Welcome to the Third Degree: Tough, Brief, Weekly Interrogations that force thinking and response. This Sunday we target: Symbols
In LBJ speak, is it time to give “a thunk” to horny toads and UGAX?
Can either the Texas Horned Lizards (Horned Frogs to TCU) or UGA, the tenth, Georgia’s English Bulldog, be termed symbols?
What team will win the promised, epic struggle Monday night–the underdog, spiny ones or the dog?
Besides spines, does horned frog ability to spray nasty smelling blood from their eyes cause dogs to run away (at least waddle quickly)?
In truth, will the horned frogs, hibernating in the Fort Worth zoo, miss tomorrow’s game but jowly UGAX, in red jersey, will take it all in?
Despite branding, allegiances and fame, are neither the horny ones nor the doggy, Winston Churchill look- alike impactful enough to qualify as symbols– but mascots for sure?
Reaching back, should we credit the 1880s, French slang derived, comic opera hit, “La Mascotte”, and its mystic, good luck giving, virgin, farm girl for creating mascot mania (animal, vegetable and mineral)?
While mascots can be popular, don’t symbols, icon like, generate great respect, deep feelings, and veneration.
Do we thrill to bald eagle sightings? Regally perched or on the wing, do they inspire us?
Eagles–symbols of America? Why even ask the question? How’s the eagle doing these days?
Are there other symbols, despite long standing veneration, now denied by noisy, neo-righteousness for some distorted historical purity?
Does the eagle weep, as greater and lesser symbols of the land, hard fought and earned, are erased from study, use and view?
If you still feel, still venerate, why not renew, reinstate, recreate and respect the iconic symbols that made and make us the American team that must prevail across the generations?
Why deny the future by failing to venerate, with understanding, past and proven symbols?
Socrates reminds: “The unexamined life is not worth living. The answers and actions remain yours.
The new, secure, Third Degree website, www.third-degreeUS.com, is up now with improved security, administrative and financial capability. Full functionality will take effect Mid-January–watch for separate messages.