Carleton’s new-and-improved Ravens football team just finished its inaugural year, and with the return of football, Carleton also inherits a culture of tailgate parties and tradition. Many American universities have made names for themselves through their football teams—University of Michigan, University of Florida, and Louisiana State University, to name a few.
The truth is, compared to what football and athletics in general mean to our southern neighbours, Carleton falls flat on its face. Sports teams in southern schools are used to build a community and give a reason to celebrate your school. While at Carleton, I struggle to recall any unique cheers or chants for our teams, besides our infamous catcall to University of Ottawa, which doesn’t really come in handy for the other seven games in a football season.
Over reading week, I travelled to the University of Mississippi, home of the Ole Miss Rebels, and the second-ranked tailgating party in the world, according to Sports Illustrated.
Before a game, hundreds of spectators fill a large park in the centre of campus with colourful tents and home-cooked food. Many travel from out of state and some even make a gruelling nine-hour drive from Houston, just to set up a tent and enjoy the festivities before entering the stadium.
The streets of tents sometimes get so packed it’s nearly impossible to move. Parking and accommodations are almost always an issue for the little town of Oxford, population 20,088. Students and revellers intermingle with parents and alumni, all while maintaining a level of hospitality and kindness that the South is so famous for.
Police were ever-present and turning a blind eye to public drinking, but while I was in town there were no fights to break up, few, if any, drunks that needed to be hospitalized, and the public maintained the famous southern cordiality they’re known for.
Whenever you get a large number of people, put them within close confines, and give them both alcohol and a common cause to cheer for, new friendships are made and communities are formed.
Though still succeeding on filling our tiny stadium’s seats, Carleton’s homecoming this year was largely washed out and unattended by most of the student body. Sitting in wet stands sucks, and there wasn’t enough pageantry and excitement to attract students to the feel of the football game.
The university clearly has little trust for any tailgating participants.
While Ole Miss’ rules mostly concern responsible drinking and avoiding setting fire to the century-old park where the tailgating takes place, Carleton states that it can perform intrusive searches of the vehicles in the parking lot, and that all tailgating must be shut down during the football game.
Carleton is passing up an opportunity to develop a more full-bodied reputation at home and abroad by divorcing itself from a ‘for fun’ student life.
We have a habit of heavily politicizing student gatherings, such as last year’s Rick Ross debacle, and then beating them down with bureaucracy and regulations until the event is a bloody pulp, totally indistinguishable from what it was conceived as.
A refusal to trust students at any university-sanctioned event only succeeds in limiting student participation, and keeps Carleton from becoming a closer, tighter-knit community.
Much like anything else in life, if we treat people like children, they’ll behave like children, but if we treat people like adults, we can have more fun than anyone had when they were a teenager.
What seems to be forgotten at our university is that silly, memorable cheers, unique traditions, and vibrant school pride are not developed by the school administration and then distributed to the student body, like flyers or coupons. These traditions are made by the student body, and all the administration can do is foster their creativity.
Some Canadian universities such as Queen’s and McGill are known for more than just their academic standing, and Carleton too deserves a student culture to match their wild, enthusiastic, and occasionally wacky student body.
