Posted by Leland on October 02, 2003 at 22:34:49:
In Reply to: Re: Re: Bad idea #6706 posted by Jeff Hicks on October 02, 2003 at 10:08:31:
DCI has nothing to do with this. The kinds of performances that show up at BOA Grand Nationals (and Winter Guard International, both in color guards & indoor drumlines) have been trying to make social statements far more often than is ever seen any more on the competitive drum corps field.
If there's any blame to be passed around, make sure it's directed towards the correct groups.
If nothing else, this band's show sure got people talking. The band director wanted a thought-provoking program, and he succeeded.
Plus -- and I know this has been said below -- the people in the stands weren't paying any attention to the announcer or the show itself until the Nazi flag popped up. If they knew what was going on, they would have been expecting its appearance, and would understand the context.
I've got a friend who wrote his first year's show for his high school band to depict "conflict through the ages". He talked it over with the kids, the parents, the school administration, and anyone else who was going to have questions even before putting it on the field. By the time it was performed, pretty much everyone who would see the show understood what they were going to see. As a result, everyone outside of the band knew what was going on, and the show was a big success.
I also think it was in very poor taste of the crowd to start throwing stuff at the school's football coaches. That just displayed the crowd's general ignorance, and makes it less surprising that they were ignoring the band until that flag showed up.
One last thought, for now -- personally, I can't stand seeing national flags being flung around in any manner on the marching field. It's highly undignified. The "idea" of the different countries' flags could have been used instead (with, say, stylized interpretations), and the simpletons in the audience wouldn't have known what they were seeing anyway.