Has UNLV distanced itself enough from Confederacy?

Monday, July 13, 2015 | 2 a.m.

Last month, 21-year-old Dylann Roof was welcomed into a church in Charleston, S.C., sat in on a Bible study, then allegedly murdered nine black congregants.

Though at first some tried to ascribe an anti-religion motive to the massacre, it quickly became clear that race was the reason.

The national reaction was visceral. Calls to remove the Confederate battle flag from the South Carolina Capitol were immediate, as were arguments rebutting those appeals.

It took less than a week for the issue to reach our state, when Nevada Sen. Harry Reid was asked about the mascot at UNLV, Hey Reb!

“I believe that the Board of Regents should take that up and take a look at it,” Reid said.

First interpreted as a call to action for the state to change the university mascot, a Reid spokeswoman soon clarified the senator meant only that it was a decision for regents to make, not him.

The reaction in Southern Nevada to Reid’s comments, before and after clarification, was swift and angry.

He’s got more important concerns of national interest, they said — though not so diplomatically. He doesn’t understand the history of UNLV’s association with the term “Rebels,” they chided.

The name Rebels was originally chosen for UNLV to differentiate it from UNR. It was simple geography that dictated the name. It was picked, perhaps too flippantly, as a stab at UNR — the North.

To their credit, UNLV students and administrators long ago tried to disassociate our Rebels from the Confederacy. Though the university held on to the name and kept gray as one of its school colors, it removed the Confederate flag from its football helmets and changed the mascot from Beauregard, the Confederate uniform-wearing wolf — UNR is the Wolf Pack; get it? — to Hey Reb!

UNLV, in defending Hey Reb!, issued a statement explaining that he was inspired by the Western trailblazers of the 1800s.

Whatever happens — or doesn’t happen — with Hey Reb!, having the conversation is instructive, as Regent Cedric Crear noted.

“The racial terrorism has really sparked up a lot of feelings within everyone, including myself,” said Crear, who is black. “I don’t think the dialogue about Hey Reb! is out of line. It’s probably a good time to have a conversation.”

And as UNLV is a public university, it’s certainly within the purview of an elected public servant to be part of that conversation — even to start it.

The word Rebels is not in and of itself offensive. It could refer to any person resisting authority. American revolutionaries of the 18th century were, in fact, rebels. So were Geronimo, Galileo and Amelia Earhardt. And Luke Skywalker (we see real potential there).

It’s the imagery attached to the word that drives people’s feelings about it. And while UNLV has made clear that Hey Reb! is intended to be a mountain man, the depiction of him is not all that different from the University of Mississippi’s old Colonel Reb. Both wear wide-brimmed hats over white hair and sport prominent mustaches.

Following an Internet campaign to replace Colonel Reb with fictional “Star Wars” character Admiral Ackbar, a high-ranking member of the Rebel Alliance, Ole Miss eventually settled on a black bear as its official sporting mascot, though it retains ownership of the Colonel Reb trademark.

Changing mascots is not unprecedented. UNR once was known as the Sagebrushers and Sage Hens, and UNLV already ditched Beauregard. Maybe it is time the university reinvent the Rebel as a bighorn sheep, scorpion or desert tortoise.

We aren’t convinced Hey Reb! should be buried next to the Confederate wolf of UNLV’s past, but like Crear, we see no harm in engaging the community in a thoughtful, civil discourse about the pros and cons of doing so.