Letter: The Audacity of Apathy

As a former editorialist for this very student paper, I know a thing or two about hitting the "Send" button too quickly, about not really thinking things over sufficiently before letting them get to print, about wanting a Mulligan after it's a little too late for one. So I am willing to give my fellow alumnus David Anderton the benefit of the doubt, to believe he was not fueled by malice when he referred to the current Richmond students as "a self-absorbed and over-indulged group of apathetic human beings" in a letter to the editor earlier this week. However, the topic of Spider spirit is one that is inevitably raised almost annually, yet nothing constructive seems to come from it. So, for what it's worth, I'd like to share a few thoughts on the issue.

First, to measure "student spirit" solely through things like face paint and pom-poms is to reduce the notion to a high school pep rally. Most students at Richmond could have gone to your average state school, where football boosters are more influential than the academic leaders and schools seek to attract Kirk Herbstreit and ESPN to set-up shop and preview their Saturday showdowns. If any of us wanted a school like that, we could have gone to one. Instead, we chose Richmond, and the arachnid nickname that comes along with it. We knew what to expect here, and so did our players and coaches. Let the state schools have College GameDay; I'd rather have Ring Dance.

So what exactly does Mr. Anderton expect? I'm not here to question his own Spider spirit; surely, his status as a season ticket holder speaks for itself. But maybe his expectations are heightened because Spider spirit just isn't what it used to be. One would think that if Mr. Anderton is this avid of a fan more than three decades after graduating, then surely his time at the university in the mid-1970s must have been an era of extreme Spider spirit, of outstanding student attendance at sporting events and general pigskin pandemonium!

Interestingly, history indicates Mr. Anderton's undergraduate experience was actually eerily similar to what he was disgusted by this past weekend. In fact, if one types "football attendance" into the search engine of the Collegian archives, the first article - from nearly 100 years of Collegians - is a piece by editor Bill Seward titled "Attendance Decreases", which ran on the front page of the November 9, 1972 edition of the newspaper. Now I graduated with a mere journalism degree, but my math suggests that this would have been Mr. Anderton's first semester at the university, which is funny because his fellow classmates seemed to be plagued with the same sense of athletic apathy as today's Spiders.

"According to statistics from the Athletic Department," the article read, "...less than one out of every three UR students attended the last home [football] game."

If students leaving the 95-degree heat on Saturday in order to enjoy a Parents' Weekend dinner with their families at the Tobacco Company infuriated Mr. Anderton enough to write this letter, I honestly don't know how he survived four years on campus with the likes of then-senior Neil Dubin.

"I've never been to a Richmond football game in my life," Dubin said in the article. "[I] would rather do anything on Saturday afternoons rather than watch football."

Or how about then-junior Jay Lassiter, who boldly stated, "I've had enough of Richmond football."

The audacity of apathy!

There are dozens of articles and headlines like this that showed up during my brief search, indicating that this issue of athletic apathy was pervasive before and after Mr. Anderton's time on campus. It seems unfair to chastise today's students for a problem that has been prevalent among Spiders for nearly a century. Like begging for kisses at the gazebo or paying for extra print credits at the library, the more things change at Richmond, the more things stay the same. It appears that we aren't very good at supporting our athletic teams. Every Shakespearian character has a fundamental flaw; maybe this is ours.

Perhaps even stranger than Mr. Anderton's hypocritical stance on spirit is his proposed solution to the problem, claiming the students - the $50,000-a-head students - do not deserve to have a section of the football stadium reserved for them and calling for them to be kicked out of the new facility. He asks athletic director Jim Miller to consider opening the student section to one of general admission for those "actually interested in supporting the Spiders," presumably to allow more space for alumni. You want to talk about a disincentive to perform? Maybe we should poll the football players themselves. I'm fairly confident that, when it comes to boosting their performance on the field, they'd prefer a half-game of looking up at KKGs and sundresses than four quarters of AARPs and hairpieces. Hell, they might even settle for a two-minute drill.

While I disagree with Mr. Anderton's message, I understand his desire to deliver it. Parents and alumni - even younger alumni like myself - feel compelled to stress the truth to undergrads of how temporary college is, ignorant to the fact that these reality checks routinely fall on deaf ears. College students live blissfully in a fantasyland where there's always another tailgate, another lodge party, another D-Hall session, and no one really recognizes how finite it truly is until it comes to an abrupt end and they are peeling you out of your UFA hours after handing you your diploma. Mr. Anderton, I understand your intentions - we all want today's Spiders to realize just how privileged they are - but hastily-written letters like this will surely not do the trick.

Instead of condemning Richmond for what it isn't and never has been, we should encourage all Spiders to appreciate it for what it is and always will be. I plan on attending this year's Homecoming Weekend football game, and if Aaron Corp happens to throw a touchdown against Towson, I will cheer. But it won't have any material effect on the quality of my weekend, because the reasons I go back to Richmond -the pines and the bricks, the beauties and the Beasts - are more constant, significant and meaningful to me than the quality of play or level of attendance at a sporting event.

This is what truly separates Spider pride from the affinity the average person shares for their alma mater. Richmond students are really good at a lot of things, but perhaps the one thing that a Richmond student is great at is appreciating what it means to be a Richmond student. The history, tradition and vernacular shared by generations of Spiders are each unique, as is the pride instilled in each of us as a result. I know this because I experienced it during my time on campus as well as during my life experiences outside of it. I've experienced it in law school classrooms in New Jersey and in national parks in Wyoming, in the press room on Capitol Hill and on the beer line at Yankee Stadium, in California and the Czech Republic and most places I've stumbled in between. Richmonders are everywhere and I always have a sense of pride and genuine happiness when I cross paths with a fellow Spider. I suspect that most alums, including Mr. Anderton himself, would probably tell you the same. In that respect, maybe he was right - maybe we are a little self-absorbed. But maybe we have a reason to be. We're not better or worse than anyone, but we are certainly different.

The irony of it all is, Mr. Anderton, you will soon find what you are looking for. No, the school will not ban its own students from its sparkling new stadium, but those students will surely come out in droves this weekend for the game against Coastal Carolina. Attendance will spike, whether out of spirit or spite, whether for a game or a season. And somewhere around halftime, right around the time when the students don't head for the exits, all of this tension will be forgotten. For some, it will be because four hours of drinking vodka in the parking lot simply is not conducive to recalling what a grumpy alum said in an op-ed. But for most, it will be because they will realize that college, much like life, is too short to hold grudges. And after the final whistle blows, the stadium lights shut off and the self-absorbed, over-indulged group of apathetic human beings stagger back into their dorms and apartments, update their Facebook pages and pass out, they will be one day closer to no longer being a Richmond student.

But they will always be Spiders.

And you, and I, will love them for it.