day.
You know how overworked
you are. You even have to schedule
time for your social life. Friends
shouldn’t have to make appoint
ments to hang out with you.
Now, there are some of you
out there who have no idea what
I’m talking about. “Work,” you say,
“At Elon... how odd.”
Well, to all you lazy smeg
muffins I say unto you, just keep on
drinking that beer. You only get out
of college what you put into it, so if
all you put in is beer, all you’re
going to get is pee-pee. You can t
make a living out of pee-pee. Have
you ever tried to sell urine? Not a
hot commodity... despite it being
sort of warm.
What is one to do? How can
we, who do know the meaning of an
all-nighter, get away from it all?
I’m not talking about the all-nighters
that involve, togas, bingeing and
hangovers. I’m talking about ones
where the only chicks you’ll be
snuggled up with are Emily
Dickinson, Ameila Earhart and
Mary Queen of Scots.
What is the answer? God bless
the power nap.
Raise your hand if you’ve ever
power napped. Uh-huh. Yes. Good.
That’s most of you. For you two in
the back with the beer stein full of
espresso, let me tell you about the
power nap.
The power nap is your way of
saying to your body, “Sorry about
our little fight. Would you like some
candy?”
Power naps last for twenty to
thirty minutes and can make up for
a full night of missed sleep.
Did you know that theliuman
body and mind can operate at peak
effiency on just four hours of sleep
every night for two weeks?
If you don’t even have that
much time then you can always skip
sleeping altogether. It usually takes
96 hours without R.E.M. sleep for
hallucinations to set in.
Now it is very important that
when you are engaging in power
nappage you don’t ever cross the
streams... Sorry, had to throw in
another pee-pee reference.
Seriously though, you can’t
power nap for more than an hour. If
you do you’ll just ruin your day. It
will screw up your sleep cycle and
you’ll think it’s the wrong day.
What are other ways that
people like you and me, who arc too
busy to have a healthy social life,
can get away from it all?
Well... I’m against smoking
but consider cigarettes. Just think
about it. Each one is like a special
little five-minute vacation. They sell
these vacations in packs of twenty
and there are hundreds of different
kinds. Marlboro Reds is like an
African safari. Menthal Winstons is
like a trip to the zoo.
If you need a longer vacation,
there are always cigars. Forty-five
minutes of pure tobacco-y hedo
nism, and you look cool. It doesn’t
get any better.
Whatever your method of kill
ing stress, just remember that you
need to get rid of it somehow. That
stuff will kill you. Well I’d write
more but it’s almost five o’clock
and I need to go home and watch
Dragon Ball Z. Not because I want
too, but because I owe it to myself.
Go •Goku, kick- Frciza-^ s butt.