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When a chant reflects bias, not patriotism

Published 11:38 a.m., Wednesday, March 7, 2012

Ethnic taunting: When chanting ‘USA, USA, USA' is not always patriotic. Here we go again.

Only this time, the misguided students aren't from a high school in suburban Austin few in San Antonio have heard of.

The hurt hits closer to home this time because the kids who crossed the proverbial line live in our back yard.

Remember when a group of Cedar Park High School students got in hot water last year for chanting “USA, USA, USA” during a boys basketball playoff game against Lanier?

Given that Lanier had a predominantly Hispanic team and Cedar Park's squad was predominantly Anglo, the Voks coaches, players and fans took the chant as ethnic taunting.

San Antonio Independent School District officials agreed and filed a complaint with the University Interscholastic League, which governs extracurricular activities for Texas public schools.

Cedar Park had little choice but to apologize to Lanier and the SAISD.

Alamo Heights now finds itself in the same predicament after a small group of its students chanted “USA, USA, USA” after the Mules beat Edison for the Region IV-4A boys basketball title March 3 at Littleton Gym.

Alamo Heights coach Andrew Brewer and a few others stepped in immediately and put a stop to the chanting, but the damage was done.

For the record, Edison is a predominantly Hispanic team and Alamo Heights is a predominantly Anglo team.

See a pattern here?

There are some who have scoffed at all the commotion, calling it “political correctness run amok.” They say these kids, like the Cedar Park kids, were merely exercising their freedom of speech and expressing their pride in being Americans.

After all, weren't all the players on the court Americans? There's an irony in their argument. It also drips with contradiction.

Chanting “USA, USA, USA” is great when a U.S. team is competing in international competition.

So what's the purpose of chanting “USA, USA, USA” during a high school basketball game between two United States high schools?

And here's something to ponder: How many times has the chant “USA, USA, USA” been heard in the heat of competition between two predominantly white high school teams?

Let's be honest here: The Alamo Heights kids, like the Cedar Park kids, knew what they were doing. They wanted to make their minority opponents feel like foreigners.

It was hurtful and it was wrong.

And let's be clear about this: This has nothing to do with political correctness, a slick term that's become a handy copout for people who can't discern the difference between right and wrong.

SAISD athletic director Gil Garza has filed a complaint against Alamo Heights with the UIL, just as he did against Cedar Park last year.

“I can't believe this is happening again,” Garza said. “I'm sick of this. Our kids deserve better. They work extra hard to get to the regional tournament and then to be subjected to this kind of insensitivity is just wrong.”

Alamo Heights superintendent Kevin Brown quickly apologized to Edison and SAISD officials.

“That's not who we are as a community and that's not who we are as a school,” Brown said. “It's not something that's acceptable for us.”

Really, the kids who engaged in this foolishness disrespected their team as much as they did Edison and its fans. A few seconds of thoughtlessness detracted from the Mules' well-deserved celebration.

© 2012 Hearst Communications Inc.

http://www.mysanantonio.com/sacultura/conexion/article/When-a-chant-reflects-bias-not-patriotism-3388958.php [no comments yet]


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Chanting 'USA' at basketball game is racist

Uploaded by oakwoodNS on Mar 7, 2012

Racial incident mars high school game -- School district, students apologize

SAN ANTONIO --A local school district is apologizing after an apparent incident of racism at a boys high school basketball game this past weekend.

When the final whistle blew Saturday, Alamo Heights celebrated a convincing victory over San Antonio Edison.

Alamo Heights Head Coach Andrew Brewer said he was proud of his team.

"Tremendously proud," Brewer said. "Tremendously. It's the best group of kids."

But it was just after the trophy presentation when the coach was not proud of the chant coming from Alamo Heights fans.

"USA, USA, USA," they chanted.

San Antonio Independent School District officials took the chant as a racial insult to a school with all minority players from a school with mostly white ones.

On the KSAT 12 Defenders Facebook page, Santos Villarreal's post reads "this has to stop."

SAISD Spokeswoman Leslie Price heard about the incident after it had happened.

"This is very disrespectful to our students," Price said.

She said the district is glad the coach put a stop to the chant immediately and hopes Alamo Heights addresses it quickly.

"It is surprising and it's disappointing to hear that anyone would be out there making those kind of remarks," Price said.

Edison students who attended Saturday's game were shocked when they heard the chant. Some thought the fans of the victors should have been better behaved.

Ruby Arredondo and Forest Lebaron are seniors at Edison and Julian Castellano is a junior.

"I was very surprised," Castellano said. "Very appalled."

"They didn't really have any class," Arredondo said.

"It just rubbed us the wrong way," Lebaron said.

Alamo Heights Superintendent Dr. Kevin Brown also apologized for the chant.

"We just hope that people know that that's not who we are and we're not going to let it happen again," Brown said.

Alamo Heights has apologized to SAISD and the students identified will also have to apologize and have been banned from the state title games.

"We think that you have to earn a right to be there and that's not a reflection of our school district," Brown said.

Both districts are now just trying to move past this disturbing incident.

