Five and a half years ago, one of the biggest reasons I came to Stanford was that no other university has a band quite like ours. I grew up on their “Controversial Actions” Wikipedia page, and when I found out my HPAC had been one of the brides in the band’s infamous marriage gag at BYU, I gained an admiration for her that no transcript could ever provide. And although many of the Band’s actions may have been tasteless (see: Notre Dame, Oregon, USC), each has stemmed from a legitimate, socially conscious stance (opposing bigotry, environmental destruction and murder and excessive media attention).
It is thus with a huge amount of pride that, as of the ASU field shows, I am now a band writer. The Band comes up with the shows they want to perform, and writers come up with material to bridge the formations and inspire others.
I am also proud to say that I wrote much of this past weekend’s Girls Gone Wild show at USC. The show, which dug into sleazebag GGW founder and USC alum Joe Francis, included entirely factual lines like this:
“USC can’t take all the credit for the successes of its students. After all, it takes a special kind of man to be wanted for sexual harassment, drug trafficking, tax evasion, prostitution, child abuse and disruptive flatulence, but that’s just the kind of captain of industry Joe Francis is.”
But a few things led this show to draw attention across the Internet (Huffington Post, Twitter, etc.) and in our own administration. First of all, there was the fact that god-among-men Jim Harbaugh orchestrated an utter, 55-21 shaming of USC. Confused and distraught, several SC fans then complained about the Band show they booed through.
Their most frequent qualm was that the band formed a soap-on-a-rope in reference to Francis’s prison stays. While the Stanford athletic department approved this formation, during the show the complex arrangement got muddied, and USC fans misinterpreted it. As one USC fan tweeted: “Stanford marching band makes an ejaculating penis.” The Twitter name of that reliable witness? @emmadoes69.
I wish I were making that up. I also wish that her opinion hadn’t mattered, but the USC fans’ inaccurate, angry tweets, combined with their e-mails and phone calls (one man called in saying he somehow saw a formation where a father was having sex with his daughter), have forced our athletic department to pay heed.
I certainly do not envy our administrators who end up having to placate upset audience members any time the band does something offensive (which, if Band had its way, would be pretty often). At the same time, though, I wish they had said, “We truly are sorry you saw a penis (or a man having sex with his daughter)–while the formation was unclear, having talked to band members and seen the footage and formation charts, we trust that they did try to form a soap-on-a-rope.”
At the very least, I wish they had said, “Dudes. It wasn’t a penis. The band’s made penises before, and that was definitely not one.” Or even: “You know what? Joe Francis is, truthfully, kind of a douche. The band has every right to criticize him.” It’s frustrating seeing the representatives for our school having to bend over backward to apologize for things the band didn’t even do, when the majority of blogs, videos and comments on the Internet have been overwhelmingly supportive, often calling the show funny, timely and poignant.
Perhaps it would help if band supporters called in as often as its detractors. Maybe then we would be able to write the Big Game show we wanted to. Instead, we’ve had to remove cheap digs at Cal (example: that their hippies smell bad. It’s such an old, classic, harmless joke that I would be shocked if anyone still found it offensive), as well as our substantial jabs (we had a joke about their athletic department siphoning funds from their academic budget. Problematically, band sided with Cal’s furious professors).
It’s a shame because these cuts are unnecessary, but it’s even more disappointing because tomorrow is the most important Big Game in decades. If not even band can mock Cal for fear of upsetting their fans, who can?
That is, aside from the football team. I hope we go for two every chance we get.
Apart from the Band, one of the biggest reasons I came to Stanford was the rivalry; during Princeton’s admit weekend, I once asked my RoHo if they had one. His response: “Well, Penn kinda thinks we’re rivals with them, but I mean, there’s just no way they’re on our level.”
The second we stop throwing mud is the second we cease to be rivals with Cal and start thinking we’re too good for them. Our rivalry is fun because in most ways, Stanford and Cal are pretty equal. They can handle jokes at their expense just as we should be able to tolerate ones at ours. It’s college. It’s fun. It’s necessary.