The Malcolm X-treme!

i'm often proud of my suburb. when it comes to social issues, the environment, etc., it's usually low in 'sub' and high in 'urb'. then we go and do something like this:

Black Panthers to prowl ice in Port Moody

By Larry Pruner The Tri-City News
May 14 2006

Port Coquitlam Buckeroos are history, which was the theme of many of the monikers submitted in the Junior ‘B’ hockey club’s recent name-the-team contest.
Only team owner Ron Luniw wanted something new when he shifted the franchise to Port Moody from PoCo after the last Pacific International Junior Hockey League season.
Meet the Port Moody Black Panthers.
In the Black Panthers, Luniw believes his team will have a fresh look while keeping close ties to the Port Moody Minor Hockey Association, whose rep teams go by the nickname Panthers.
“Nothing against Port Moody minor hockey at all but I still wanted my own identity,” Luniw told The Tri-City News Friday. “Hopefully, their players will go one day from being Panthers to Black Panthers. I want them to also realize we want a close connection to their faction.”
Luniw said he received nearly 200 submissions over a three-week period in the name-the-team contest, including such traditional suggestions for the PoMo club as the Prospectors, the Gold Rush and the Locomotive.
Two youngsters offered the name Black Panthers, with Port Moody 16-year-old Patrick Moussa and Port Coquitlam 11-year-old Callum McDonald sharing the winning prize. For their effort, the two will each receive a season pass to next year’s Black Panthers home games.
The team will retain its former uniform colours of red, white, black and grey, although Luniw said that’s more to resemble Canada’s national teams than maintain tradition.
A new logo has also been designed; it’s a panther bearing its teeth and claws atop a hockey skate, with the words “Black Panthers” encircling it.
“I guarantee you we will be the best-dressed team in the league,” Luniw raved.
The Black Panthers, whose players are usually 15 to 20 years old, will hold an invitational rookie camp June 16 to 18 in Pitt Meadows. For more information about the camp, or regarding season tickets, email portmoodyjuniorhockeyclub@shaw.ca .

i don't know whether it's worse that our PIJHL Hockey Team has chosen to call itself the Black Panthers, or that no one at the Tri-City News said "hey, this name choice may not be entirely appropriate. maybe we should make a note of it in our article." yeesh.

i sent a letter to the editor about it. they didn't print it:

The editor,

The Port Moody Black Panthers? After games, will there be parties? Black Panther Parties? And what am I expected to do to celebrate a goal, bow my head and raise a gloved fist?

The 16 and 11 year olds who came up with the name shouldn’t be expected to know better, but their parents and those in charge of the team most certainly should. Surely someone involved in the operations of the team, or, say, your own reporter covering the story, could have pointed out how inappropriate a name this is. This name selection reveals our incredible ignorance of (or indifference to) North American history, and will make us a laughing stock once the word gets out.

I may be too quick to judge, however. Is Black Nationalist literature going to be distributed at games? Will players be encouraged to use their sticks to forcibly resist oppression? If so, the name might just fit. Otherwise, lets find a new one. How about the “Port Moody Malcolm X-treme”?

Yours truly,

Rob Taylor

on that note, a poem from the suburbs:

socialist paranoia

green means 'go'
unless turning left.

red means 'stop'
unless turning right.

even the traffic lights
are out to get me.