Metaphors we die by....

I sent a shorter version of my "Speaking of offensive names, drop 'The Civil War'" post to The Oregonian as a letter to the editor after the paper editorialized in favor of the recent State Board of Education decision to force high schools do drop stereotyping names for sports teams.

Much to my surprise the editorial page editors printed my 150-word letter on Thursday. And to my equal surprise only one friend and my mother-in-law (who is, I should be quick to note, is also a friend) mentioned seeing it.

I think this speaks to the demise of the print medium. Or to my demise in reaching out to friends.

I actually addressed my comments to The Oregonian editors. I noted the media's role in perpetuating the use of "Civil War" to describe a mere collegiate rivalry. Sure, I wanted the paper's readers to mull over my modest proposal, but I really, REALLY, did want The Oregonian editors to consider dropping the term, just as they took the lead 20 years ago in dropping the use of Native-American names that describe sports teams.

Perhaps the most notable example is the "Washington Red Skins." Sports fans here have managed somehow with having Washington's NFL team referred to simply as "Washington" on the Oregonian's sports page.

So, in the few years left in which The Oregonian still clings to relevance as a means of communication, it could once again lead us to stop equating athletic rivalries with war.

While its editors are at it, they might look at the use of war terminology to describe political campaigns (war rooms, attack ads, war chests etc.) and government programs (War on Drugs, War on Poverty etc.)

Sadly metaphors have a way of unrealistically defining our expectations. Wars, government programs and political campaigns are won or lost...or so we are led to believe. There is no in-between. But were the Korean, Vietnam and Iraq wars won or lost? What of Afghanistan two years from now? And do wars ever really end for those who fight in them or are victims of them? Consider the rate of suicides among returning Iraq veterans....just for starters. Wars kill long after they "end" or are "won" or "lost."

And because of the flood of war imagery in our discourse is it wonder that compromise becomes increasingly difficult in our impressionable, emotional society?

The Oregonian, and the media in general, need to choose metaphors far more carefully. Who knows, it might even help them survive....

P.S. in today's Oregonian (5/28) is a letter supporting my letter. It is from William C. Woodcock of McMinnville.

Oh, THAT Civil War....

A note to Oregonian sports fans:

All this talk about the 150th anniversary of The Civil War must seem confusing.

It may come as a surprise, but the press attention to The Civil War is not to the intra-state rivalry between Oregon State and the University of Oregon.

There was this other Civil War. It was an actual WAR. You can read about it here.

More than half million Americans died in The Civil War. There were no "bragging rights" in front of TV cameras. No trophy to display. There was nothing to brag about.

Brothers butchered brothers.

There were no coaches and so-called "scholar-athletes" seeking fame and multi-million dollar NFL and NBA contracts; just generals and soldiers set upon slaughtering each other.

The Civil War now getting fleeting attention was, in fact, a blood-drenched, body-breaking national tragedy.

Oregonians (and sports writers and editors) who trivialize the carnage and destruction by naming petty and passing sports rivalries "The Civil War" dishonor this nation's history and horror.

That this good state's citizenry can't end the disrespect astounds me.

My rage against a dying light

Each year in the week leading up to the UO/OSU football game I protest the rivalry’s name, “The Civil War.”

What's the problem? friends and family ask. Lighten up!

Simply put, I find it abhorrent that a collegiate football game would call itself a war, even metaphorically.

And so I persist in a losing cause.

As far as I can tell, the name for the Oregon rivalry has been around for 80 years, thanks to some long-forgotten sportswriter. No one even thinks about it any more. Except, seemingly, me.

Of course, there’s the play on the word “civil” that softens the name. But at the same time “the Civil War” raises the specter of real civil war. One-hundred-and-fifty years ago our "War between the States" took the lives of a half million Americans. (Matthew Brady recorded the war dead in the trenches at Fredericksburg in the photo shown below. Above, the "Civil War" "trenches" between OSU and UO.)

On Sunday The Oregonian ran the headline “Dark precursor to war.” You’d think the headline was attached to an account of the deadly shelling between the Koreas, but, no, it ran above a story about the upcoming game in Corvallis.

The sports page loves to milch the war image. “Dark precursor to war.” Give me a break.

Civil wars, real ones, are very much with us, in the Congo, in the Sudan, in Somalia, and potentially on the Korean peninsula. There are bombings and shoot-outs in Iraq, China and Mexico with civil war overtones.

We don’t need metaphorical civil wars on our campuses. All they do is amplify the bellicose tone for already violent football games.

My family refers to my annual protest as “Rick’s rant.”

If for some reason I miss a year, they might worry. “Is the old boy winding down?”

