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Guess New Mustangs Didn't Help ?

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Re: Guess New Mustangs Didn't Help ?

Postby mustangbill67 » Sun Oct 18, 2009 9:42 pm

SMU 86 wrote:
RGV Pony wrote:
mustangbill67 wrote:Love your avator RGV Pony. Believe it or not, my old highschool football coach and a former SMU coach.


that's awesome.



O. A. "Bum" Philips

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S20qvvDGBt0


When Bum was in Amarillo, he would come over to the house frequently as he and my dad were good friends. Stand out in the driveway and talk Amarillo Sandie football. Of course, Wade was just a kid then but would normally hang around our highschool practices. Good memories of a great man and coach.
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Re: Guess New Mustangs Didn't Help ?

Postby SMU21TCU10 » Mon Oct 19, 2009 3:27 am

Of course they didn't. The new horses sucked.
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Re: Guess New Mustangs Didn't Help ?

Postby Statler » Mon Oct 19, 2009 7:12 am

VarsityShop wrote:
SMU89 wrote:Was there a big protest? Lots of T-Shirts / stickers? People walk out? From the posts, sounded like there was going to be a big showing.


Are you kidding? That was all cheap talk. A "big showing" hardly. The new Mustangs introduction ceremony was a wonderful event and very well accepted by the SMU fans. I personally saw children that were very excited.


Well PonyFans has a new Bagdad Bob:

Image

The above post reminds me of, "I tell you, the infidels are being repelled."

I have been involved and or seen a whole lotta halftime shows, and the applause was polite but no rousing endorsement of the nags. I mean who is not for saving wild mustangs. The ridden horses were a failure. Many around me said, "that's what's replaceding Peruna?!" I said, "yep." And they said, "we aren't the cowboys."

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Re: Guess New Mustangs Didn't Help ?

Postby Mustangsabu » Mon Oct 19, 2009 7:44 am

I'm sorry, someone is going to have to explain the outflowing of condemnation of the horses displayed on Saturday to me using small words. The symbol of SMU is not a shetland pony. It is a nationally recognized emblem of a Mustang. We have, through the first almost 100 years of the university's existence, never had an actual Mustang of our own. How can anyone complain when the opportunity to be represented by a flesh and blood example of the emblem we have taken pride in since 1917 when we picked it?

Ok, so I will answer my own question to a certain extent: 15 years after we became the Mustangs someone dressed up a shetland pony, called it Peruna, and a tradition was born. This animal became the mascot of the SMU Football team, arguably the University as a whole although Peruna does not feature at anything except Football games in my experience. I fully understand that Peruna is a valued tradition to many, because it is a valued tradition to me. However, SMU is going to be around for centuries. Look at the Universities in Europe, these institutions do not go away. In 100 years, as SMU looks to celebrate 200 years of education, if the football team is led out by two mustangs that will be a tradition too. Traditions come and go, history is replete with bygone traditions. It's OK folks.

I am just going to suggest that people at least consider the following hypothetical: We are the Mustangs but Peruna never happened. We never had a mascot. Someone gives us a Mustang to have as a mascot and you are asked to opine as to whether that is appropriate. What would your answer be?

All of this is contingent on the correctness of the assumption that we are actually replacing Peruna, of course. But IF we are to decide whether to replace Peruna with a Mustang or Mustangs then there is ONLY ONE issue. Do we wish to replace Peruna with another mascot? One does oneself great disservice by pretending that having the beautiful horses presented to us on Saturday as our mascots would be in anyway inappropriate or unimpressive. Go back to my hypothetical. Having Mustangs as the mascot for the SMU Mustangs makes patent sense. It is simply that many people do not wish to see Peruna replaced because of the tradition that Peruna has become. That's ok too.
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Re: Guess New Mustangs Didn't Help ?

Postby Insane_Pony_Posse » Mon Oct 19, 2009 8:24 am

yeah wow some big "protest"....the stands are clapping and there are like 3-4 sour-pusses standing in the south endzone at the Peruna monument....i can tell you it was closer to 0.008% than 81%!


DONT BELIEVE THE LIES - PERUNA IS NOT GOING ANYWHERE!
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Re: Guess New Mustangs Didn't Help ?

Postby BIGHORSE » Mon Oct 19, 2009 9:41 am

If we didn't have a live mascot all these years, and they gave us a choice

of a big Mustang or a shetland pony, what do you think people would choose?

I love Peruna and the new Mustangs, just pretend we had them for 80 years.
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Re: Guess New Mustangs Didn't Help ?

Postby PonySoprano » Mon Oct 19, 2009 9:56 am

I'll admit that my biggest fear was some sort of diaster at halftime and I was wrong as it looked like the presentation went smoothly.

