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Stagg CONTINUED FROM PAGE A7 When does tailgating begin then? The night before. I’m not kidding. —Don’t ever wear orange to the game. In fact, just don’t wear it at all. If you just asked yourself why, it’s because Carolina’s archrivals for over a hundred years, the Clemson Tigers, have school colors of orange and purplt Stop laughing, I’m serious. Even mothers don’t dress their babies in such contrasting colors. It’s the ugly kind of orange, too, like you are a roadside worker and need to be seen at night. I’m not from South Carolina, but I swear I’ve seen vomit that looks better than the Clemson orange and purple combination. —Did you see that crack I just took at Clemson? You need to make up some of these and say them randomly. “Clemson sucks” is common but always a good one. (You could also put something relating to Clemson in place of the word “Clemson,” like Death Valley [and if you really don’t know, that’s where the Tigers play their games]). You could also yell, “Going to Clemson is like being bit by a dog in your crotch while standing on a nail that's going through the biggest nerve in your leg aftei having severed your jugular jumping rope by snaring the rope around your neck and accidentally stepping on it so it violently sliced through your skin. ” But don’t take that one, that’s mine. —At the game, there are certain things you have to do to not look out of place. Anytime that ridiculously annoying, screeching Gamecock crow is played over the loudspeaker, you yell. When the kickoff is about to happen, you throw one hand in the air, swing it around (like you just don’t care), pinky and thumb extended, and yell, “Goooooo” until the moment the kicker’s foot hits the ball, at which point you yell, “Cocks!” and immediately after, in succession, “Fight! Win! Kick ass!” Then, you immediately begin to be annoyed by the mic guy. —Also at the game, before it starts, you must know the student section is down by the end zone under the scoreboard and kind of curves around for a section or two to the left of the band (where they are nicely nestled in the very comer of the stadium). Don’t sit where the band will. If you come to the game on time, you are late and you will be standing somewhere wishing you had come 30 minutes sooner and had a seat. All of the student section will be full, and everyone will be standing on their seats. And please, stand where you would sit, not on the row in front of you. This gets really annoying at half time when the people in the front row realize they don’t have a seat anymore after everyone sits down. Then a domino reaction occurs and inevitably it’s me who’s giving up his seat to some beautiful girl I probably have no chance with. — “2001,” the theme from the movie, is our “song,” similar to how a boyfriend and girlfriend had a “song” growing up, like “Secret Garden” because the two of you watched Jerry Maguire on your first date. Our relationship with the football team is similar. You fall in love in the first game, what with the whirlwind of energy that surrounds the stadium, and after “2001” is played, you knew you were meant to be. Then, for every time you hear it while the relationship is going well, you get all schmoopy. Then the football team does something wrong, you two get in a fight, and next thing you know, it’s a horrible break-up, people are talking behind people’s backs, blame is being shifted, and then every time you hear that stupid song it reminds you of what you two used to be and get depressed. Sooner or later, you both come around, realize you’re meant for each other and “2001” is played at your wedding. To conclude, it’s best if you go to games. It’s not just all fraternities and sororities or SportsCenter freaks or has-beens reliving their youth. It’s a good time and a good way to get involved in what’s going on at the school. But if you choose not to go, good luck getting out of the city. You ■* can’t even go north on Assembly Street. All roads point to Williams-Brice Stagg is a fourth-year media arts student. I’ll always come home to Cola ALLYSON BIRD GAMECOCKOPINIONS@GWM.SC.EDU North & South are vastly different places I was in Boston a few weeks ago and noticed something: A lot of people were wearing sandals, none of the sandals I saw had the cloth bands with little palmettos stitched on them. I wasn’t in Carolina anymore, and I was reminded of that every time an order of sweet tea yielded bitter brown liquid and packets of Sweet & Low, and every time someone squinted at me when I said “y’all. ” It was a relief to get out of that Yankee haze and back to the scorching Southern sun, but in a few weeks I’ll head back up north. I’m not coming back to USC this fall. I’ll be in Washington, D.C., for the semester, working at a news service three blocks from the White House, working the internship I’ve wanted since I began school here. But it’s already weird not being here now and planning to visit my roommates next week as a guest in their new apartment. I’ll still be hanging on to summer while everyone else is starting school. And I already know how it’s going to feel when I move up to D.C. in September, driving over the Charleston connector and out of town, past Columbia and the campus on Interstate 26 and then right over the unmarked line above North Carolina that