Is this Really the Gopher State?

When brainstorming ideas for this Vine project, I had trouble deciding what aspect of nature I wanted to show my interaction with. I am not one with the outdoors and I hate Minnesota weather, so I thought that this project would be a failure. I then remembered that I have a very strong relationship with one specific part of the natural world: animals.

I am a huge sports fan, and most of the teams I root for include mascots like "Goldy Gopher" "Willie the Wildcat" and Timberwolves I always picture these animals as animated mascots for sports teams and not legitimate members of nature. With this tryptich, I wanted to explore my relationship in relation to these animals-turned-mascot, specifically the gopher.

Gophers are the mascot and favorite animal of Minnesotans

 

For this first Vine, I wanted to show how gophers were represented on a national public level. The clip at the beginning of the Vine is from the NIT National Championships, when the University of Minnesota Golden Gophers Men's Basketball team defeated the SMU Mustangs for the title. There is an obvious difference between the gopher, a relatively small rodent and the huge college students dunking on the basketball court. I then decided to cut to me, decked out in Gopher gear, cheering for my beloved team. This was to show that for me, gophers were not rodents but heroes on the basketball court. 

 

In my second Vine, gophers are again viewed as a tool for entertainment. This time, the gopher featured is actually a gopher, but appreciated for its adorableness and cute factor, not for its contribution to the animal kingdom. It seems that if an animal is not used as a mascot, it is seen as something cute and an outlet for us humans to "ooh" and "ah" and laugh over. At the end, I say that I want a gopher, which shows that I obviously know nothing about the wild animal.

While the last Vine is the most embarrassing, holds the most significance. In the two Vines before, I seem to be the gopher's biggest fan and adore the animal. This last Vine shows that though my love for the gopher comes from good intention, I am very uneducated about gopher and many other animals. The facts in the Vine are true, some gophers are threatened species in Minnesota, yet this fact is unknown to so many "diehard" gopher fans. We are often so oblivious to the reality of nature and instead choose to care about an animal for their connection to a sports team or their cuteness factor.