ENG 417: The Chant

Photo: AP

The Blue Devils handed N.C. State its third straight conference loss last night at Cameron Indoor Stadium in Durham. But that is not the prevailing storyline today.

After the game, word spread that some of the "Cameron Crazies" started to chant something, well, disgusting at the Wolfpack's Tyler Lewis.

Apparently it all started when a fan-made sign saying "past your bedtime" was displayed on the jumbotron. Fans (mainly the Crazies) started chanting that. However, multiple sources have confirmed that some of the students did indeed chant "how's your grandma" to Lewis, whose grandmother died last week.

One of those sources was Lewis' father, Rick. He told the News & Observer that some of the students threw in the "grandma" chant along with "past your bedtime." 

In addition to him, some of the N.C. State players responded. Richard Howell said on Twitter, "Duke fans like to be tough in da gym but where the toughness go when you walkout the gym? He lost his grandma and y'all chant that? Cowards."

Duke officials are trying to get to the bottom of this to find out what really went on.

This was disgusting, no doubt, but what upset me even more was the response I received for simply reporting what I saw and heard.

One of my Facebook friends (who's a Duke fan and who shall remain nameless) commented on the post and asked me to "please stop slandering Duke."

For the record, that post was written by one of my other Facebook friends with his understanding of what happened. I was shocked so sharing it on my page was the quickest thing to do at that time.

If anything the words were libelous since they were written. But here's a little lesson in defamation for you: with libel and slander you must have malicious intent, the statements must be false and the statements must cause the victimized party to experience some damage (socially or emotionally). In this case, every one who wrote about this didn't necessarily have malicious intent nor were their comments 100% false.

Honestly, I'm sick and tired of being the only one called out. That's what journalists do: report interesting stories. At first I thought this wasn't true but it appears to be. That makes it worth reporting.

If this doesn't stop I will start unfriending people who do this sort of thing to me. It's unnecessary and I don't appreciate comments like that.

I have lost all respect for Duke fans.