What is your opinion?
- Thread starter boomwayne
- Start date
It chaps my *** when sidewalk fans of other schools attempt to equate their random fandom to mine.
I should explain that my grandparents, parents, aunts, uncles, sisters, and cousins all graduated from State. My maternal grandfather played football at State in the Roaring '20s. My dad taught there for 28 years. I grew up in Starkville and got two degrees there myself. After I graduated, I spent two years more on campus working at the TV Center, and I worked the Sunday morning coach's shows during the Sherrill era.
So when my father-in-law and sister-in-law, who are both arbitrarily obnoxious sidewalk OM fans, try to intensify the Egg Bowl rivalry during Thanksgiving, say stupid **** like, "I buh-leeed reyud und bleww!!," or drop inane comments about Eli Manning trivia or what-not, it's everything I can do to avoid hulking out on the spot.
Generally, I agree with everybody else that it's admirable to root for the underdog school, which OM and State would certainly qualify as being. But my sister-in-law has never set foot in Oxford, and further, she's not easy to look at. I imagine one trip through the grove for her would be a pretty rude awakening.
If you don't attend a school or have family connections there, doesn't that make the allegiance somewhat arbitrary?
I should explain that my grandparents, parents, aunts, uncles, sisters, and cousins all graduated from State. My maternal grandfather played football at State in the Roaring '20s. My dad taught there for 28 years. I grew up in Starkville and got two degrees there myself. After I graduated, I spent two years more on campus working at the TV Center, and I worked the Sunday morning coach's shows during the Sherrill era.
So when my father-in-law and sister-in-law, who are both arbitrarily obnoxious sidewalk OM fans, try to intensify the Egg Bowl rivalry during Thanksgiving, say stupid **** like, "I buh-leeed reyud und bleww!!," or drop inane comments about Eli Manning trivia or what-not, it's everything I can do to avoid hulking out on the spot.
Generally, I agree with everybody else that it's admirable to root for the underdog school, which OM and State would certainly qualify as being. But my sister-in-law has never set foot in Oxford, and further, she's not easy to look at. I imagine one trip through the grove for her would be a pretty rude awakening.
If you don't attend a school or have family connections there, doesn't that make the allegiance somewhat arbitrary?
Gentlemen,
It sounds like you guys suffer from a massive inferiority complex. I apologize profusely for Ole Miss's status as "Mississippi's Team," but excellence attracts more attention than mediocrity.
People want to emulate doctors and lawyers. Computer nerds and farmers? Not so much.
Cheers.
It sounds like you guys suffer from a massive inferiority complex. I apologize profusely for Ole Miss's status as "Mississippi's Team," but excellence attracts more attention than mediocrity.
People want to emulate doctors and lawyers. Computer nerds and farmers? Not so much.
Cheers.
My Father-in-Law didn't go to State. He joined the Air-Force after WWII and helped send his Brother to State. He's a big State supporter, not quite as big as his Brother is though, they are big time RV'ers.
My Dad is an actual Bama Alum, he went into the service to be able to pay for college so Bama 'Sidewalk' Alumni kind of give me the red ***. Particularly the ones from Mississippi. I can understand it if you are from Alabama. When I got to State it took about a week for me to drop any real love for Bama. It took a semester or two to really build up the hate.
My Dad is an actual Bama Alum, he went into the service to be able to pay for college so Bama 'Sidewalk' Alumni kind of give me the red ***. Particularly the ones from Mississippi. I can understand it if you are from Alabama. When I got to State it took about a week for me to drop any real love for Bama. It took a semester or two to really build up the hate.
We had a mail man in our home town that was the biggest , most obnoxious Ole Miss fan in the town. He ate,slept and breathed Ole Miss and went to every game religiously. The man had never attended any university to our knowledge.
My lawyer friend and the other upper crust UM alumni in town thought the guy was amusing but never spent any time talking with him about the Rebs because well he just wasn`t one of "them".
