Barstool Sports

HuffPo- The University of Virginia’s student council has unanimously passed a resolution to bar co-eds from inserting the word “not” before the word “gay” (meaning “happy”) in the school’s song, which is performed at athletic events. As Outsports reports, UVA students have been inserting the word in the school’s traditional “Good Ol’ Song” since the 1970s, but previous calls to change the practice have fallen on deaf ears. “Using the proposed resolution, Council seeks to take a stand against the chanting of the unscripted phrase — a phrase that members see as contrary to the safe and welcoming environment the university seeks to provide to all its students,” Emily Hutt and Jordan Bower of UVA’s Cavalier Daily report. “Council members said they hoped the legislation would be a step toward ending disrespectful or derogatory acts toward LGBTQ communities and supporters.”Though some students reportedly questioned how effective the ban could be, others praised the move. Among them was student Eric McDaniel, a college representative and the council’s director of university relations, who called the chant “a relic of hate from a time of intolerance that we have more than progressed past,” according to the Cavalier Daily.

I get it: By now we’re supposed to have evolved as a society beyond intolerance and hate and all that shit and accept everyone for who they are. And I’m cool with that. But that doesn’t mean you can ignore the simple fact that the word “gay” has evolved right along with the rest of American culture. The only context where that word means “happy” anymore is in a sentence like : “Look at those two guys making out on a park bench. They look so gay!” So can you really blame the students at UVA for wanting to add a little disclaimer to their fight song? Anyone who honestly thinks this is an anti-gay chant needs to go get some shitty activism internship with the ACLU and let everyone else get on with their lives. The reality is that despite what their fight song might suggest, the majority of the students at UVA have a tendency not to fuck people of the same sex. Can you blame them for wanting to change the lyrics of a song that suggests the polar opposite? Plus the purpose of a fight song in the first place is to get everyone pumped up, and like it or not letting everyone know you have a massive army of homosexuals to cheer you on probably isn’t the most intimidating or inspirational strategy. That’s not prejudice, that’s reality.  In the immortal words of Carl Johnson: Don’t blame me, blame society.