MrsSpringsteen
Blue Crack Addict
Considering the history of the song and what the students from the Black Student Union said, I think they could find several other "pump up" songs that could be used.
SI.com
DURHAM, N.H. (AP) -- Black Betty, a '70s rock song used to rally fans at University of New Hampshire hockey games for perhaps a decade, is no more.
Athletic Director Marty Scarano told the campus newspaper, The New Hampshire, the rollicking, 1977 song by the band Ram Jam was banned because it is "theoretically racist."
The NAACP deemed the Ram Jam version of the old song offensive to black women three decades ago, and UNH has received intermittent complaints about it for years, the Concord Monitor reported Saturday.
Two years ago, a student group that studied diversity at the school said it should be banned. Scarano said a more recent complaint pushed him to outlaw it, but he did say who complained.
Scarano did not return telephone calls seeking comment.
Dominated by repetitive "na-na-na-na-nas," "bam-ba-lams" and the exclamation Black Betty, the song has been played at the starts of the second and third periods of UNH hockey games for more than a decade, according to a school Web site.
UNH plays in Hockey East. Spokesman Noah Smith said the league has received complaints and league members have had "a couple of discussions" with UNH officials and decided the song was "probably inappropriate."
But Smith said Hockey East couldn't force UNH or any other school to stop playing a song.
Student reaction on a campus where hockey is king have ranged from indifferent to angry. "Save Black Betty" T-shirts and banners have appeared at home games and someone has started a Web site called FreeBlackBetty.com.
Freshman Ryan Leach, who formed a similar group on the popular online college site Facebook.com, signed a recent e-mail "Ryan Leach, Save Black Betty Chairman."
"The true fight has not yet been seen," he wrote.
But senior Kelly Vogel said she hadn't heard about the flap until a story appeared in The New Hampshire soon after students returned from winter break Jan. 24. People talked about it for a few days until interest dropped off, she said.
"I haven't seen any rallies or anything," Vogel said.
Most students interviewed said they didn't realize anyone considered the song offensive.
"It's just a pump-up song," sophomore Brittany Clement said. "I never knew about the lyrics because I just associated it with hockey."
Sophomore Matt Connors is head of the Wild-Ice-Cats, the UNH hockey fan club. He said he was disappointed by the ban and plans to propose that the song be played without its lyrics.
But two members of the school's Black Student Union are happy the song is gone. Senior Stefanie Hauck and junior Ola Akinwumi said blacks were considered inferior in the United States when the song was written, and the song has no connection to athletics or hockey.
"If you look at it, basically the whole audience at these games is Caucasian," Hauck said. "For them to be singing a song like Black Betty, it doesn't make sense. It is kind of derogatory."
SI.com
DURHAM, N.H. (AP) -- Black Betty, a '70s rock song used to rally fans at University of New Hampshire hockey games for perhaps a decade, is no more.
Athletic Director Marty Scarano told the campus newspaper, The New Hampshire, the rollicking, 1977 song by the band Ram Jam was banned because it is "theoretically racist."
The NAACP deemed the Ram Jam version of the old song offensive to black women three decades ago, and UNH has received intermittent complaints about it for years, the Concord Monitor reported Saturday.
Two years ago, a student group that studied diversity at the school said it should be banned. Scarano said a more recent complaint pushed him to outlaw it, but he did say who complained.
Scarano did not return telephone calls seeking comment.
Dominated by repetitive "na-na-na-na-nas," "bam-ba-lams" and the exclamation Black Betty, the song has been played at the starts of the second and third periods of UNH hockey games for more than a decade, according to a school Web site.
UNH plays in Hockey East. Spokesman Noah Smith said the league has received complaints and league members have had "a couple of discussions" with UNH officials and decided the song was "probably inappropriate."
But Smith said Hockey East couldn't force UNH or any other school to stop playing a song.
Student reaction on a campus where hockey is king have ranged from indifferent to angry. "Save Black Betty" T-shirts and banners have appeared at home games and someone has started a Web site called FreeBlackBetty.com.
Freshman Ryan Leach, who formed a similar group on the popular online college site Facebook.com, signed a recent e-mail "Ryan Leach, Save Black Betty Chairman."
"The true fight has not yet been seen," he wrote.
But senior Kelly Vogel said she hadn't heard about the flap until a story appeared in The New Hampshire soon after students returned from winter break Jan. 24. People talked about it for a few days until interest dropped off, she said.
"I haven't seen any rallies or anything," Vogel said.
Most students interviewed said they didn't realize anyone considered the song offensive.
"It's just a pump-up song," sophomore Brittany Clement said. "I never knew about the lyrics because I just associated it with hockey."
Sophomore Matt Connors is head of the Wild-Ice-Cats, the UNH hockey fan club. He said he was disappointed by the ban and plans to propose that the song be played without its lyrics.
But two members of the school's Black Student Union are happy the song is gone. Senior Stefanie Hauck and junior Ola Akinwumi said blacks were considered inferior in the United States when the song was written, and the song has no connection to athletics or hockey.
"If you look at it, basically the whole audience at these games is Caucasian," Hauck said. "For them to be singing a song like Black Betty, it doesn't make sense. It is kind of derogatory."
I can't believe no one's mentioned that U2 have played this song, whole or in snippet, numerous times live too.
