http://www.collegefootballnews.com/2002/Ask_CFN/Ask_CFN.htm Is that really their school song? I've never really payed attention when someone was singing it before. If so, someone needs to change the damned thing. That's the biggest public sign of an inferiority complex I've ever seen...
Yup, that's really their school song. Jim Rome had a hilarious bit about A&M and how their whole identity is defined by UT. Someone posted the article awhile back....do a search and it should pop up. I dated an Aggie or two in my day, so while I'm not an Aggie I'm certainly familiar with them....I'll admit I'm impressed by the traditions of A&M just because I'm like that, but "fanatical" is too kind of a word to describe Texas Aggies. And the fanaticism NEVER stops, no matter how old you are and how long its been since you were in school. One of my profs in college was a Texas native and she never set foot in Austin until she was 30-something because her dad was an Aggie and he hated UT so much. True story. Longhorns love to hate A&M as well, but they tend to just roll their eyes at A&M over their fanaticism, which just irritates Aggies that much more, which make the whole thing that much funnier.
I went to A&M for two years out of high school. My dad went to UT but his preference was for A&M. As Lynus said, they have some awesome traditions: Silver Taps for instance. At Silver Taps they honor current Aggie students or noted alumni who have died recently with a military processional down the center quad of campus at Midnight (?). Kids come spilling out of their dorms to line the center walkway as the Honor Guard marches down that walkway. At the conclusion of the march, Taps is played. In early October of my freshman year, my Freshman Orientation roomate was killed in an auto accident and was included in one of the Silver Taps observances. Powerful. You'll never forget that feeling. I have 3 nephews at A&M now. Grandfathers on both sides of their family went to UT, but they have managed to be Aggies.
Isn't this the "All Things TAMU" thread? What's the big deal? There wasn't much to say otherwise; I'm not going to jump on your bandwagon making fun of A&M.
I'm going to A&M next year. I don't think I totally understood what I was getting myself into when I made that decision.
Like many others, I have alot of friends who went to A&M. Some of my closest law school friends are Aggies. I considered TAMU after high school, but it just wasn't for me. I grew up in a very conservative household, so I thought I might fit in. However, my leanings grew progressively more libertarian and I made the decision to go elsewhere. It was a good decision for me.
i currently go to UT and have made some observations regarding aggies over the past couple of years. obviously i also have alot of friends who go to A&M. when we all come back into town, without any provocation i start getting asked questions from the A&M friends like "how the hell can you go to where you can be proud of nothing" and " You gotta bunch of hippies runnin around dont you" i mean out of no where these type of questions are asked. I never provoked any of them. We arent even talking about school. I just kind of ignore the question, and they keep pressing me for an answer. So i give them some half answer like "at least we dont get credit hours for learning to milk a cow" and other b.s. This past summer taking classes at UH, there are a bunch of UT, A&M taking classes along side each other. We students start talking during break and the conversation gets into where we go to school. I say "I go to UT" and they are automatically like "Oh you bunch of tea sips" Once again without any provocation. Mind you i dont start out by calling them "cow tips" or anything like that. I just kinda ignore it and so do the other Texas students in the class. Later I hear some of the A&M people still making jokes about UT and still obsessing on the fact there are UT people in the class. But what i dont get is their inherent inferiority complex.It seems as if thats all those people do down there is just talk trash about UT. Whats worse is their team isnt even that good. Back when I'm at UT i dont hear other students talking about how bad A&M sucks, only except when we are playing them. I've even seen some cars around campus with TAMU stickers on them. Just my observations.
Going to TAMU as a minority is a TOTALLY difference experience. I've heard the racism at UT is about the same though . . just in a different form. Rocket River
When i was REALLY young, i hated both UT and A&M pretty equally. I think it was just because teachers in elementary school or friends or whatever seemed to be pretty obnoxious about professing their faith to their school while denouncing all others. Annoying stuff. However, by the time I got to my junior and senior year of high school, i realized that UT was the school that was going to align much better with my mindset and just my easy-going, big city enjoying lifestyle. PLUS, i was looking for a school with good football, baseball, and basketball programs, cuz i'm such a sports addict. THough i was admitted to both syracuse and U. of Michigan, the cost was pretty damn outrageous, so i ended up at Texas. So, now being a UT graduate, I'm glad i made that choice. Most of my aggie friends, or people i know who went to A&M, are pretty fanatical and irrational. Then again, they were on the verge of that in high school anyway, so it's not like A&M totally did that to them. I think staring at too many cows and dictator collies didn't help, though. And as far as sports go? Well, Texas now has one national championship this year with a distinct possibilty for one in football and basketball, too. A&M has.....RC Slocum. Sounds fair to me.... OU SUCKS A&M is a gimme game
Have you seen those "saw em off" stickers? I'd never ever put the logo (even if its deformed) of a rival school on my car. It ranks right up there with Calvin taking a whiz on the steer head. Only the real old Aggies and real young Aggies hate us. It all revolves around their football team which was no offense to Bear fans, Baylor pathetic during much of the 20th century until the mid 80's. In fact the Bears used to knock the Aggies around similar to what Tech does now. The guys who went to anm in the late 80, early 90's don't hate as much cause the football was pretty dominant in the SWC. The newer Ags hate us again cause their football team is in mediocrity and with Mack Brown in Austin and Bob Stoops in Norman, the Ags will always finish no higher than 3rd in the Big 12 South. Now they just fight with Tech fans to see who is the 3rd best team in Texas.
