Pictured here are some Roosevelt High School frosh hanging near the snack bar at half-time. The one with the sunglasses is asking his friend: "What should I get: Red Vines or Doritos?"Yep, Roosevelt High made it to Oregon's 5A hoop finals. It's a huge accomplishment. A ne'er-do-well underdog taking it to the Big Show, surprising lots of people, which are mostly richy-rich white kids who've had things pretty good with their year-round club sports, hoop camps, and awesome shoes.
Evidently Roosevelt High's entourage (supporters) caused quite a stir at Mac Court in Eugene last week because, um, they were mostly black and sitting together. And weren't enunciating their team spirit clearly.
To sum up the hallaballooh, the Roosevelt High Roughrider student body occasionally gets to shouting a certain cheer to rally some enthusiasm and courtside momentum. The chant goes like this: "Riders! Riders! Riders!" Short for Roughriders, as far as I can tell, which is the school's mascot, which is a teachable moment in itself. Especially for budding Teddy Roosevelt and Spanish-American War scholars.
Anyhoo, it goes "Riders! Riders! Riders!"
Like any good chant, it's catchy and worth repeating. Try it. Riders! Riders! Riders! and so on. Unfortunately, some uptight (white) parents and high school chaperone-types (uptighty whities) weren't hearing "Riders! Riders! Riders!" from the stands. They were hearing -- holy cow -- "Riot! Riot! Riot!"
"Can't have none of that. We don't want no riot on our hands," said a pear-shaped white man hugging a liter of Coke.
"An official" (unfortunate man) was asked to explain to the Roosevelt student section that their chant was inappropriate and that they have to, um, stop. I'm not making this up.
Meanwhile, Churchill High and its hometown crowd numbering in the bazillions, cheered (and probably chanted Christian-themed battle cries) so loudly that the vast majority of regular prep fans had no idea a riot was about to break out.
It made me wonder about all the other chants that were being "chanted." Last thing we want is a lot of minorities and/or illegal immigrants taking advantage at a basketball playoff game. No one wants to be fooled. Fool me once and you've fooled me, but fool me twice ... well, you've fooled me again if you know what I mean. I don't even want to know what happens if you fooled me a third time, I guess, basically.
Actual: Riders! Riders! Riders!
What people heard: Riot! Riot! Riot!
Actual: Defense! Defense! Defense!
What people heard: Black Power! Black Power! Black Power!
Actual: Hold 'em! Hold 'em! Hold 'em!
What people heard: Give us your money! Give us your money! Give us your money!
Actual: We're number one! We're number one! We're number one!
What people heard: We're going to cut you up! We're going to cut you up! We're going to cut you up!
Actual: Two points! Two points! Two points!
What people heard: 400 years of oppression! 400 years of oppression! 400 years of oppression!
In summary, I think the town folk -- converging from just about every suburb in Oregon -- just weren't used to seeing dozens of black people all together in one place yelling loudly. Maybe that's what we need to work on. Yep, we need more "urban" and "inner city" schools basically, um, winning.
