From: Lisa Miller, Dean of Diversity
Harvard University
RE: Mascots
I applaud the NCAA's recent efforts to elminate harmful and offensive school nicknames and mascots. We must all work together to create a peaceful environment where no one is offended by the name of a particular sports team - only the fact that their team may lose. That is the subject of another memo. Perhaps the NCAA and other sports governing bodies will consider eliminating scoring altogether so that no student is left feeling bad about him or herself because of a loss.
I will not even begin to address the ranking system or BCS polls. Those are a travesty!
Back to the subject of nicknames, forcing schools to change obvious offenders such as Seminoles, Utes, and Warriors is not enough. We must also be sensitive to our animal friends. Names like Bruins, Gamecocks, and Ducks are harmful to animals. They create false sterotypes that animals are... well.. animals. They are not lowly animals, beneath us and here for our pleasure or to serve as workers! They are vital parts of this world; we must live in harmony with them - in the great circle of life.
I recommend that Harvard change its school color from Crimson, which invokes blood, lust, and violence, to something more sedate and non-offensive like baby blue. That color works for the University of North Carolina. It could work for us as well. Although UNC must change its nickname. Tarheel is offensive though I really don't know what it means or what it says about North Carolina history.
I'm from the North and I know better than those raggedy, backwards Southerners.
