Unt Vs Navy T-shirts

[ShopMeanGreen]

It's all in how you pay respect I suppose. My gut says tone it down a bit. A goat would be funny. ALSO, If this is a CLC licensed product for sale to the public the University must OK it prior to sales. If there is a possibility of bad press hopefully they have considered it.

[UNTLifer]

I don't really have an opinion on the shirt. It's okay. I guess my opinion would mirror emmitt's comments in an earlier post. I just don't want a bunch of bad publicity, right or wrong, aimed at NT over a shirt.

[Eagle-96]

If avid supporters of NT like us are debating the shirts this fervently then what will the "average joe" say when he sees the shirt on Veterans Day weekend. It just aint worth the trouble.

Edited April 5, 2007 by Eagle-96

[CoachD.]

I don't really have an opinion on the shirt. It's okay. I guess my opinion would mirror emmitt's comments in an earlier post. I just don't want a bunch of bad publicity, right or wrong, aimed at NT over a shirt.

I think you all are giving way to much credit that people would actually buy it. I mean you can't exactly walk into a store and buy it. There might be a few hundred sold....that's it.

Its a shirt....if you don't like it...don't buy it...don't look at it....worry about yourself....If more people practiced this type of approach I could still say Merry Christmas in the school I teach in without getting fired!!!

Edited April 5, 2007 by CoachD.

[KRAM1]

WOW...The PC Police are certainly out in force starting with Greenjoe.....or whatever the name is...I have a son and a daughter-in-law in the Navy and they thought the shirt was great, I am a veteran of the Viet Nam era and I think the shirt is great. It is too bad that in today's world everyone looks for "hidden messages" in everything. IT'S A FOOTBALL GAME! I think the Exes should be congratulated for doing something to support the school and to "rev up" interest in the game. The shirt OBVIOUSLY references a football game! Get a life! I doubt that any Naval Academy Midshipman would be offended. They are smart enough to realize it references a FOOTBALL GAME. I LOVE THE SHIRT,...sign me up! I will wear it proudly! I think I'll get a couple extra for my Naval officer son and daughter-in-law. They thought it was a "hoot"! I can't remember the last time something like this was done by the Exes or anyone else for that matter. Maybe it doesn't happen because whatever is done..someone will get their feelings hurt! Let's don't even keep score at the game...it would hurt my feelings if we lost...let's just give everyone a trophy for participating...and...don't yell too loud it might scare the birds flying over the stadium.

Thanks to the Exes for doing something positive...shame on the PC police!

[jgb0607]

Well, whether for it or against it, the shirt is being altered.....

Email I received:

Hello

Yes, we will be altering the t-shirt design before printing. As you noted, it was not our intent to be offensive to veterans, instead, we hoped to bolster support for the Mean Green and what is sure to be an exciting game.

Please stay tuned for an updated design and thank you for you concern.

Please let me know if there is anything else our office can do.

Cindy Mc

Cindy McClanahan, '01

North Texas Exes

Director of Marketing and Membership

940-369-8506 (office)

940-369-7431 (fax)

CindyM@unt.edu

[MarkCiz]

Poor, poor taste...

As soon as I saw the design, without even thinking about political correctness, I was taken aback by the ship. I would be embarrassed and ashamed to see NT supporters wearing those shirts on game day. It has nothing to do with people getting their feelings hurt; it's because we're currently at WAR and people are getting killed. Keep "Sink Navy", lose the ship.

[KRAM1]

Poor, poor taste...

As soon as I saw the design, without even thinking about political correctness, I was taken aback by the ship. I would be embarrassed and ashamed to see NT supporters wearing those shirts on game day. It has nothing to do with people getting their feelings hurt; it's because we're currently at WAR and people are getting killed. Keep "Sink Navy", lose the ship.

[UNTLifer]

I think you all are giving way to much credit that people would actually buy it. I mean you can't exactly walk into a store and buy it. There might be a few hundred sold....that's it.

Its a shirt....if you don't like it...don't buy it...don't look at it....worry about yourself....If more people practiced this type of approach I could still say Merry Christmas in the school I teach in without getting fired!!!