Strangers have reacted to past Red Electric posts on the subject with “You’ve got to be kidding!” and “Get a life!” responses from avid Ducks and Beavers. I must seem a timorous lamb. “The Civil War” name to them is as much a part of the game as trash talk, hobbled quarterbacks, brain-jarring hits, and unnecessary roughness.

I’ve tried to take a positive approach by suggesting other names, but none of them expresses the chest-pounding gusto and testosterone rush that “The Civil War” does.

Somehow Stanford and Cal can get by with “The Big Game.” Harvard and Yale simply face off in “The Game” and Auburn and Alabama manage with the “Iron Bowl.” (Hey Oregon fans, how about The Silicon Forest Bowl? The Spotted Owl Bowl? The Visit-but-don't Stay Bowl? The Anti-War Bowl?)

I’m not sure why Oregon needs to invoke war to get its competitive juices flowing. Perhaps it’s to ward off the onset of hibernation. Or maybe it is ignorance of the terrible costs of war on our sheltered campuses. (I wonder what Oregon veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts feel about the name. “War” for them has an indelible meaning that is beyond the comprehension of college undergraduates and "Civil War" fans.)

Maybe the Oregon rivalry’s name persists because Oregon has never experienced a real civil war. Would a football rivalry in Kentucky or Tennessee or Virginia be called “The Civil War”? Would a soccer rivalry between German and Belgium be named “The Battle of the Bulge”? Don’t even ask about “The Holocaust” describing a rivalry in Israel.

So there it is: another year, another rant. Is anyone listening?

In this year of my seniority, the words of Dyan Thomas come to mind:

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Enjoy the game but not the war

Each year at this time I remind fellow Oregonians that war involves maiming, misery and death.

Why do I do this?

Because each year, Oregonians, without pausing, refer to their intra-state rivalry as “The Civil War.” (Surely there is a better name. Suggestions?)

The "Civil War tradition" and casual usage of the name lead to such things a “Civil War Appetizers and Main Dishes” (vis. Today’s Oregonian food section.)

The list of “Civil War” paraphernalia, oddities and trivia goes on and on.

So here’s my reminder: the American Civil War (1861-1865) never came with appetizers and main dishes.

Nor did it involve split ends, cheerleaders (with or without split ends) and tailgaters.

The Civil War did come with death; 620,000 soldiers (the most of any American war) were killed. Hundreds of thousand were maimed. Divisions from the American Civil War remain to this day.

You might give our Civil War history passing thought as you settle into the Oregon State/University of Oregon football game Thursday. When “The Civil War” is mouthed — and it will be endlessly and mindlessly—allow the horror of real civil war to flicker ever-so-briefly across your mind.

That number again is 620,000 dead.

If you are having trouble wrapping your head around it, here’s help: the statistic is the equivalent of every man, woman and child in Portland and Beaverton.

And if you think that’s bad, the Russian Civil War (1917-1923) claimed between 15 million and 20 million lives. A staggering toll.

That’s what civil wars can do.

Now go back to the game and your Civil War cheese dip….

P.S. To readers tempted to write "lighten up" or "get a life," save yourself the trouble. You've been heard in advance. Peace.

What the White Stag Sign should say

How unfair that the University of Oregon now owns the iconic White Stag sign and proposes to replace “Made in Oregon” with (what else?) “The University of Oregon.”

And this in the week following the Ducks' Holocaustic (are we offended yet, sports fans?) gassing (yet?) of the OSU Beavers.

No, this sign, the Crown Jewel of our glittering downtown skyline, belongs to the city — a city of Ducks and Beavers, and ducks and beavers, and the rest of us.

So here’s my suggestion. Let’s accept the sign as advertising (that’s a HUGE concession on my part) and let’s use it to promote BOTH valley universities. That would be an act of great magnanimity for the University of Oregon, but, let’s face it, it’s about time.

“The University of Oregon & Oregon State University” is too long and boring.

I propose a massive message that both Ducks and Beavers agree on;

WIN THE CIVIL WAR!

Imagine it. Each day tens of thousands of commuters arrive at the clogged confluence of I-5 and I-84 to be greeted by the leaping white stag, the Civil War battle cry of our great institutions of higher education, and the teeny “Old Town” at the bottom.

It says it all ... I guess.

* * *

Attention Ducks and Beavers, this just in on The Civil War — the other one. The New York Times today lists among the five best non-fiction books of the year “This Republic of Suffering, Death and The American Civil War” by Drew Gilpin Faust.