One Monday after a football weekend my lawyer buddy was pissedbecause he had seen the mail man sitting in better seats than his high dollar seats at the ballgame that weekend so he called the school to get their asses straightened out. When he confronted whomever he was talking to with his complaint of the damn mail man having better seats than his he received this simple reply. "Sir he gives quite a bit more money than you do".</p>
Mail man was a "true fan". We still laugh about that phone call.</p>
My lawyer friend and the other upper crust UM alumni in town thought the guy was amusing but never spent any time talking with him about the Rebs because well he just wasn`t one of "them".
One Monday after a football weekend my lawyer buddy was pissedbecause he had seen the mail man sitting in better seats than his high dollar seats at the ballgame that weekend so he called the school to get their asses straightened out. When he confronted whomever he was talking to with his complaint of the damn mail man having better seats than his he received this simple reply. "Sir he gives quite a bit more money than you do".</p>
Mail man was a "true fan". We still laugh about that phone call.</p>
I attended State, received my degree from State, and consider myself to be a strong fan of State. One thing I noticed while I was in school at State was the a lot of the students that went there were fans of other SEC schools. They wore the Caps/Shirts, they had Stickers on thier vehicles. Those schools pretty much have the same education programs as us, so why come to State and not be a fan of them.
The way I see it, if your are a fan of Alabama or Ole Miss, They are close enough to Starkville for you to go to them instead of State.
The way I see it, if your are a fan of Alabama or Ole Miss, They are close enough to Starkville for you to go to them instead of State.
To clarify I am not trying to justify anything. Was just curious as to what everyone else's opinion was. As for my excuses since you are prepared.I am in the military and live in Virginia. Its kinda hard to get time off and go home for a game, but I do try to make at least one a year. I'm excited,taking the fiance to her first game against Alcorn St. She's slowly converting from a Hokie fan by birth to a Dawg. </p>
since becoming a student at State the difference between people that didn't grow up State fans and experience all the heart ache.<div>
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</div><div>My dad never went to school here but my grandfather did and 2 of his 3 sisters did. He's attended games all of his life and I would consider him maybe more diehard because he didn't go to college but still buys football/basketball tickets, gives to the BC, and comes to all the games(usually one or two away too.)</div><div>
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</div><div>Funny story, my older sister went to Sewanee and lived in Nashville after college. She calls my dad up to get him to drive up from Tupelo for a visit. Over the course of the evening, Dad tells Sis to spit out whatever she has to say. She tells him that she wants to go to grad school. He thinks the idea is a good one. Then she says, "...but Dad, I want to go to Ole Miss." Dad couldn't have cared less. My sister is a lawyer now working with the Vermont legislature fyi.</div>
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</div><div>My dad never went to school here but my grandfather did and 2 of his 3 sisters did. He's attended games all of his life and I would consider him maybe more diehard because he didn't go to college but still buys football/basketball tickets, gives to the BC, and comes to all the games(usually one or two away too.)</div><div>
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</div><div>Funny story, my older sister went to Sewanee and lived in Nashville after college. She calls my dad up to get him to drive up from Tupelo for a visit. Over the course of the evening, Dad tells Sis to spit out whatever she has to say. She tells him that she wants to go to grad school. He thinks the idea is a good one. Then she says, "...but Dad, I want to go to Ole Miss." Dad couldn't have cared less. My sister is a lawyer now working with the Vermont legislature fyi.</div>
if the school has benefited from you being a fan. If youwentto school there, paid forsomeone else to go(tuition), donated money, or bought tickets when it wasn't sold out then you have given the school a financial benefit it would not have received otherwise.Basically, even on a small scale,the school would be worse off if you stopped being a fan.
Buying merchandise doesn't count since it would have been bought by someone else if you hadn't bought it.
Buying merchandise doesn't count since it would have been bought by someone else if you hadn't bought it.
I'm not going to tell anyone what it takes to be a diehard fan... but someone that never attended the university on a day to day basis just won't have the same connection.