I also believe that we have become to PC, but I also respect our veteran's and don't want to offend them. That is my only point.

Edited April 5, 2007 by UNTLifer

[Smitty]

Well if you're okay with a sinking destroyer, why don't you just make a t-shirt with a picture of the USS Cole with a smoking hole in its side? Do you think that would be funny?

Once again, it's not being PC. I'm fine with a t-shirt that says SINK NAVY (as a simple play on words) but not the image of a sinking warship, especially in a time when American warships are very much in harm's way. It is not politically incorrect, it's just bad taste with the potential to generate bad publicity - and North Texas needs neither.

[KRAM1]

Score another for the PC police...I think it's great that the Denton Exes are doing something fun and supportive of the school and athletics. Sure hope all you PC folks who were "offended" by the original T-Shirt buy several of the new and PC-Correct versions...Sure hope no one gets their feelings hurt this time...sure wouldn't want that...by the way...you PC folks...buy season tickets and support the team! Buy the "new" and "improved T-shirt too. Hope to see you at the game! GO MEAN GREEN...GO DENTON EXES for getting going and helping "sell-out" Fouts Field for the Navy game! You guys deserve a real "thank you" for getting it going....see you at the game! Gotta run buy my new and improved "Sink Navy" T-Shirt. I will wear it to the game PROUDLY!

[UNTLifer]

Well if you're okay with a sinking destroyer, why don't you just make a t-shirt with a picture of the USS Cole with a smoking hole in its side? Do you think that would be funny?

Once again, it's not being PC. I'm fine with a t-shirt that says SINK NAVY (as a simple play on words) but not the image of a sinking warship, especially in a time when American warships are very much in harm's way. It is not politically incorrect, it's just bad taste with the potential to generate bad publicity - and North Texas needs neither.

The point I've been trying to make, but didn't too good of a job of in my post above.

[UNTLifer]

Score another for the PC police...I think it's great that the Denton Exes are doing something fun and supportive of the school and athletics. Sure hope all you PC folks who were "offended" by the original T-Shirt buy several of the new and PC-Correct versions...Sure hope no one gets their feelings hurt this time...sure wouldn't want that...by the way...you PC folks...buy season tickets and support the team! Buy the "new" and "improved T-shirt too. Hope to see you at the game! GO MEAN GREEN...GO DENTON EXES for getting going and helping "sell-out" Fouts Field for the Navy game! You guys deserve a real "thank you" for getting it going....see you at the game! Gotta run buy my new and improved "Sink Navy" T-Shirt. I will wear it to the game PROUDLY!

It's not the PC police, it's the "class" police. Let's have some.

[rcade]

I can't see any people getting that up in arms about it.

GoMeanGreen.Com is not what I'd describe as a PC crowd. If the shirt has offended this many people here, I think it's guaranteed to offend some people if they're actually printed and worn at the Navy game.

[Daddy Dumpsalot]

Uh oh...CNN's Larry King is doing a special on the 'Sink Navy' shirts being printed by the University of North Texas Exes. Stay tuned April 15th for more.

[GreenTiger_OriginalAcct]

No one cried when they made Battleship, the board game that lights up when you strike the right square on a grid.

...I hated losing at Battleship.

Seriously underated post. Hey, ever seen the Battleship WITHOUT lights? Or am I showing my age?

[KRAM1]

It's probably best we don't make the shirts. By the way it's not very clever or original, someone can do better than that.

[KRAM1]

STEP UP and do something better! Go for it...I'll buy your T-Shirt too if the Exes sell it. I am sure the Exes would love you to volunteer and get involved. Someone did and the PC police get all over it! I am all for the PC Police crowd doing something positive instead of complaining about what other folks are doing. It sure would be crowded at Denton Exes chapter meetings if the local PC Police crowd would show up and get involved. But, tghen it is always easier to criticize others than do anything yourself, right? Just thinking out loud.

Enough of this already...let's get fired up for some great DodgeBall...and let's fill the stadium for Game 1 of the DodgeBall era. All are welcome at Fouts Field. I'll see you there....

