F*** Crow T-shirt

My Letter to the Editor
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ASU Student Newspaper

Last month we had F*** Bush and this month we get F*** Crow.  Since I am a Fraternity member (Sigma Chi) and for a time the Alum that Crow MOST hated I would like to weigh in on this matter.

Crow is certainly seeking to remake ASU.  Some of those changes I welcome while others I’m still waiting to see.  That said, Crow seems to have certainly toned down his “Sherman’s March to the Sea” approach as he seeks to implement his vision.

When Crow first arrived he certainly seemed hell bent on driving the Fraternities from campus.  I was seated less then 10 feet away from Dr. Crow on September 27, 2002 when the Regents approved the sale of the Alpha Dr. properties to the Fraternities.  I related the following story at the time to our Alums.

“While I was seated with other members of Alpha Drive house corporations (Pike, Sigma Nu and Sig Ep) waiting for the meeting to get started Michael Crow (the new ASU President) walks over and is talking to a couple seated in the row in front of us (he has never met any of us) and I overhear him talking to them about Fraternities. He certainly let slip his personal animus towards Greek Letter societies. He said “When I left to go to school my father said to stay away from anything with Greek Letters so when my Phi Beta Kappa arrived I threw it in the trash”. Now does that indicate a deep-seated bias and outright hostility??”

Since that time Crow has had his worldview of Fraternities moderated to some extent by an understanding of where donated money to the University tends to come from.  Hint: it?s not from the kid that was living in a ?dorm?.

I hope Crow embraces the F*** Crow t-shirt and sees it for what it really is, a healthy (and fun) expression of disappointment.  Most everyone likes to try to portray themselves as being against “The Man”.  Maybe Crow could personally buy one of those T-Shirts himself and wear it to the game?  Heck he could follow Rush Limbaugh?s example.  Autograph one of the shirts and auction it off to benefit a worthwhile Student-focused Charity.

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The original article in the State Press
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Original Article

Student tries to cash in on Crow’s name
 by Dan O’Connor
 published on Thursday, October 25, 2007

ASU President Michael Crow will be made into a fashion symbol next week when one former ASU student reveals his new line of shirts that display a blatant disapproval for the University leader.

Miles Wickersham, a former ASU industrial design student and Phi Kappa Psi member, is in the process of fulfilling a growing number of student requests for T-shirts that show the explicit F-word next to a graphic of a crow.

The shirts initially caught the attention on a facebook.com group, which allows members to communicate in a forum about the topic.

“His last name’s Crow, so how much more perfect can this be,” Wickersham said. “Of course it only made sense to put this on a shirt.”

Wickersham said he has since made the shirts less vulgar by dropping three letters from the logo and applying the emblem to shirts in ASU’s maroon and gold colors. He is charging $10 to $15 for each shirt.

Wickersham said he has already received orders for 100 shirts and will have them ready by Monday. There will be hundreds more available for tailgaters at next week’s ASU vs. California football game at Sun Devil’s stadium. But Wickersham said anticipates he won’t be able to fulfill the demand.

He said he thinks most people will buy the shirts because it’s trendy for people to wear apparel that mocks high-ranking officials.

“People will take any excuses they want to in order to stand up to authority,” Wickersham said. “The only reason I want to do this is to see a healthy profit margin.”

Wickersham said he dropped out of ASU in 2006 to pursue a job in architecture, while continuing to practice his hobby of graphic design.

He said he has no lasting vendetta against Crow.

But almost all of his former fraternity brothers despise Crow, Wickersham added.
“Personally, I’ve never met the guy, but 99 percent of the people I talk to are like, ‘ya, [explicit] Crow,'” he said.

Wickersham said he doesn’t fear any retaliation from ASU officials after he unveils his product, and he encourages students that may be weary of his shirt’s implied anti-Crow declaration to stand up for First Amendment rights.

Terri Shafer, an ASU spokeswoman, said the University is aware that a large number of Greek organizations are angered by a recent push to promote responsible behavior, but will not support misconduct.

“We do not believe that the behavior in which these students would like to engage is endorsed by the national organizations to which their chapters belong,” Shafer said in an e-mail. “Neither do we believe these individuals represent the majority view of students who choose to affiliate with Greek organizations on campus.”

But Wickersham said he doesn’t agree. Even though Greek life still exists under Crow’s vision for a “New American University,” many fraternity’s traditions have been wounded, and a handful destroyed altogether, he said.

History junior Nate Lourie was Sigma Nu’s pledge class president until the Interfraternity Council ? the governing body for fraternities on campus ? revoked the fraternity’s privileges to recruit pledges.

“My biggest beef with [Crow] here is he’s essentially ruining these kids’ lives by taking [pledging] away from them,” Lourie said. “The T-shirts are, I think, the coolest things ever.”

Lourie said he’s going to be ordering 800 to 1,000 shirts next week to distribute to Sun Devil fans and anti-Crow advocates within his fraternity at the ASU football game Saturday.

But not all fraternity members share in Lourie’s gripe against Crow.
Marketing senior Todd Ellinswood is a member of ASU’s Sigma Chi chapter. He said ASU’s president deserves the respect from the student body and should not be reduced to a mark for negative scrutiny.

“[The F-Crow shirts are] just dumb because Crow’s been doing these things for the betterment of the school and it’s other councils making these rules,” Ellinswood said. “But I’ve got to admit, it’s a pretty cool shirt.”