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Football coach fired after controversial 'watermelon ritual'
Topic Started: Oct 22 2014, 06:28 PM (113 Views)
Copper
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Shortstop
The safe thing would be to simply run the ritual past the NAACP first to get their thoughts.

How difficult would that be? The coach just wasn't thinking.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/22/us/coach-fired-watermelon-ritual-irpt/index.html?hpt=hp_t2

Quote:
 

Football coach fired after controversial 'watermelon ritual'

(CNN) -- A high school football coach in Charleston, South Carolina, was fired after he permitted a post-game celebratory ritual involving a watermelon that some say is racist.

After a parent reported the "watermelon ritual" to the school board, the Charleston County School District launched an investigation and ultimately fired Academic Magnet High School coach Bud Walpole, according to CNN affiliate WCSC.

"Players would gather in a circle and smash the watermelon while others were either standing in a group or locking arms and making chanting sounds described as, 'Ooh, ooh, ooh,'" school district Superintendent Nancy McGinley said, describing the noises as "monkey sounds." The watermelon was decorated with caricatures drawn with Sharpie markers, she added.

Dot Scott, president of the Charleston branch of the NAACP, said the organization supported the school's decision to fire Walpole. Scott thanked the superintendent at a Wednesday press conference "for her swift attention to an inappropriate and racially insensitive ritual performed by the football team."

The school district has not yet responded to CNN's request for comment.

A number of parents and students, however, are standing in support of Walpole, who coached at the school for 10 years. More than 4,000 people have signed a petition to reinstate the ousted coach, as of Wednesday afternoon.

Some say they don't see the ritual as racist.

"I just don't understand why the school district is concerned this is an issue," Connie Biggs, the president of Academic Magnet's Booster Club told WCSC. "Is it because it's a watermelon? If it had been a pumpkin or a cantaloupe would that have been a different reaction from the district."

Harry Griffin, a junior at The Citadel, The Military College of South Carolina, said he has known Walpole for six years and considers the coach a man of integrity. Griffin played for Walpole's high school team as a fullback and nose guard. CNN first learned of this story through an iReport Griffin uploaded.

"Coach Walpole was fired because his team had a harmless tradition that was made to seem prejudiced," Griffin wrote in a CNN iReport. "They had a post-game ritual of smashing a watermelon and eating it after every victory. A parent on an opposing team deemed this act as racist and the school board decided to interrogate the players."

Some parents are taking issue with how the investigation was conducted and how students were questioned about the ritual.

"The school district is not telling us what they said to these kids," Biggs said. "They're giving us two questions that they say that they asked but these interviews have lasted 10-20 minutes apiece, so I'm really unclear how two questions could take that long."

Griffin called Walpole's firing an injustice.

"I want to help my coach get his integrity back," Griffin said.

"You can ask anyone that has ever met Bud Walpole if he has ever said or done anything that would cause you to think he was racist. Nobody would ever say such a thing."


The Confederate soldier was peculiar in that he was ever ready to fight, but never ready to submit to the routine duty and discipline of the camp or the march. The soldiers were determined to be soldiers after their own notions, and do their duty, for the love of it, as they thought best. Carlton McCarthy
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Larry
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Mmmmmmm, pie!
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Of the Pokatwat Tribe

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Jolly
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Geaux Tigers!
Isn't the person who thought the players acted like monkeys the one who is racist?
The main obstacle to a stable and just world order is the United States.- George Soros
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Mikhailoh
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If you want trouble, find yourself a redhead
People need to quit seeing racism behind every tree. It is crying wolf and trivializes real incidents.
Once in his life, every man is entitled to fall madly in love with a gorgeous redhead - Lucille Ball
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Improviso
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HOLY CARP!!!
Jolly
Oct 23 2014, 03:46 AM
Isn't the person who thought the players acted like monkeys the one who is racist?
Racist... or a sore loser? You decide.

Quote:
 
"Coach Walpole was fired because his team had a harmless tradition that was made to seem prejudiced," Harry Griffin, a junior at The Military College of South Carolina, said in a CNN iReport.

"They had a post-game ritual of smashing a watermelon and eating it after every victory. A parent on an opposing team deemed this act as racist and the school board decided to interrogate the players."

The United States of the Offended is alive and well. Let's all play the victim card.
Identifying narcissists isn't difficult. Just look for the person who is constantly fishing for compliments
and admiration while breaking down over even the slightest bit of criticism.

We have the freedom to choose our actions, but we do not get to choose our consequences.
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