Here’s what the Times had to say about the book:

"In this powerful book, Faust, the president of Harvard, explores the legacy, or legacies, of the 'harvest of death' sown and reaped by the Civil War. In the space of four years, 620,000 Americans died in uniform, roughly the same number as those lost in all the nation’s combined wars from the Revolution through Korea. This doesn’t include the thousands of civilians killed in epidemics, guerrilla raids and draft riots. The collective trauma created ' a newly centralized nation-state,' Faust writes, but it also established 'sacrifice and its memorialization as the ground on which North and South would ultimately reunite.'”

Go HERE for the Times’ ten best books list for 2008.

Top Hits: Sarah Palin's Glasses & Oregon's Civil War

Anyone who has blogged has felt the pull between writing you want to write and writing what others will be drawn to.

I abide by the first, but on a few happy occasions I manage to satisfy the second too.

After two years and 851 posts, two topics have attracted far and away the most visits to this site.

The ostensible topics (as defined by my search engine tags) were Sarah Palin’s glasses and The Civil War (the Oregon football rivalry). But the tags deceive because the topics were points of departure to far different content.

Perhaps the lesson is to choose timely, popular topics (and tags) to hang larger, provocative substance to. A kind of blogger’s bait and switch.

In the case of Palin’s glasses, I wanted to pick an argument with Marshall McLuhan and make a point about “cool,” visual appeal. Despite all she wasn't, Palin as visually cool.

In the case of the “Civil War” rivalry, I wanted the reader to consider the unintended power of a sports metaphor.

I got more than 800 visits to the Palin specs post, but I think that most of the visitors were interested in where to purchase glasses like the governor’s. I hope their disappointment was more than offset by a new awareness of McLuhan.

The Civil War post, which is an annual ritual (some would say “rant”) for me in the week before the big University of Oregon/Oregon State game, drew 200 plus visits, which isn’t nearly as impressive as the Palin response. What made the “Civil War” post notable was the unanimously negative response. I clearly struck a nerve.

How dare I question the tradition of calling the game “The Civil War”? For some, my complaint was literally unheard of.

For them, it’s unheard of no longer. Disagree as they might, my view now is part of their consciousness. That’s reason enough to share and disseminate it. I’m pleased they were moved to defend their own.

Try this metaphor on for size

It's curious. When I write about significant problems here, they rarely draw a response.

But when I oppose "The (so called) Civil War," the name of the game, devoted Ducks and Beavers go ballistic. And I'M the one who is supposed to "get a life."

See comments on my post.

OK, let's choose another (mere?) historical event in which multitudes (millions, in fact) were killed. I guess you would call it a real rout, in football terms. Let's suppose that one of Oregon's teams runs away with today's game. Why not call the rout "A Holocaust"?

Offended yet?

First, count to ten.

Think.

Now ask yourself where you draw the line and why.

Extra credit: Who was that sports editor who voted "The Civil War" off the sports page? What could he have been thinking?

"The Civil War" — unworthy of Oregon

Each year in the week before the UO/OSU "Civil War,” I rail against this over-the-top name for a simple football rivalry.

I argue that the universities' stature is lessened because of their rivalry’s appellation.

Today’s Oregonian sports page gave me a “peg” for this year’s lament.

The headline reads, “It’s not civil nor is it war.”

Well, duh, if it’s not civil and not a war, in the name of mere accuracy, LET'S CALL IT SOMETHING ELSE!

The Oregonian's writer, Ryan White, tells those of us who are agitated (outraged?) by this abominable name, to lighten up. It’s only a metaphor. He might have added that “Beavers” aren’t really beavers, and “Ducks” aren’t really ducks.

Problem is, thanks to “The Civil War” and the name's inhumanity, I’m not so sure.

To Ryan, I recommend George Lakoff and Mark Johnson’s little book, “Metaphors We Live By.” Metaphors (and words, for that matter) shape how we think about our world. When we say “I fell in love,” we do in a way surrender ourselves to the helplessness of falling.

Metaphors reinforce and even guide how we behave, write Lakoff and Johnson.

“The Civil War,” as a name for a mere intercollegiate rivalry, also cheapens the word “War.” It also dishonors the 500,000 American lives lost in the real American Civil War.

Worse it suggests an ignorance and lack of respect for that event by the faculty, administration, students and alumni of Oregon’s two major universities.

After 9/11, I actually wrote the presidents of the University of Oregon and Oregon State University to urge them to drop the name once and for all because of anguish about real war, violence and terror. To my surprise, the president of OSU wrote to say that the administration had taken the name change under consideration. Nothing became of it.

White’s story in today’s Oregonian refers to an enlightened past sports editor who banished the term from the sports page. Writes White, “The Civil War, he told reporters, was between the North and the South and took place between 1861 and 1865.”

Exactly.

White doesn’t tell us the name of the editor, but it should be inscribed on the tombstone of Oregon's "Civil War.” Metaphorically speaking, of course.

