Hello. This is Jon, the editor of Average Joe's Sports Blog. For those of you that don't know me, I upload Joe's posts, put pictures in and correct any misspellings i happen to come across.If you don't mind, I'd like to voice a sports opinion that has been bugging me lately and this is a better venue for it than my own blog.
You know the "haka," that "intense" dance that some BYU players perform for the east stands before home games? Well, It's stupid. I know that may potentially be offensive, but it's true. Trust me on this. It sucks and I think it's a silly deterrent to BYU football.
I may be culturally insensitive, but I'm not culturally ignorant. I served my mission in beautiful Auckland, New Zealand and I'm very much aware of the haka. That's probably the biggest reason I hate it actually. I've seen the haka performed 4 1/2 jillion times. The first jillion times was, honestly, pretty cool. Now, after being home for like five years or so I'm sick of dealing with it here as well. It was cool when I first saw it, but it's played out now. And when I say "now" I mean the last two centuries.
Also, the haka they perform is the Maori haka. I haven't bothered to do the research, but I'm pretty sure the percentage of Maori or New Zealand players on the BYU football team is less than 2% (and I think I'm being plenty generous there). What are these guys doing performing someone else's war dance. We have plenty of other Polynesians on the team. Why not do a Samoan war dance? Doesn't that make sense? Wouldn't that stir up more legitimate emotion? Perhaps if it was a rugby match the use of the haka would be slightly more justified, but we play football in Lavell Edwards Stadium.
But here's the biggest reason why the haka should be stopped. It's not, and never has been, for the entertainment of the home crowd. The haka is a war dance. It's meant to be directed at the enemy. The BYU players who participate in the haka need to be facing the opposition when they perform it. Why would our players be attempting to intimidate the fans?
Check out this picture of the New Zealand All-Blacks. Notice that they're facing the rugby team they're playing. In this case it's the hand-holding nation of South Africa. They're performing the haka just like the Maoris used to -- just before battle and facing their foes. Of course that's also when the British open-fired on them. See, that's another reason not to do it.
The haka doesn't work. It doesn't do anything. And I think we can all see why.
11 comments:
Did it show anything about the beer guy on the live TiVO you watched? That was pretty funny
agreed. But you can't underestimate the effectiveness of putting a bunch of people in the same outfit (uniform, whatever) and having them dance. It's a strange phenomenon.
Jon, I was a little bugged by it until I saw an interview with Bryce Mahuika (who is maori and whose grandfather and father were maori warriors) he is actually the only maori on the team but he made sense of it. Rather than using it as a war dance they use it as its alternate purpose, and that is to unite the team as "brothers in arms" so to speak. Which is still going along with the whole war cry thing, just making it an internal strength rather than a show of aggression. Just a note, BYU has only lost 3 games since they started doing it.
Agreed. Fully.
Lame.
Instead, they should throw down some cardboard and have a break-off before the game. Have you ever seen a 360 air-turtle to windmill performed to Daft Punk's Around the World? Now that would intimidate the other team. Boom.
I know this is my blog, but I totally agree with you Mr. Editor. The Haka is extra stupid and needs to go away.
Also another lame thing about BYU is the silly fight song. It's way too long! It's way too 1879! It needs to either be completely re-done or at least be shortened by half to the "Rise and Shout" part and take out the "Ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra" and just say "Go Cougars" at the end.
Joe, just wanted to point out that you missed one "ra", just thought it would be good to know so that you can keep your journalistic credibility. Also, you never got back to me about the Hornets.
This isn't a sporty comment but I gotta say the Haka is hot!....so I'm all for it!
Johnny,
I will never join the Hornets bandwagon because Chris Paul and James Posey will not bring them a title. Chris Paul does not have enough help on his team.
The only reason the Hornets won so many games last year is because everybody was miraculously healthy. All his teammates, and Chris Paul himself, are injury prone and I could never jump on the bandwagon.
I dunno what team I'll switch to next year, just the team with the best chance of winning it all, except the Lakers, of course. I could never root for Kobe and I have many, many reasons. - Joe
The Haka has no infultrated our beloved Utah Jazz.
I am a New Zealander and I just want to say the haka is stupid and makes a bunch of grown men look like little kids. I cringe everytime I see it. That is all.
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