Another SAISD school, Lanier High, faced a similar incident within the last year from students in the Cedar Park school district.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4TtVA-9D7Q


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Even in S.A., Mules can be jackasses

Published 11:26 a.m., Wednesday, March 7, 2012

“USA! USA! USA!” That's what a bunch of kids from Alamo Heights High School chanted after a basketball win over Edison High School last weekend, KSAT reported.

The chant could be heard on the footage used in reporting the incident, and it was pretty ugly.

I can imagine how the Hispanic boys on the Edison team must have felt hearing those chants after having a 50-39 defeat pinned on them by the kids from Alamo Heights.

And as a mother, I can imagine how the parents of those kids must have felt hearing that chant directed at their kids. Regardless of their behavior at home, your kids — the goody goodies, los apestositos who always leave their shoes in the living room, los resongones who always have a reason to argue, the upstanding future mayors of San Antonio — are, the piece of your heart you defend the most.

I can imagine they felt disrespected. Humiliated. Infuriated.

I can even imagine what the young offenders might have been thinking. As is the case when people turn others into a punchline, they were probably only thinking of getting a cheap laugh: We represent the USA, they don't because, well ... look at 'em! More than likely, they didn't mean to hurt the other kids; they just wanted to make everyone laugh and cause a stir, or to prompt wide-eyed surprise and an amused chuckle that says, “No they didn't!”, as if they were comedians pushing the margins of good taste for an audience with low standards.

I can imagine they thought what they were doing was acceptable because, when everyone else disapproves, a bully is redefined as a troublemaker.

But, I can imagine that many of those who witnessed the chanting brushed it off as high school silliness; cosas de niños chiflados, if you will. In fairness, the adults in charge put a stop to the silliness and, es mas, publicly apologized right away. That was the right thing to do. It's what good people are supposed to do when the children in their care get out of hand in public, aunque los desordenados se merecen unas nalgadas bien dadas.

What I can't understand is how this kind of thing still happens in 2012, hasta aquí en San Antonio. Not that it was any less offensive when it happened last year to the kids from Lanier High School in Cedar Park.

But here in San Antonio? San Antonio! One might imagine this kind of thing would not happen in a city where we all get along and celebrate together with a big downtown Fiesta, where mariachis are part of every public celebration, where more than half of the population is Hispanic.

And, one would be wrong.

[e-mail]

© 2012 Hearst Communications Inc.

http://www.mysanantonio.com/sacultura/conexion/article/Even-in-S-A-Mules-can-be-jackasses-3388898.php [no comments yet]


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Eric Bolling: Chanting ‘USA!’ At A Mostly Latino Basketball Team Is Like Tebow Praying



by Frances Martel | 10:02 pm, March 7th, 2012

During today’s The Five, the group took a look at a delicate case of potential discrimination in a high school basketball team in Texas, where a team made up of mostly white students chanted “USA! USA!” at a mostly Latin American team after a victory. The ethnic discrimination seemed clear to the offended team, though some of the panel today found it difficult to come to the conclusion that patriotic fervor is inappropriate in any context.

Andrea Tantaros was the first after Kimberly Guilfoyle‘s introduction to object to the idea of calling the team racist for using a “USA!” chant, particularly in the context of young athletes. She noted that the chant came from Olympic games, was used when the death of Osama bin Laden was announced, and often came up randomly in beer pong tournaments (“allegedly”). She added she couldn’t imagine her father, an immigrant himself, objecting.

Juan Williams disagreed. “I just can’t understand how anybody cannot feel the weight of what was a racially antagonistic statement made by these kids,” he noted that “clearly, this was not an international competition” and the overtones of “the white American kids have defeated you others” were abundantly ovvert to him. “When did it become racist to be patriotic?” replied Eric Bolling, though he did not get support from Dana Perino, who jumped in to support Williams’ point. “I don’t think they were playing a team from Venezuela,” she noted, and tried to explain the situation humorously as, “it’s like when you chant ‘establishment!’ at me.”

Bolling objected that the issue wasn’t so much the potential racism, but “the political correctness of what they are doing… They are apologizing for chanting USA, within the USA, playing another team from the USA, who likely has legal American citizens on their basketball team!” Tantaros agreed with the sentiment, adding that it was problematic in a slippery slope way, and the potential of censoring patriotism in school was a dangerous one to fertilize. Bolling agreed and likened the impulse to make the kids not chant in such a way to the objections to Tim Tebow praying after a game.

One of the most interesting aspects of this discussion is the way the panel breaks down on the story given their experiences. By Tantaros’ admission, both she and Guilfoyle come from a recent immigrant background, as does Williams. Of the three, only he objects– and Perino, slightly more removed, agrees with him. To compare the needless ethnic other-ing of the small team in such a small community to the mockery of a public figure like Tebow feels somewhat wide of the mark– it’s not like anyone chants “Christianity!” at Tebow during games. And the humiliation of being excluded from the only nationality one has because of ethnicity is entirely absent from the Tebow narrative– and from the narrative argued here that these are simple kid games the authorities should not involve themselves in.

The segment via Fox News below:

[video embedded]

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/eric-bolling-chanting-usa-at-a-mostly-latino-basketball-team-is-like-tebow-praying/ [with comments]


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