Let This Sink In

#26
#26
Ag87# said:
Howdy,

I thought I would give some information on the whole male cheerleader / yell practice thing.

A&M was an all military 100% male institution until the mid-60's. Think VMI or the Citadel.

As such, the yell leaders had to be men. While we now have the Aggie Dance Team for Basketball etc, we have kept the tradition in Football.

The yells were an offshoot of the military nature of the schools. What one person sees as weird and cultish, another person would see as togetherness and unique. Just depends on how you view things.

I will say this, though. Kyle Field is a unique venue. I can honestly say that there is no other place like it in College Football (for better or worse). The aforementioned things make it unique and, as such, I can't view this as a bad thing. Without this type of stuff, it just becomes another 100K+ stadium.

If you go, I can guarantee that you will be treated with respect. I have had guests from Alabama, Florida and Auburn who have stated that they were very welcomed and treated great (the anti-LSU was how it was described to me).

Hope some of y'all can make it. Should be a great game. I'll definitely be there.

Gig em.
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Excellent post! Thank u!

I have two Texas A&M alumni friends and they are both indeed extremely respectful.
 
#27
#27
Ag87# said:
Oh, and as far as the fake soldier comment, there are 8 citations in the Memorial Student Center for the 8 Aggies that were awarded the Medal of Honor. You should stop by and read them.
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That's great. Must be the only school to have alumni get that award.
 
#28
#28
Jax_Vol said:
Not sure on this, but I think Texas A&M was an all-male, predominately military institution until the mid 1960's. Therefore, no females to be cheerleaders.


But, don't quote me on that.


They have many interesting old traditions that seem to be somewhat based on an all-male culture with excess time on their hands. In the old days, about half of their graduates went into the military. They diversified over time, but they still have a heavy Corp of Cadets influence.

Many of the western states had an agricultural college and still use the slang term Aggies as a nickname. I visited New Mexico State once and they are the Aggies. A couple of years ago, we played the Utah State Aggies.
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Yep that's it. So for tradition they still have all male cheerleaders and they are members of the Corp of Cadets.

Also they don't have alumni. They have an Association of Former Students. Again tradition that goes back to WWII. So many cadets left school early to enlist and never returned that at some point they made that change. Not sure of details.

A&M still turns out a very high number of officer candidates for a non academy school. Maybe only VMI and the Citadel higher? Not sure.
 
#30
#30
Whining about TA&M traditions will only make us look worse when they kick our butts by 2 TDs. They are a VERY good team. Both offensively nd defensively better than anything we have seen this year.
 
#31
#31
Power T-Rev said:
That is one weird school. Closely resembles a cult. I'm not just referring to the story above, but I've heard some strange things that go on there
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As a graduate of A&M, it definitely is a cult, but I don't think anyone really cares. A lot of people try to defend that, but it is and hey I am totally okay with it.

Most of it stems from the fact that A&M was an all-male, all-military school for the first 100 years of its existence. It has grown tremendously and become much more diverse especially in the last 15 years where you can't really peg the whole fan base as any type of person (used to be very highly rural, farmboy types, but that has really changed as many more urban students have gone there)

The traditions that started long ago when we were all military stuck and we embrace it. It is what it is.
 
#32
#32
armchair said:
It IS a weird school. It is partly the fact that a lot of its male students are in ROTC, so there is the military component, and then there is the fact that it is in texas, which is a weird, horrible, redneck state with the exception of Austin. I was watching at women's soccer game at A&M, and there were a scores of ROTC students at the game, and many of them stood holding flags for the entire game. They are a bit intense. As for kissing your date after a score, it's cute, it's fun--it's also very 1950ish, which is sort of the ethic in texas generally and at A&M.
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The ROTC is about 2000 students of 60000 undergrad. It is highly over represented in the media for obvious reasons, the uniqueness.
 
#35
#35
Jax_Vol said:
What is the approximate male/female ratio these days?
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Its about 50/50. I will say this, when I went to A&M between '83 and '87, the girls were not attractive to say the least. There were a few hot chicks, but each one had about 10 decent looking guys chasing them. We used to haul ass over to Austin every weekend to chase the Texas Chicks (where they had more hot chicks and some dweeby dudes)

When I go back to A&M now, I must say that the talent in both quantity and quality has risen dramatically. Actually looks like a fun place to go to school whereas when I was there it was kinda boring.
 
#36
#36
NorthDallas40 said:
Yep that's it. So for tradition they still have all male cheerleaders and they are members of the Corp of Cadets.

Also they don't have alumni. They have an Association of Former Students. Again tradition that goes back to WWII. So many cadets left school early to enlist and never returned that at some point they made that change. Not sure of details.

A&M still turns out a very high number of officer candidates for a non academy school. Maybe only VMI and the Citadel higher? Not sure.
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While most yell leaders are in the corps of cadets, they don't have to be. We had a non-reg yell leader back in 07-08 ish. They also don't have to be male, although there has not been a woman elected. They are elected by the student body.

TAMU commissioned 131 officers in 2015. By comparison, The Citadel commissioned 97, and West Point about 900.

Correct in A&M does not have alumni, only former students. Once an Aggie, always an Aggie. Your former coach Robert Neyland was an Aggie and played football and baseball here before getting his West Point appointment. So Gig'em Gen. Neyland!
 
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#37
#37
I don't think the OP really understands or appreciates the pageantry and traditions of college football. It's impressive to me that a large public university can actually attract a large number of students to participate in something like the Yell. It seems like most schools that aren't winning big have trouble getting the students to even show up at the games.
 
