Letters to the editor: Sept. 24, 2008

Band was inflamatory and not very good

Regarding "University band harassed by cadets at Citadel," (Monday, Sept. 22, 2008):

You really don't believe the Citadel corp attacked your band for no reason at all, do you? Yes, your band was given permission to march through the campus but not through the middle of the Corps' field day on the parade grounds. Any band member knows you don't break another band's ranks, and anyone with an inkling of common sense knows you don't march through or even cross the parade grounds on a military college campus, especially with the intent of antoganizing the cadets. Shame on the band.

For your information, we go to many Citadel games to see the opposing bands like yours. I hate to rain on your liberal parade, but your band needs to show better judgement! Over the past four years I have seen literally hundreds of high school, college and professional bands. Musically and artistically, the Princeton Band is not very good.

Chip Kelly

Plenty of guilt to go around for incident

Regarding "University band harassed by cadets at Citadel," (Monday, September 22, 2008):

I was not in Charleston, S.C. last weekend, so I do not have first-hand information about the incident reported. I know only what I read, something I have in common with the majority of your readers. The local Charleston newspaper, the cadets and alumni tell a somewhat different version, which is no surprise to anyone. I suspect, however, the your article is written with a significant slant.

I would suggest, in the interest of sportsmanship and hopefully, future football games, that someone take an objective look at the incident and report it accurately. I'm certain there is sufficient guilt to go around.

Tom Patton, Citadel '69

Next time, leave the clowns at home

Regarding "University band harassed by cadets at Citadel," (Monday, Sept. 22, 2008):

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You have Princeton students dancing disrespectfully down The Avenue of Remembrance - where we honor our war dead - and you don't expect Citadel cadets to protest?

You have Princeton students humping each other on a football stadium ground in front of parents and girlfriends and you expect Citadel cadets to just to look away?

This was "tame" to you?

Keep your clowns at home next time. Princeton is the one who should apologize.

Angela Wynter

Notes for Princeton from Charleston

Regarding "University band harassed by cadets at Citadel," (Monday, Sept. 22, 2008):

I missed the game but see from the local press, The Charleston Post and Courier, that you achieved more than you possibly hoped to achieve.

You successfully did not confuse the military with The Citadel. You knew that The Citadel is not a college but a cult. You rightly laughed at ignorance and arrogance. You escaped with your lives. You led at halftime.

You did not know - but some of the male cadets and most of the male alumni did - that Princeton took a major role in the legal effort to admit women into the Citadel in 1993-96. Through testimony of former president Bill Bowen GS '58, well-documented evidence of the successful admission of women into Princeton in 1976 was used by the plaintiff Shannon Faulkner in federal district court to prove that women could be assimilated easily into a previously all-male university.

Your university is not liked by The Citadel for that reason.

You will buy my book, "Local Counsel," if it ever finds a publisher, on the history of the case.

Why not invite Shannon to next year's game in Princeton?

Robert Black GS '74