That said, it was hard to tell what the point of the horses was. Was it to help draw attention is Mrs. Pickens' cause? If so, I think that was lost in translation.
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Re: Guess New Mustangs Didn't Help ?

Postby George S. Patton » Mon Oct 19, 2009 10:22 am

I think about 2/3s of the people in the stands had no idea what was going on. I wound up not going to the jumphouses because I gave the girls the choice of either going to them or seeing the horses. They wanted to see the horses.

But the 10-year-old is also concerned about Peruna's future.

After thinking about all this, I'm kinda like Jaws, we may have blown it out of proportion on our side. I think he's staying. I just don't know what the role will be. I just don't want it to be a de-emphasized role because he is our mascot.
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Re: Guess New Mustangs Didn't Help ?

Postby mustangklick » Mon Oct 19, 2009 11:49 am

Mustangsabu wrote:I'm sorry, someone is going to have to explain the outflowing of condemnation of the horses displayed on Saturday to me using small words. The symbol of SMU is not a shetland pony. It is a nationally recognized emblem of a Mustang. We have, through the first almost 100 years of the university's existence, never had an actual Mustang of our own. How can anyone complain when the opportunity to be represented by a flesh and blood example of the emblem we have taken pride in since 1917 when we picked it?

Ok, so I will answer my own question to a certain extent: 15 years after we became the Mustangs someone dressed up a shetland pony, called it Peruna, and a tradition was born. This animal became the mascot of the SMU Football team, arguably the University as a whole although Peruna does not feature at anything except Football games in my experience. I fully understand that Peruna is a valued tradition to many, because it is a valued tradition to me. However, SMU is going to be around for centuries. Look at the Universities in Europe, these institutions do not go away. In 100 years, as SMU looks to celebrate 200 years of education, if the football team is led out by two mustangs that will be a tradition too. Traditions come and go, history is replete with bygone traditions. It's OK folks.

I am just going to suggest that people at least consider the following hypothetical: We are the Mustangs but Peruna never happened. We never had a mascot. Someone gives us a Mustang to have as a mascot and you are asked to opine as to whether that is appropriate. What would your answer be?

All of this is contingent on the correctness of the assumption that we are actually replacing Peruna, of course. But IF we are to decide whether to replace Peruna with a Mustang or Mustangs then there is ONLY ONE issue. Do we wish to replace Peruna with another mascot? One does oneself great disservice by pretending that having the beautiful horses presented to us on Saturday as our mascots would be in anyway inappropriate or unimpressive. Go back to my hypothetical. Having Mustangs as the mascot for the SMU Mustangs makes patent sense. It is simply that many people do not wish to see Peruna replaced because of the tradition that Peruna has become. That's ok too.


Hypothetical situations are fun, but very weak when arguing a point. I respect your attempt to put the issue in a new light, but you cannot simply "rewrite" history in order to change your perception of things. You must start with the factual assumption that Peruna IS our mascot, and always has been. Obviously, if things were different, people would have no attachment to a Shetland and would welcome some sort of mascot to fill the gap.

The bottom line is this:

Peruna is our mascot, and most members of Mustang Nation love Peruna. While a real mustang would be logical (given our name - the Mustangs), Peruna embodies the spirit and fight of a wild stallion that the larger horses do not (would be too dangerous, etc.). In addition, by requiring riders to control the horses, our natural inclination is to associate the school with the person controlling the horses (i.e., the rider - especially since he will not be a zombie up there and probably would cheer / do tricks / whatever)...We aren't the cowboys or whatever...While Peruna's handlers attempt to control him (and you could thus associate SMU with stable hands...), it is obvious through the presentation and the long-standing tradition that they are not the focal point (in fact, I bet most people would not recognize the handlers outside of a football game).

You can say that some traditions come and go (and you would be right), but the most reverred traditions are extremely long term (think of some religious practices such as facing Mecca when you pray). Personally, I hope Peruna is one of the long term traditions that represents SMU.

I can say right now, the horses were unimpressive. They may be appropriate (since they were once Mustangs), but they were pretty boring. Perhaps if Peruna just stood there, he would be boring as well, but he has the advantage of being the standard by which others are judged (plus...he and his predecessors have done some crazy things - like killing other mascots).


Anyway, I think our football team is improving immensely. That was a FUN game to watch, even though we lost. I can't wait to go see the team in person when they come down here next week (I've been bad and haven't made a Dallas game yet). Hopefully, we can give the Cougars another solid effort and come out victorious!
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Re: Guess New Mustangs Didn't Help ?

Postby Samurai Stang » Mon Oct 19, 2009 12:23 pm

Was the purpose not to remove the pony? Why then were we celebrating a small female's "pony she named Wildfire" that froze to death? Is this a death ritual in which the American elderly wander into blizzards, much like the tales of the elephants' graveyard?
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