Small town white populations are overtaking urban black communities’ long-running dominance in creating ridiculous names–and spellings–for their children
In grade school spelling tests, it used to be that even the most underdeveloped children were sure to get at least one answer right: their name. Now that the new wave of millennium babies have risen to the ranks of schoolchildren, their mothers and fathers have placed that trusted notion in serious jeopardy.
Even this guy thinks some parents are "morans" for giving their children odd names.
Parents, in a blatant self-aggrandizing fury, have radicalized the way Americans name their offspring. They seem to have deserted tradition altogether, scoffing at tried-and-true names found in centuries of literary richness and even Biblical reference, and are opting to hatch titles for their little ones that are better fit for science fiction or strip club nomenclature.
Growing up, many of us might remember the old joke about how people in China name their babies by throwing a fork down the stairs and using the phonetic clanging sounds to string a name together (e.g., Ching Chang Chong, etc). Maybe a funny thing to laugh off as you wait in line for school lunch in 4th grade, but I assume that it still rattles the funny bones of the same parents who “creatively” name the unripened fruit of their loins. Little do they know, the joke’s on them.
As the University of Utah Prepares to face TCU in one of the most important football games in school history, we look back to the evolution from coming up short in the 1980s to flirting with superiority in 2010.
When No. 5 University of Utah lines up to face No. 3 Texas Christian University on Saturday afternoon in Salt Lake City, the stakes will have never been higher for either team. The winner stands to firmly entrench itself near the apex of college football rankings and could have at least an outside shot at playing for the BCS Championship. Utah has never been ranked higher during regular season play and Utes fans are already in a frenzy, impatiently counting down the minutes to the kickoff of what is already being called the most important regular season game in school history.
Saturday’s faceoff will feature two evenly-matched teams that have both dominated the Mountain West Conference for the past several years. TCU is a defensive powerhouse, allowing only 217 yards per game and good enough for NCAA’s top spot in that category. Utah has the third-highest scoring offense in the country, averaging more than 45 points a game. Granted, both teams’ schedules have not featured many tough opponents, so you can throw these stats out the window.
Utah QB Jordan Wynn will need to deliver a clutch performance to defeat TCU on Saturday.
The key to the game will be whether Utah’s defense can slow TCU long enough for sophomore quarterback Jordan Wynn and the Ute offense to get on track. Outcomes are always uncertain and this game could easily go both ways. What is certain, however, is that this game is absolutely HUGE. For both teams. Should Utah win, they could (potentially) ascend to an unimaginable height that no longtime Utes fan ever fathomed: a (potential) legitimate shot for a National Championship.
* “potential” used so as not to jinx anything before Saturday; also used to diffuse the likely snub by the Almighty BCS Committee
They also have the rare chance to go on their own Crusade of sorts by defeating football teams from religious institutions in three of their next four games (Texas Christian, Notre Dame and Brigham Young).
But to really understand what this season and the previous undefeated campaigns in 2004 and 2008 means, you have to look at the history of gut-wrenching defeat that defined Utah Football for decades to truly appreciate the current position of Ute players and fans.
In an attempt to relax my nerves for the big game on Saturday and look at it from a big-picture perspective, I took a trip down memory lane to the days when simply beating rival BYU made the season a success; moving to the 1990s, when getting an invitation to a bowl game was a giant step; and onto the new millennium, where Utah has ascended to heights I could never have imagined.
So before we fully focus on beating TCU and the potential glistening shores that we face—and have frequented in recent years—let’s gaze back upon the black-water morass and revisit the rise to where we sit today.
Proposition 19 Triggers Spike in Voter Registration among Liberal Pothead Demographic
California boasts an illustrious political history that few states can match. Over the past 50 years, the Golden State has given us presidents Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan, and more recently, has provided us with other iconic public figures with equally impressive track records such as Arnold Schwarzenegger and Nancy Pelosi.
Perhaps even more notorious than the politicians spawned from California are the ubiquitous, controversial propositions that appear on ballots during each election cycle. In addition to potentially altering legislation, these hot-button issues serve mainly to anger and divide citizens of the state, as well as the rest of us across the U.S. who must rely on our elected officials to overturn our civil and Constitutional rights rather than do so by our own hand.
Two years ago, Proposition 8—the infamous bill to ban marriage between homosexuals—took center stage in California and garnered the attention of the entire nation. The costly campaign to drive voters to the polls and support the measure drew enormous amounts of external funding, much of it coming from the religious right who reside beyond state lines. As a result, California became a moral and political battleground for American politics.
We all know what happened. Droves of frenzied citizens flocked to voting booths to exercise their unfounded authority to deny alternative segments of fellow Californians the right to legally marry each other. On the other side of the spectrum, people turned out in record numbers to vote against the proposition only to be ultimately outnumbered by selfish heterosexuals who wish to reserve the legal right to marry–and subsequently cheat, divorce, and sue–as a sacred privilege to be shared only between a man and a woman.
This year, California ballots will feature a much different issue to be put up for public vote: Proposition 19—the move to legalize marijuana. While the outcome remains to be seen, one thing is imminent: high voter turnout. Pun intended. Continue reading Elections 2010: California Experiences “High Voter Turnout”→
13 Shades of Grey 