Marching, cruising front-runners gain upper hand

Here we go again. Metaphors run amok!

Front page of today’s Oregonian. Lead story. Top right.

Let’s count the metaphors.

Ready?

Illinois Sen. Barack Obama cruised (1) past New York Sen. Hillary Clinton in the Wisconsin primary Tuesday, gaining the upper hand (2)* in a Democratic presidential race (3) for the ages (4?).

But wait! There’s more!

Second paragraph.

Arizona Sen. John McCain, the Republican front-runner (5) [actually a repeat of #3 above], won a pair of primaries, in Wisconsin and Washington, to continue his march (6) toward certain nomination.

At least we don’t have “battleground states,” “’air’ wars,” “war rooms” “near knockout blows,” “routs,” “thrashings” and “poundings.”

That’s good because the story quotes Obama talking about ending the war (the real one in Iraq). Perhaps the reporter, the AP’s David Espo, could see the reference coming and restrained himself. Best not to use political war metaphors in political stories mentioning war and its death and devastation.

Reality exposes war metaphors as the shams they are.

By the way, that’s why I’ve suggested on numerous occasions that the University of Oregon and Oregon State University declare peace and stop referring to their low-stakes athletic rivalries as a high-stakes “Civil War.”

Ducks! Beavers! Are you listening? Or are you just, well, Beavers and Ducks?

* The origin of “Gaining the upper hand” according to the American English Sports Games Idiom site is "the medieval gambling practice of throwing a stick to your opponent who would catch and hold it. Players would alternate hands around the stick until one won by having "the upper hand" on the stick, no room being left for another hand."

Come to think of it, I used to do this as a kid to determine which side would bat first. The thrown stick in question was our baseball bat. After the catch, we did the hand-over-hand. The kid left grasping the top had to pass one final test. If he could hold on to the bat as it was kicked by an opponent, his side was awarded "the upper hand" and the first at bat.

It seems like a long way from what Barack Obama did in Wisconsin on Tuesday.

PSU's new "killer" coach

I've written before about how the hyper-commercialism, and just plain hype, of big-time collegiate athletics is at odds with our universities' academic missions. How alumni pour money into athletics coffers while academics starve.

Here in Oregon, where higher education is on academic life support, the culture of intercollegiate athletics is so debased that fans refer to the OSU/UO rivalry as "The Civil War." Didn't a half million Americans give their lives in this nation's Civil War? Aren't Americans dying as I write because of a civil war in Iraq?

A football game — a war?

Now comes one Peter Reader (a great name, by the way) of Northwest Portland with a related complaint. This time it's about PSU and its new yahoo football coach, Jerry Granville.

He misses my larger point about the role of big-time sports on campus, but Peter's problem is part of the whole.

Writing in the letters section of the must-read Portland Tribune, Reader puts it to PSU for hiring Granville, known for his trademark black outfits and white cowboy hats.

Here's Reader's scorching letter, to which I say, "Amen!"

PSU’s best strategy: Find a new coach

Steve Brandon reports that “Viking coaches will be recruiting the rest of May” (PSU Football, May 11).

Here’s a suggestion: Send scouts to state and federal penitentiaries. There should be plenty of aggressive folks there who would be itching to follow Coach Jerry Glanville’s new direction for Portland State University’s football team.

For example, in the May 15 article “Viks warm up quickly to new systems,” Brandon quotes PSU safety Michael Dorsey’s admiration of Glanville’s teaching that encourages him to “hurt people … in terms of actual physical punishment. … There will be a chance for us to take a lot of kill shots. … We’re looking to take people out of games.”

Portland State University is my school. I graduated in 2005; I’m enrolled in its Senior Adult Learning Center. I want to be proud of my alma mater, its coaches and athletes, as well as its professors and students.

Coach Glanville is a disgrace to the institution. What kind of coach teaches his players to “hurt” and “kill”? What kind of coach wants to win by “taking people out of games”?

I’m not naive. I know that football has become a big moneymaker for colleges and that PSU is desperate for a winning team.

But at what cost? By turning student athletes into bloodthirsty monsters?

Coach Glanville should be teaching good sportsmanship, not cruelty. After all, isn’t the purpose of a college education to humanize people, not desensitize us?

What, I wonder, will Michael Dorsey glean from his experience at PSU? That it’s OK to hurt others?

I blame PSU’s administrators for this reprehensible situation. How could they hire such a dreadful person for their football coach? Is their silence tacit approval of his tactics? If so, they are one shameless bunch.

I, for one, would be happy to send Coach Glanville packing. I’ll even provide the hatbox.

Peter H. Reader

Northwest Portland