Cheerleaders Can Be Presidents, Too
Here’s a little something H.E. shared with me: five of our presidents used to be cheerleaders—FDR, Eisenhower, Reagan, and both Bushes. Hm. Maybe now cheerleaders will gain a little respect.
But I doubt it.
I’ve seen a few authors or bloggers tell very bitter tales about how the cheerleaders in their high schools used to treat them, and then they’d joke about how stupid those girls were and how low they’ve fallen since graduation. It sounds like every stereotypical cheerleader in every teen movie ever made—popular, mean, and not too bright, marrying straight out of high school and bearing babies like they’re the last women in the world.
That makes me sad because I used to be a cheerleader, and I was never like that—I was somewhat a loner, shy, and an honor student, and even after college and after years working as an artist I still bear my maiden name and no children. I’ll grant that there may be a few cheerleaders that fit the awful stereotype, but I honestly never knew any.
But back to the article…
I’d always known that there used to be more men in cheerleading and that it actually used to be mostly men who led the cheers. It’s got quite the history, actually, though the stunting, dancing version of it that I knew in high school is fairly modern. I think my mom was a cheerleader back when she was in school, but I don’t think she did much more than yell cheers. Today, that kind of old fashioned cheerleading would be considered the job of the pep squad or the booster club, or whatever it is people are calling it these days.
I somehow can’t imagine my mother doing round-offs and ‘vators in her youth. Heck, I can’t imagine FDR doing cartwheels or cradles either.
OK, OK, so maybe modern cheerleaders can’t be presidents after all, but pep squad members can be presidents, too!
Close enough, I think.
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4 thoughts on “Cheerleaders Can Be Presidents, Too”
“Best Pom Poms in all 50 states” H.E.
LOL! April. My 17 year old son plays basketball. The cheerleaders are nothing like the way they were in my day… waaaay back when. Then, they rallied the crowd. There was still the half time dance, but that wasn’t their focus. Now, they go to games to practice for competition. *shakes head* The crowd is spurred on by the players, not the cheerleaders. Though I enjoy watching the national cheerleading competition on ESPN, I’d like our local cheerleaders to do more than look cute in front of the crowd at basketball games. And unfortunately… according to boy-child… they are just the way the movies portray them.
H.E., 🙂
Nina, I’m sorry to hear the cheerleaders at your son’s school seem stereotypical, and I’m sorry to hear they seem to focus more on their competitions than on their games. When I was a cheerleader, I had over 250 short cheers to remember, and they were all for the games. The ones we did for basketball had sit-down versions we could do on the bleachers if there wasn’t enough room in the court for us to stand on the sides. My three co-captains watched the games like hawks, keeping track of when we were offense and when we were defense.
On the stunting and dancing side of things, we did elaborate pyramids at the end of the field whenever our football team scored a touchdown, and because our team was so good, that meant that at least fives times in a game we’d have to sprint to where the touchdown was made from the 50-yard line and then climb on top of each other before the extra point was made. We sometimes did half-time dance shows, but it was more often for basketball than for football. In football, the band usually got to do the half-time shows.
I will admit that it’s harder to cheer for basketball than for football. It moves so fast that there really is no time to look at anything but the players as they move. So, of course, the crowd is more spurred on by the players than by the cheerleaders. The cheerleaders themselves are probably struggling just to keep up with who’s offense and who’s defense. I have always MUCH preferred cheering for football and didn’t really see the point of cheering for basketball. The only good we did in basketball was keep the people entertained at half-time.
We did go to competitions, though, but we practiced for that on our own time as we didn’t like to reveal our stuff quite yet to the crowds. We were second and third in the state in some competitions, so we were still pretty good, though we never got to go to ESPN.
I’m not sure why the cheerleaders appear to your son just like they do in the movies, but if they’re anything like I was I can probably explain a few misconceptions.
…like the clique concept most people seem to have.
Cheerleaders spend a LOT of time together. The entire summer even before school starts, they’re together all the time at summer cheer camps, seminars, and practices at the park. As a result, they tend to be very close and rather isolated from other students, and some people who are NOT in the squad tend to think they have just as much reason to be as close to or to be as familiar with a cheerleader as cheerleaders are to and with each other. SOOO not the case. Cheerleaders have the same experiences, so they understand each other. Anyone on the outside who also has a sense of entitlement to be part of the group just doesn’t understand. It’s not a clique thing at all.
It’s almost like some stranger off the street approaching a movie actor and the rest of the cast eating at a restaurant. The stranger might feel they know the actors, but the actors don’t know the stranger at all. They’re there to have a meal together and to talk about the movie project, and here this stranger is ingratiating himself out of nowhere. They know that the stranger wouldn’t even approach them if it weren’t for their celebrity and that the stranger really doesn’t know them the way he thinks he does.
That’s what it’s like. Seriously.
If a cheerleader turns down a date proposal or a party invitation, I can explain that too. Cheerleaders don’t normally have the time for much of anything. After school, they practice. After practice, they have to do homework. After that, some of them might actually have some part time work somewhere so can can earn some extra money to pay for their uniforms and seminars. On top of that, they have to maintain a certain GPA or risk being benched. And in some cases, as in mine, there are certain rules to follow. While we were allowed boyfriends, we were not allowed public displays of affection while in uniform, or we were given demerits. We were not allowed to use foul language because we paid for every bad word we used.
If a cheerleader seems aloof or mean, I can’t really explain every instance in every cheerleader. That really depends on the person and on how their actions are normally perceived. Some of that may be due to the above two explanations. I don’t really know. All I know is that no one in my squad was ever intentionally mean to anyone. And me? I was so shy and quiet, I might have appeared aloof. But I was the most academic of the bunch, so I was often alone, the only cheerleader, in a class because I was in all the advanced and AP classes. I felt very lonely most of the time.
Another misconception I can clear up: The cheerleader in Heoes? Never would have happened. She was never at all the camps and the practices, and squads don’t normally take in a newbie in the middle of the school year because it takes so long for the group to learn to work well together.
I don’t know of many other stereotypes, myths, or misconceptions. If you can think of any, or if your son has a few, let me know, and I can probably explain what’s going on behind that.
🙂
I can vouch for her explanation. My other daughter was part of the cheering squad, too! They were exhausted most of the time when they were home from all the routines they had to practice almost everyday.
I was a volleyball player in H.S., but we cheer our other sport teams. Just “spectator” cheering, not the organized cheer squad that we have here.
G, it is so the other side of what you have now, which is limited physical activity. Good thing, you are still slim.
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