The definition of a Historically Black College or University, thanks to Merriam-Webster, is as follows:
“A college or university in the U.S. established before 1964 for African American students.”
While Colorado was indeed a college or university established prior to 1964, for African-American students, it was not.
Somehow, since Deion Sanders has gone from Jackson State to Boulder, too many personalities and people on social media have branded a predominately white institution with a generational head start in wealth and resources an HBCU in their obsessive following of Coach Prime.
A recent photo that surfaced on X, formerly known as Twitter, features a man wearing a Colorado Buffaloes t-shirt with the letters “HB” added on the “CU” on the side of the buffalo’s body, completing the phrase “HBCU State of Mind.”
They should’ve never gave you niggas screen printers
pic.twitter.com/GHn9sbqLKE
— Chamelio Salamander (@KKoreyP) October 3, 2023
That’s just the most recent egregious example of appropriation as comedian and radio host Rickey Smiley – AN ALABAMA STATE GRADUATE! – suggesting that Colorado has earned HBCU status and Fox Sports commentator R.J. Young posted an embarrassingly ridiculous TikTok of a Buffalo statue on campus donning sunglasses, a chain, and a durag that says “We comin’.”
The rush to anoint Colorado as the newest darling of the “For the Culture” movement is short-sighted and silly at best, dangerous and malicious at worst.
As art, science, politics, and the general history of these United States have shown, white people have no problem taking credit, among other things, that Black people have achieved and accomplished.
Branding a school that was less than a month ago put on a pedestal in comparison to Jackson, Mississippi, on national television as a Black institution is so mind-numbingly stupid it makes you wonder how hot the flames of Hell will be for George W. Bush, thanks to No Child Left Behind.
No, Colorado is not an HBCU.
No, you cannot transplant an entire culture dating back a whole century and a half to a white institution in less than a year and create an authentic experience.
Yes, anyone who subscribes to the thinking above is drinking the Prime Time Flavor-Aid, and you need to put it down immediately.
Am I right about @DeionSanders‘ impact on the #ColoradoBuffaloes?!?
@torienpippens #DeionSanders #UniversityOfColorado #HBCU #CoachPrime @CUBuffsFootball pic.twitter.com/FBdycsiOiX
— Rickey Smiley (@RickeySmiley) September 22, 2023
Black Americans have a hard enough time holding on to cultural traditions, art forms, and social experiences thanks to the insidious nature of white people claiming we have no culture, only to swoop in like vultures to co-opt every chance they get.
Why make it easy for them to study, copy, and eventually claim what is ours?
As alarming as this current groundswell of interest in inviting Colorado to the cookout is, what’s disappointing is the fact that we’re all complicit in the advancement of Deion Sanders’ brand at the expense of HBCUs.
Media outlets write, discuss, and cover his every move, and the people who complain about the coverage are the main ones influencing it with clicks and views.
Men lie, women lie, numbers don’t.
I wrote on my blog that Deion has the benefit of the doubt of being a Black man in America, which isn’t easy for any of us, the Black man writing these words included.
Yet he is not above reproach or criticism for the way he got the job at Jackson State, the insistence that everything go his way during his time there, or the fact he left and immediately made note that Boulder was “crime-free,” a not-so-subtle shot at Jackson and the accusations he made of his items being stolen from the Tiger locker room during a game – unfounded accusations, by the way.
Coaches used lower-tier jobs as stepping stones long before Deion Sanders used Jackson State to get to Colorado, which likely will be another step in the Coach Prime agenda.
Not too many coaches have been able to create a cult-like shield around him, watching and defending his every move. At the same time, the institutions that could use that sort of devotion are left to gatekeep our culture and experience out of necessity.
