This sorta makes me ashamed to be a college football fan

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

University of Alabama fan poisons trees on rival Auburn University's campus.

Trees that happen to be sort of a "sacred spot" on that campus.

I mean, it's fine to hate your rivals, but to destroy part of their campus? That's pretty low.

[AdminAssistant]

It is low, but considering the shit that Auburn pulled in what amounts to buying a player, and then setting a legal precedent that it's okay to buy a player, I have no sympathy.

[Greenday]

Destruction of property is going too far in my opinion. It accomplishes nothing besides making yourself look like a dickhead.

[protege]

Several years back, my high school's main rival...decided to burn their school's initials into *our* football field grass. Things got amusing when it was revealed that the entire incident was caught on tape. The kids got busted, and had to pay for repairing the damage to the field as well as the track...which they'd spray-painted.

[HYHYBT]

Trees are different than other kinds of property damage. Things like broken windows can be fixed with a suitable application of money, which you can sue the culprit for. Paint can be removed or covered over. Grass will regrow quickly enough. But the only way to get hundred-year-old trees is to *wait* a hundred years. And who has that kind of time?

[Boozy]

Several years back, my high school's main rival...decided to burn their school's initials into *our* football field grass.

That's so weird to me. When I was in high school, it was considered intensely uncool to have any sort of school spirit. The vast majority of students made fun of the pep squad.

Of course, our school sucked hard at pretty much every sport.

[AdminAssistant]

Generally speaking, Boozy, it's the other way around here. You get made fun of if you don't have school spirit, especially in the case of a long-term rivalry. Here, for example, I can not care about sports all year long...except when we're playing Mizzou or K State. And you sure as hell don't wear a rival school's colors on campus. The Auburn/U of Alabama rivalry is *legend*. There isn't a person in Alabama who doesn't have allegiance one way or the other.

Except hipsters. Hipsters are the only people "too cool" for school spirit.

[Kheldarson]

I don't know AA. I lived in VA for a while right in VT's backyard. My high school was a sister school (same colors and everything). I'm not a hipster, but frankly, I hate football and never understood the point for school spirit. It's not because I'm "too cool", it's just...what's the point? Besides getting out of class for a hour or so and be bored in gym instead.

That being said, poisoning trees? WTH? That's not cool at all. Hope the catch who did it.

[Rageaholic]

That's just a very dickish thing to do. I don't have anything else to say.

[Hyena Dandy]

It is low, but considering the shit that Auburn pulled in what amounts to buying a player, and then setting a legal precedent that it's okay to buy a player, I have no sympathy.

I agree that Auburn has had its flaws in the past.

That said, that was the decision of the athletics department. That doesn't give you open season to commit crimes because they 'bought' a player.

See, to me, if it was just messing with something in the athletic department, I could almost understand it. But poisoning trees is completely unjustified, because it messes with the quality of life for the students, people who have absolutely nothing to do with the athletic department's administrative decisions, however flawed they may be.

[Greenday]

That's so weird to me. When I was in high school, it was considered intensely uncool to have any sort of school spirit. The vast majority of students made fun of the pep squad.

Of course, our school sucked hard at pretty much every sport.

We had no pep squad at my high school and I'm sure it would have been unpopular if we did have one. But it was always cool to hate our rivals.

[crashhelmet]

What's even worse about this story is that whoever it was that actually poisoned the trees is now and forever will be a "living legend" in the 'Bama community. I wouldn't be surprised if boosters represented him in court, or paid his legal fees.

[HYHYBT]

Hmmm... now I'm trying to think what similar action, if any, an anti-fan of the University of Georgia could do. I mean, all right, they have the hedges, but they're 1) locked up tight inside the stadium and 2) only about 15 years old anyway, as the old ones had to be removed to make room for Olympic soccer. And while Athens does have a landmark tree ("The Tree That Owns Itself"), it's not really associated with the school and is on a sort of back street where nobody would gather for a celebration.
The only thing I can think of is the arch... which *is* old and well-known (and appears on the state seal, sort-of), but also, pretty hard to do substantial damage to cast iron quickly and without being noticed, and anything remotely superficial could easily be repaired. (The same problem would apply to the double-barrelled cannon, which also has nothing to do with the school, much less its football team) Anyway, there's nothing (that I know of) with anything like the toilet paper tradition.

[crashhelmet]

Hmmm... now I'm trying to think what similar action, if any, an anti-fan of the University of Georgia could do. I mean, all right, they have the hedges, but they're 1) locked up tight inside the stadium and 2) only about 15 years old anyway, as the old ones had to be removed to make room for Olympic soccer. And while Athens does have a landmark tree ("The Tree That Owns Itself"), it's not really associated with the school and is on a sort of back street where nobody would gather for a celebration.
The only thing I can think of is the arch... which *is* old and well-known (and appears on the state seal, sort-of), but also, pretty hard to do substantial damage to cast iron quickly and without being noticed, and anything remotely superficial could easily be repaired. (The same problem would apply to the double-barrelled cannon, which also has nothing to do with the school, much less its football team) Anyway, there's nothing (that I know of) with anything like the toilet paper tradition.

A similar prank/stunt for Georgia would be to find whatever way to disable the Chapel Bell that they ring after victories. Perfect timing would be before the game against "Tech" just in case they won the game.

[guywithashovel]

When I was in high school, we were rivals with the high school in the town about nine miles up the highway from us. School spirit always increased whenever we played them, especially during football season. However, other times of the year school spirit was pretty tame. It wasn't considered "uncool" to have spirit, not by most, anyway. There was a segment of the student body who thought it was really lame to have school spirit, and I was friends with most of them. However, most people really didn't care either way. The people getting psyched up during pep rallies were usually athletes or the people who were friends with or dating athletes.

Many of my friends thought pep rallies were stupid, but I never minded them too much. Heck, we got out of class for them. Surely that has to be a plus side.

However, I don't think we ever vandalized our rivals property.