If the student government at Rutgers University gets its way, the school mascot, the Scarlet Knight, will soon receive a politically correct makeover. The white male Scarlet Knight, adopted in 1955, would come in several designer shades — including black (African-American), brown (Latino), and yellow (Asian) — and sexes, including a “third” gender.
According to the student newspaper, the Daily Targum, a bill allowing multiple iterations of the mascot was voted on and passed last week by the Rutgers University Student Assembly. Student assembly parliamentarian Emmet Brennan explained that the goal is to promote diversity and group pride:
What we were thinking — the way the bill’s laid out — it’s not defined that we need an Asian knight, a black knight, a Latino knight. That we would really leave it up to the different student organizations … and basically the student body as a whole to determine how many knights they’d like and what these knights would represent.
Before the measure becomes law, it needs to be approved by the alumni association, whose members are expected to oppose it. Said Brennan:
I mean, obviously you’re going to have people who are going to say, you know, we’re destroying tradition. It’s inevitable. There’s always going to be people who complain, but I think we won’t receive that much pushback because we are keeping the current knight. We’re just, I think, taking pride in our current diversity as a school as we are now, but also recognizing where we were.
Rutgers prides itself on its diverse student makeup. According to its website, 53% of the student body is female and more than half of the incoming class self-identifies as non-Caucasian.
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