Earlier this month on October 6th, the branding committee chair revealed during a pep rally that the name of the DSST Byers Falcon mascot would be Frankie. The gym audience erupted in murmur rather than applause. See, earlier that week a form was sent to students on what they felt the name of the mascot should be. “It should’ve been Fergus!” Some decried. While others sobbed, “Not Fletcher?” While life on campus moved on, the sadness in our hearts continued. What happened? This question was on the minds of hundreds throughout the month. Until a rumor started; the election was rigged. Said rumor had no merit, until now.
As one brave witness recounted their time in the branding committee, “We’re going around talking about potential avenues for club budget spending. Then, the topic of the mascot is breached. After a couple of minutes deliberating what we can do to raise propaganda, Al*ndra drops casually, ‘By the way, between just you and me, the election was rigged…. We never meant to send out that form, it was a result of miscommunication. Frankie was chosen by the staff.”’ This revelation shared by our anonymous source has the potential to rock the school to its core.
While it should be noted that this information is alleged by our witness, it should be taken seriously and with alarm. An attempt to overturn the will of the people even at the hands of a simple mistake should be taken seriously. It has also been brought up that it was likely that this was actually the result of the form being mistakenly sent out, after the staff and educational elite had decided that they would rather choose the mascot name themselves, but it was too late to rescind the form at that point, so they figured they’d just steer around it. Still, however, while not an egregious oppression of human rights by any means, it should not be glossed over that this was a rejection of democracy, for what at the time seems to be a rather trivial reason. Why would the staff so desperately want to have the name be Frankie and not Fergus (the rightful winner)? While one could say that perhaps they were protecting the greater school image by choosing a “better” name, they are not some to determine what is better and what is worse when they had decreed that the population themselves should decide it.
What does this mean for the future? Probably nothing. Certainly the staff and educational elite felt that they were completely harmless in their manner of changing the name, and tangibly they undoubtedly. Intangibly, however, this sets into play the question of whether or not this will happen again, and worse, such as how after the Roe v. Wade overturning people were and are wondering what would be next. Quite likely, nothing. But, as food for thought, one should always entertain the possibility…
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