Jan. 6, 2007
 
Editorial: Depravity: For One WVU Fan, a New Low
 
In a world of blogs and message boards, occasionally an item surfaces that is hard to peg as a news story and yet hard to dismiss for its novelty.
 
Such a case occurred this past week with the revelation on a Georgia Tech sports fans message board of an account of a young WVU football fan doing an act of lower body elimination in the seats of the Yellow Jackets Marching Band during the Gator Bowl in Jacksonville.
 
Accompanied by a series of photos that were reasonably convincing, a Georgia Tech fan explained to those on the message board how he came to observe a young, male Mountaineer fan showing the ultimate in disrespect for the Yellow Jackets' band, then debating security guards about it after being caught in the act.
 
Whether the young man in question got a taste of southern justice for his behavior, the incident crystallizes for the entire WVU community just how black an eye can result from one or more ne'er do wells. WVU has a reputation these days, and it's not a good one when it comes to some fan behavior at home games. But who knew it could get even worse on the road?
 
The answer for this public relations problem is for the vast majority of responsible WVU fans to police their own ranks severely, making it clear to the younger generation that there is zero tolerance for bizarre and anti-social fan behavior ranging from public drunkenness to couch burning to profanity to....using the bathroom in another team's band section.
 
WVU President David Hardesty is to be commended for targeting this behavior in Morgantown in the last few months. But like the war on terror, this may be a long, hard battle. Why?
 
Because this kind of behavior didn't start overnight, and the temptation to shock is always present for delinquents.
 
But if the many good WVU fans encircle the bad ones with moral outrage, then the days of boorish behavior at WVU games may yet be numbered.