Activists are demanding that Hormad High School drop its ‘Tanystropheus’ mascot because, they say, it’s racist.
An extinct reptile with a startlingly long neck, the Tanystropheus has been the nickname of Hormad High’s sports teams for some 600 years. The students’ favorite cheer is “Tanystropheuses, go, go, go!” But that has to change, says the Southern Poverty Law Center.
“The image of this disgusting creature is offensive to our nation’s ethnic minorities,” said Fernando Gesundheit, a spokesbeing for the Hormad City chapter of Antifa. “It is also a slap in the face to Settled Science. Drop it, Hormads, or you’ll be sorry!”
The students are unhappy about this. “Do they have any idea,” asked Rodney Podney, captain of the Hormad High curling team, “how much it cost us to get those Tanystropheus outfits for our cheerleaders? I mean, the necks kept dragging on the ground! It took us a full 200 bake sales to raise enough money to get that fixed.”
Why is the image of a Tanystropheus racist?
“Because we say it is!” explains the SPLC Office of Browbeating America.
No one has yet suggested an alternative mascot for the school.