Ripped this one from the hornfans.com classic posts section. Enjoy Ain't much has changed in Lubbick sense the last time we got dooky stomped by the Red Rayders. Same thang ever time we go out there. The Fighting Texas Aggie Football Team gets a wippin on the field and the 12th Man gets a wippin in the stands. How ever I must say this is the first time The Spider ever done had a goal post rammed up his tailpipe. I was jess a standin there doin my hand jesters and practicin my post game yells then all the sudden hear come this goal post outta nowheres. Like any good Aggie that sees a long lean objeck comin at um I turned my back and bent over.... Thunk!!! It was a little more than The Spider could handle. I was a lifted airborn and my legs was a kickin and my arms was a flailin. Don't tell no one but I caught Mr. Mackinny upside the eyeball with my flailin Spider arm. I aint never hit no one so hard in my life, but I aint never been a human mannakin either. It was all adrenalin. Any ways, I was finnaly lowered enuff and a four or five good Ag fellas grabbed my arms and yanked me from the death rod. It sounded like a cork pulled from a wine bottle and both my sholders was pulled outta socket, but I stayed there and finished my yells before I let um take me to the hospital. The Doc says my shoulders would get better with time, but he says my dooky hole won't never be the same. It just kinda flaps open and shut now soes I decided to name it the Swingin Gate after one a my favert Aggie plays. Spider allways finds the positives in everthang. And aktually it was kinda good that the 12th Man got our butts kicked cuzz it takes the attention away from our football team gettin there butts kicked. We really caint complane about the offishiatin this year soes its good that Tech gave us sumpin else to complane about. Beat the hell outta uo!!! Gig'em "I know that people will say that we must win a bowl game and I agree. I would also add that we have been close to winning several of those bowls. We have not been as far away as some might think." RC Slocum
Don't let reading that stuff fool you. A great portion of it is untrue. Do you really believe kids are "brainwashed"? Do you believe you can't walk on the grass over the entire campus? Do you believe that all A&M students walk around in envy because they want to go to Texas? Or as for the stupidest quote in that article, do you believe that all Aggies are country kids? Its just another article written by a pro-UT person exaggarating certain things about A&M. And a lot of UT people on this board seem to have no problem with stereotyping, so they shouldn't be taken seriously either. Most of the weird traditions (and their are some weird ones) have to do with the Corps, which is a whole different world than what the typical A&M student goes through. You'll see them around campus, but that's about the biggest effect they'll have on your life. A&M has a very good engineering school if that's what you're interested in. I think the latest rankings by USNews has A&M as 17th and UT as 12th. Not too bad for a bunch of redneck hillbillies. As for the A&M business school, they still have a ways to go, but they're making progress. As for the fight song. I don't like it either. As for RC Slocum. I've been praying for his removal for a couple of years now.
Okay, so maybe a decade. The thing is he's a brilliant defensive coordinator, and that's where he should have stayed. He doesn't know the first thing about offense...or head coaching for that matter.
UT fans may get pumped for the big games, but I don't know that there's any real hatred of Oklahoma or A&M that carries through all year. That's because the UT mentality is: "We're Texas". They have in their mind that "The University" (as if there are no others) is already the best and everyone knows it, so they don't have to worry about anyone. Even if Oklahoma wins the ballgame, Texas students know that it's going to be the high point of the OU students' year, because after that they have to continue their miserable lives in boring Oklahoma. The Aggies... I think they've already been discussed at length. The fight song suggests a serious problem. Not only do they sell sawed-off-horns stickers, but once when my Dad was visiting me (and had a bunch of stickers on his car, including a Texas longhorn), somebody sawed the horns off the longhorn sticker in the parking lot. There is just a problem with a whole stadium full of people swaying back and forth (and making their upper deck itself sway back and forth) singing passionately about sawing off a steer's horns. Still, I'm not originally from Texas and I thought all this stuff was ridiculous. Both schools always seemed like large diploma factories without a whole lot to brag about (I went to Rice). We sympathized more with Texas because they were nicer to us (unlike those times in the old days when the Aggies physically attacked our band and mascot). We are still irritated at both schools for breaking up the Southwest Conference. I went to UT for grad school and managed to put one longhorn sticker on my car, have given the hook 'em horns sign a few times, and once or twice sang the actual words to "I've been working on the..." sorry, the Eyes of Texas.
UT and A&M did not break up the SWC. TV broke up the SWC. The SWC did not have national appeal...all 8 members were from Texas. In 1995, when new TV deals were being negotiated ABC and the Big 8 approached the SWC to add 4 schools and a championship game ($$$$$). UT and A&M knew it was either this deal or no national TV. I'm sorry we were concerned about our own future rather than Rice's. The SWC was dead in the late 80's. You should also be irritated at the 8 members of the WAC who formed the Mountain West...another TV move. You should be upset at TCU who left the WAC for greener pastures in C-USA. We are better off without the SWC. It's only the schools that got left behind who are upset and living off past glories. Wait till 2006 when you will have no choice but to get demoted to I-AA
