ISU press conference about band situation
- Thread starter spierceisu
- Start date
The Register is going to die off for good in a few years, and if this is the best journalism it can produce, good riddance. My God, Randy sat right there and heard all this in excruciating detail, and this is what he comes up with.
https://www.desmoinesregister.com/s...ary-barta-iowa-state-iowa-rivalry/2427430001/
https://www.desmoinesregister.com/s...ary-barta-iowa-state-iowa-rivalry/2427430001/
Point to a band member on here saying the HMB was blameless for trying to march through the crowd, playing cadences with horn swings, or trying to play their fight song going through that crowd. Quite the opposite, this was the original problem that needs investigated.
I will wait. You will not find any.
Whoever gave those orders — directors, staff, drum major, drum captain, whoever it was — has some explaining to do and at least owes an apology for badly handling the logistics of the situation and putting the HMB and Iowa State fans in a dangerous situation.
What we have said is that, once contact was made with the crowd and the incident started, the rank and file members took actions that are understandable in context, what they normally do, and plus consistent with your general subservience to orders and defensiveness while in uniform and on parade. You listen to the drum line, play and do horn swings when they instruct you to, and you keep together for safety in numbers around a hostile crowd.
The expectation that some of you have that these 18-22 year olds should have been perfectly aware of the situation and marched away from their leaders or knew exactly what was going on is patently ridiculous. You can barely see two ranks in front of you. None of them must have known other exits were deserted.
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Good we got to have our say. So who gets our $25,000 this time. The Big 12 again or the Big 10?
A lot of the stuff he's spewing in this article is blatantly false. So does ISU have to allow him to have press credentials anymore if he can't report the truth? What a scumbag.
Also, I particularly loved this little paragraph in Randy's article....
"I can’t blame someone for being reticent about coming forward right now, either. A lot of people are worked up. The story has gone national. So if there’s a victim who is reluctant to attach themselves to an allegation, I get that it might be too hostile of an environment right now."
So Randy.... why did this story go national, huh? Would you care to tell us in your article? Oh yeah, Gary Barta jumped the gun and ran with a press release without having gathered any information whatsoever. So, if as you say, a potential "victim" might be scared to come forward because of how this has all been blown up.... who's fault is that Randy? You somehow FAIL to tell us that? It's all on Barta you stooge!
You know, this thread has really gotten out of hand. A handful of band members stopped in to say that there's nothing wrong with trying to keep people from crossing sideways through a marching band that is in motion. Then, we tried to give context to what people are thinking about while marching to a stadium with a huge crowd of people nearby that have been drinking for 5+ hours while you are wearing a funny uniform and why the band does certain things it does (not ramming through dense crowds, again, that has been universally condemned by all band alumni). It's clear that even someone with marching band experience didn't understand the context of what was happening and by trying to explain more we just created an even bigger misunderstanding because most people have absolutely zero context for what it means to be in a college marching band at a P5 school. This doesn't mean people in band think they are special or better than others, just that we have done different things than others. Just like if you never played a sport you don't really understand what it means to be on a team and being on a high school team doesn't mean you understand what it's like to be on a college team. Now, we are being told that we are zombies marching in Putin's Russian legions and we condone marching bands blasting through crowds and running people over. I think something got off track here.
In your most recent post, I feel like you may have finally realized that you have misunderstood us the entire time. Maybe not, but I'm going to leave it that way in my mind that at least one person realized we're not saying that college marching bands are entitled to mow through crowds. So how about we just go back to saying that it's a good idea to try to keep people from crossing sideways through the middle of a marching band that's on the move.
My question is (I was in HS band for most of HS) why the heck do bands always have uniforms that no reasonable person would ever want to be caught in?
So I guess the Iowa band members that have been all over social media all week are saying Pollard lied today about the Iowa band taking an exit they were told not to.
They are saying that ISU just yelled at them to leave immediately, so they just took the shortest route.
I call BS on that. ISU was probably yelling at them to get off the field, but JP and the Police Chief both say the Iowa band was told to use the East exit, just like the ISU band did.
I sure believe them over some band students at Iowa with an axe to grind.
They are saying that ISU just yelled at them to leave immediately, so they just took the shortest route.
I call BS on that. ISU was probably yelling at them to get off the field, but JP and the Police Chief both say the Iowa band was told to use the East exit, just like the ISU band did.
I sure believe them over some band students at Iowa with an axe to grind.
If they are claiming they took the nearest exit wouldn’t that be the NE side of the Jacobson building ?
