More Utah Man Am I Thoughts
Oct 12, 2013 Salt Lake City, UT, USA; Utah Utes cheerleaders lead the team onto the field prior to a game against the Stanford Cardinal at Rice-Eccles Stadium. Utah defeated Stanford 27-21. Mandatory Credit: Russ Isabella-USA TODAY Sports
A few days ago a Utah Man group asked me to retweet their tweet about saving Utah Man, and then I promptly lost the tweet somehow and can’t find it. So I thought I’d do them a favor and at least blog about Utah Man. And I saw some kind of forum was happening on campus today, so here it goes.
I’ll start with a couple of thoughts…
- Utah Man is a tradition, maybe the only long standing tradition Utah has.
- Utah Man is sexist.
- The Coed line especially is sexist, and kind of silly actually. Also not the original line.
- The sexism expressed is pretty harmless and cute, like your grandpa telling you how pretty you are right when you’re getting your Ph.D
But here is something I’m going to urge. How about we all sit down and listen to each other. We just might find a solution without freaking out at each other.
First white guys freaking out about protecting Utah Man. Stop acting like that idiot Cliven Bundy and imagining that everything is a conspiracy to destroy your way of life. Like I say, the song has issues.
Sam Ortiz and the ASUU folks who passed the anti-Utah Man resolution. What is it about the song that makes you or the groups you’re talking about feel marginalized? Will changes too the song help or is it something more?
Utah Man always seemed like a silly song to me. When others tease us about having the Mickey Mouse theme as our fight song, well there is some merit to that. But it’s also our silly song and our tradition. And because a century ago, our athletic teams weren’t enlightened enough to not use the name REDSKINS and in 1972, when changing to Utes, our administration didn’t have the political will to make a full change, like they probably should have, we’re stuck in no mans land. Any traditions we had, were forced to be left behind. And since our football team sucked at just the wrong time, we didn’t develop new ones.
So, I’d like to keep Utah Man. But if it can be a catalyst to open a debate about groups on campus who feel marginalized, I don’t think that is a bad thing.