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#38
#38
VolunteerHillbilly said:
I don't think the OP really understands or appreciates the pageantry and traditions of college football. It's impressive to me that a large public university can actually attract a large number of students to participate in something like the Yell. It seems like most schools that aren't winning big have trouble getting the students to even show up at the games.
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On an additional note Texas A&M is the largest student body in attendance at football games in the NCAA. We sold roughly 34,000 student season tickets for this year.
 
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#40
#40
armchair said:
It IS a weird school. It is partly the fact that a lot of its male students are in ROTC, so there is the military component, and then there is the fact that it is in texas, which is a weird, horrible, redneck state with the exception of Austin. I was watching at women's soccer game at A&M, and there were a scores of ROTC students at the game, and many of them stood holding flags for the entire game. They are a bit intense. As for kissing your date after a score, it's cute, it's fun--it's also very 1950ish, which is sort of the ethic in texas generally and at A&M.
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So what's weird about the ROTC/military component? Did you know that ROTC was compulsory at land grant schools - including UT - at least into the 1960s. It probably wouldn't hurt if everyone learned a bit about the military today, but with current social trends that would certainly be an uphill battle not worth fighting. It's good to have some places that still have a respect for more traditional values.
 
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#41
#41
Chano said:
As a graduate of A&M, it definitely is a cult, but I don't think anyone really cares. A lot of people try to defend that, but it is and hey I am totally okay with it.

Most of it stems from the fact that A&M was an all-male, all-military school for the first 100 years of its existence. It has grown tremendously and become much more diverse especially in the last 15 years where you can't really peg the whole fan base as any type of person (used to be very highly rural, farmboy types, but that has really changed as many more urban students have gone there)

The traditions that started long ago when we were all military stuck and we embrace it. It is what it is.
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Sounds like the local Church of Christ
 
#42
#42
Think you're a good bit off base. Midnight Yell is one of the better school traditions out there.
 
#43
#43
I respect TAMU if for nothing else, they flipped off Texas, told them get bent, and left the Big 12 to come to the superior conference.
 
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#44
#44
bignewt said:
A bunch of pretend dress up soldiers makes me angry , we must crush them!
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20,000 Aggies served in WWII.

7 received the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Other than the Service Academies, A&M sends more commissioned officers into the United States Military than any other university.

And finally, prior to his appointment to West Point, Robert Neyland was a member of the Corps of Cadets while attending Texas A&M.

Pretend dress up soldiers?
 
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#45
#45
VolunteerHillbilly said:
I don't think the OP really understands or appreciates the pageantry and traditions of college football. It's impressive to me that a large public university can actually attract a large number of students to participate in something like the Yell. It seems like most schools that aren't winning big have trouble getting the students to even show up at the games.
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Show up at midnight on friday the night before a home game to get drunk and scream with thousands of Co-eds? Yeah, I would never show up to that :crazy:
 
#46
#46
chattaboogie said:
Show up at midnight on friday the night before a home game to get drunk and scream with thousands of Co-eds? Yeah, I would never show up to that :crazy:
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I will be in Chattanooga Friday night and after I finish dinner at the Public House I'm going to stroll around UTC campus and see how many students are out practicing cheers for their game against Mercer on Saturday.
 
#47
#47
VolunteerHillbilly said:
I will be in Chattanooga Friday night and after I finish dinner at the Public House I'm going to stroll around UTC campus and see how many students are out practicing cheers for their game against Mercer on Saturday.
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Public House is really good

I automatically have a soft spot for any institution that has a "little brother" sort of a status to a bigger/more prominent/more established program. So A&M has that going for them in my book.
 
#48
#48
CAVPUT said:
If you've ever been there for a game, you'd feel a bit differently about the "fan practice". The name "12th man" is earned and well deserved. The freaking stands sway. One of the toughest environments in all of college football. We have young pups here who complain about folks standing and screaming the entire game yet mock a fan base that does just that....and does it very, very well! I don't think there's any way our team can really appreciate what they're walking into Saturday. If they come out flat again in the first half, aTm will run them right out of the stadium. The staff had better have signs, hand signals, walkie talkies or develop telepathy because they're in for one helluva loud and rockin crowd Saturday.
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I think Tennessee will be ok with the cried noIse. You act like they've never played in front of a raucous crowd. I realize there's a difference between a road crowd and a home crowd, but Neyland is just as (prob more) crazy, than Kyle Field, when it gets rockin. Crowd noise and synchronized cheers are some of the least of the team's worries this week. They should be more worried about whichever defensive end Kendrick has to block and their receivers and running back gashing the middle of our depleted defense.
 
#49
#49
ImportedVoL said:
I like A&M, and most traditions they have..but some of those yells are really weird. Some of the movements, dude looks like a drowning bear.

Love the enthusiasm and all that, just maybe update some of that stuff? IDK..
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I believe that is preserving the history of the first yell leader. TAMU was getting their butt kicked many years ago and someone got up and basically tried to cheer up the fans with a comedy routine.
 
#50
#50
The Artful Dodger said:
I think Tennessee will be ok with the cried noIse. You act like they've never played in front of a raucous crowd. I realize there's a difference between a road crowd and a home crowd, but Neyland is just as (prob more) crazy, than Kyle Field, when it gets rockin. Crowd noise and synchronized cheers are some of the least of the team's worries this week. They should be more worried about whichever defensive end Kendrick has to block and their receivers and running back gashing the middle of our depleted defense.
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Its not a competition with Neyland and as you said our boys don't face a hostile Neyland.

This will be the most hostile environment team 120 faces this year. The 12th Man does its job and does it with the best of them.
 
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