<p> Fanaticism — my favorite word in the English dictionary. It comes from the Latin fanaticus meaning "inspired" or "frenzied." A fan is someone who displays fanaticism. I am an RPI athletics fan. The Red Army is an organization of RPI fans. The people at Saturday's game who heckled the Red Army were, if anything, fans of laziness. While our hockey team (three members of which are my roommates) skated their hearts out to a victory, the people sitting behind me whined about not being able to sit and watch the game. The "Cameron Crazies" of Duke University stand at every game they attend. The fans love them. The "Crazies" cheer and yell and heckle more than anyone else in the arena. At Notre Dame, the student section is a sea of navy blue shirts. Not a person within it is seated at any point during the game. They're so spirited that they even cheer along with the marching band's halftime show. At RPI, we have the Red Army. Like it or not, it's here to stay. </p>
<p> As with any organization, there's some start-up time involved. I'd like to apologize up front for our lack of attendance. I'm sorry that we only filled 125 seats with our members this past weekend. This coming weekend will be better. I'm also sorry that the students in the Army are mostly underclassmen and don’t know all the cheers yet. We're going to work on that. In the coming weeks, we will go from loud and spirited to loud, spirited, and accurate. </p>
<p> At 300 members strong, the Army is the evolution of a lack of spirit on campus. Around 25 students actively participated in Go Be Red last year. They all believed that the school could use an organized group for cheering, but they all also knew that a competition was not the way to go about it. These students started the Red Army because student spirit groups have been so successful at other schools. So far, it has been wildly successful here. The athletics department loves the Army, the teams love the Army, and opposing teams hate the Army. Personally, I couldn't be happier with the group. To the rest of the student body, I'm not asking that you be a member of the Red Army, or even that you emulate it. I just ask that you appreciate your teams and that you appreciated what the Army does for them.
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