separates the South from everywhere else. There I’ll ride to work on a subway filled with people, but the ride will be silent as if the train were empty. Fall will feel like winter, and winter will feel like Iceland. The terror alert in Washington will fluctuate, and my parents will worry. I’ll read Away messages from Carolina about the parties I’m missing and the mornings after the parties I’ve missed. But this semester will likely be my most formative college experience. And I know how it’s going to feel moving back to South Carolina on Christmas Eve. I won’t see any snow, and I might not even see my breath outside, but it’ll be Christmas nonetheless. Because I do know that once I cross the state line, on some radio station Hootie and the Blowfish will still be playing. Clothing and cars will be decorated with palmettos and crescent moons, and people will understand there is nothing crude about the word “Cocks.” Barbecue will be shredded pork, and not simply anything grilled. Grits will be an interchangeably singular or plural word, depending on personal preference, and a beloved staple regardless. A store affectionately dubbed“The Pig” will be the preferred grocer. Strangers will talk to one another, and it won’t be awkward. And they will talk about one another in the vilest manner, but they’ll follow it up with a “Bless his heart” that will make it all OK. This is Carolina. Think of the place where you first fell in and out of love; where you survived coming-of age trials that shed old skins to uncover who you’ve become; where you’ll always have small bundles of conflicting emotions enveloped by a sense of peace. Carolina is that place for me, that place I can affectionately embrace with a four-letter word I call home. Bird is a third-year journalism student. Pythagoras may have had a theorem, but you can have smart style. Bold geometries in sterling silver really make the grade! Bracelets, earrings, necklaces and pendants in a variety of curves and angles starting at a very intelligent $12. j&_ ; Harden St. behind The Firm Harbison Blvd. next to Publix www.behandpicked.com * STERLING, STONES AND SURPRISES t_ Free speech isn’t un-American STAGY GREGG GAMECOCKOPINIONS@GWM.SC.EDU Freedom of speech means all speech I know that it is old news, but I am still a little sore about Slim Fast’s dropping spokesperson Whoopi Goldberg because of some “explicit” jokes she made at President George W. Bush’s expense at a recent Kerry fund raiser. To be honest, I have never been a fan of Goldberg, especially after the Great Ted Danson Debacle of’93, but this incident touches a nerve with me. In her own defense, Goldberg maintains she has poked fun at every U.S. president seated in the past 20 years. I commend conservatives for taking a stand and forcing Slim-Fast’s hand on this issue, but Slim-Fast shouldn’t have caved in to the pressure of a small group of people. Furthermore, why did no one else come to Goldberg’s defense? Since when is the president not an acceptable target for comedians? Certainly, Bill Clinton was a target of much publicized humor and unrelenting criticism, but it seems that the rules have been changed since his administration, though an entire sector of people did not receive the memorandum. Unfortunately, Whoopi Goldberg hasn’t been the only casualty. The Dixie Chicks were among the first to be ostracized because of commentary made by group member Natalie Maines. A few weeks ago, Linda * Ronstadt appeared in concert at the Aladdin Theatre for the Performing Arts in Las Vegas. Near the finale, she made the mistake of dedicating the Eagles classic “Desperado" to Michael Moore because of the production he did in the movie “Fahrenheit 9/11.” Although it had become a routine part of her show, this time, her commentary was met with both cheering and booing; discord eventually took over. Ronstadt was eventually escorted from the building and was officially uninvited for future performances. Aladdin President Bill Timmins told Las Vegas Sun gossip columnist Timothy McDarrah, “If she wants to talk about her views to a newspaper or in a magazine article, she is free to do so. But in a stage in front of foui and a half thousand people is not the place for it.” I am perplexed. If Mr. Timmins had stated simply, “We paid to hear her sing and not to talk,” ther I would completely understand. But since when should our viewpoints be limited to newspapers and magazines? As I was researching this topic, I found that the aforementioned ladies have repeatedly been accused of being “un-American” and “unpatriotic." I am having a hard time understanding this sentiment. The very foundation of this country hinges on freedom. We are in the middle of a war fighting for people who suffered misery, torture and death because they lacked these very same freedoms under the Hussein dictatorship. The founding fathers of this magnificent country so believed in the freedom of speech that they addressed it in the U.S. Constitution. With that said, I ask you to ponder: Are statements against our government really un American, or is it the suppression of these statements that is un American? Gregg is a third-year interdisciplinary studies student. Your Neighborhood Restaurant and Tavern - Since 1977 - • After the Game, Show or Concert • Free P.M. 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