[Eagle1855]

STEP UP and do something better! Go for it...I'll buy your T-Shirt too if the Exes sell it. I am sure the Exes would love you to volunteer and get involved. Someone did and the PC police get all over it! I am all for the PC Police crowd doing something positive instead of complaining about what other folks are doing. It sure would be crowded at Denton Exes chapter meetings if the local PC Police crowd would show up and get involved. But, tghen it is always easier to criticize others than do anything yourself, right?

As stated before, its not the PC Police, its people who would like to see the university represented in a classy manner. The sinking ship is distasteful. Everyone I passed it to said the same thing- "I dont know about the ship...". Whether we think its a big deal or not, others will, so why mess with it?

Its all a moot point anyways as it's being redesigned.

Let's move on.

[greenminer]

Seriously underated post. Hey, ever seen the Battleship WITHOUT lights? Or am I showing my age?

No, not showing you're age. I remember playing it in very primitive forms with classmates during elementary and junior high.

Just for fun...

In The Dillinger Days, historian John Toland writes that prisoners in solitary confinement in the Indiana State Penitentiary played a version of Battleship during the 1920s, marking squares on their cell floors and calling out attacks from cell to cell. "For years the more obtuse guards wondered what was being plotted when they heard men calling: 'B-7.' 'Miss.' 'C-8.' 'Destroyer sunk!'" (John Toland, The Dillinger Days, p. 24. Da Capo Press 1995)

from the wiki article about the game.

[Smitty]

STEP UP and do something better! Go for it...I am all for the PC Police crowd doing something positive instead of complaining about what other folks are doing....But, tghen it is always easier to criticize others than do anything yourself, right?

Sir, I have a entire website of "something better" that I have spent countless hours creating, have posted on the web, and have distributed free to the Mean Green Nation. Don't get sanctimonious with me. I have made - and continue to make - my contribution, and do not appreciate name calling or suggestons of some lame political agenda.

The idea that if someone disagrees then they are being PC is insulting, as is your wrapping yourself in the flag of freedom of speech and therefore being immune to criticism. Freedom of speech is a wonderful thing, but it doesn't forgive bad taste or bad designs. The Exes want to put out a design and try to sell it? Fine. Then get ready to have that design judged. I have offered up my designs for public consumption and that makes them fair game for criticism. Now its the Exes turn.

And some of us, quite a number of us, don't like that design. Not PC. Just bad.

Edited April 5, 2007 by Smitty

[TeachinTodd]

Considering this entire debate had been about a shirt design, its too bad it is sitting in a forum that is dedicated to football. Shouldn't we just lock this thread and let it die? I'd rather be talking football, not taste, or class, or the PC-ness of a couple hundred (at most) t-shirts that now aren't even being sold.

[Texas Stranger]

Those T-shirts are great !

When we play Air Force in a couple of years, let's do one that says "Shoot Down Air Force !" Maybe put a picture of a plane being shot down in flames. To satisfy the "liberal PC crowd" that might object, we can show the pilot ejecting safely.

And if we ever play Army again, let's have one that says "Roadside bomb the Army !" Good times, no ?

In before the lock.

[Daddy Dumpsalot]

Those T-shirts are great !

When we play Air Force in a couple of years, let's do one that says "Shoot Down Air Force !" Maybe put a picture of a plane being shot down in flames. To satisfy the "liberal PC crowd" that might object, we can show the pilot ejecting safely.

And if we ever play Army again, let's have one that says "Roadside bomb the Army !" Good times, no ?

In before the lock.

I LIKE it!

Or maybe we could have a Navy ship in the sea and a GIANT eagle flying over head pooping but the poop is in the shape of missles and they are destroying the Battleship. This idea can be used against pretty much anyone we play. I mean we could substitute the Navy ship for any mascot. BRILLIANT I TELL YOU, BRILLIANT!

[Mean Green 93-98]

When I first saw the T-Shirts, I was not impressed. It just sent the wrong message. I realize there are those who are going to buy and wear these shirts because they do not see it as I, and obviously many others, do. I just have to accept that the message you send with those shirts will be perceived as the message all of us are sending to Navy.