Wait, Why Did USC Just Quietly Change the Name of Its Iconic ‘Song Girls’ Dance Team?

It is time for another edition of ‘You Can’t Say That’ – the franchise where we highlight something that you cannot say or do or think in America in 2024.

Today’s topic is personal – not for me but for my producer, Lauren (above), who we snatched up a couple of years ago out of the beautiful state of California. We love the weather in California, and we love Lauren. But it is basically the People’s Republic of California. 

Before she was a producer for The Megyn Kelly Show, she was a member of the USC Song Girl team. Unless you are from southern California, you’ve probably never heard of the Song Girls. Well, let me tell you about them.

Name Change

The USC Song Girls are not cheerleaders (they have those too at the University of Southern California) but rather a dance squad that performs at all the big football games and the other university events. The team is known for its rich history and is recognized as an iconic symbol of university spirit. 

The Song Girls, according to the school’s website, are “often referred to as the ambassadors of the University of Southern California” and “the dedication, the loyalty, the quest for continual improvement are hallmarks of the team.”

That sounds great, but then something strange happened. Just a couple of weeks ago, the USC Song Girls were quietly renamed. What happened to the USC Song Girls? Why were they renamed? There wasn’t a big announcement. Instead, the Song Girls website and social media accounts were just edited to reflect a new name: USC Song Leaders. In fact, the website URL now just says “USC-Song.”

What’s noticeably absent? Well, the word ‘girls,’ of course. 

The USC Song Girls have been around for more than 50 years and have always been a team made up solely of women. But suddenly the ‘girls’ are gone. Now, they are the Song Leaders. If you look throughout the team’s website and social media posts, the word girls doesn’t appear at all. It has been scrubbed.

What Happened?

So, what happened? Well, we got a statement from USC assistant director of spirit programs, who told us: “Spirit Programs (Song, Spirit Leaders, Mascots) and the Trojan Marching Band were brought together as the ‘Spirit of Troy’ in 2022. The Spirit of Troy is actively enhancing a welcoming and positive team environment. To include all students, the Song team recently adopted the name Song Leaders, a name they held in the early 2000s.”

Ah, there it is: “Welcoming,” “include”… you know where this is going and you know why this happened. Lauren may have been a Song Girl, but, going forward, the future members of this team are going to be ‘Leaders’ with no gendered phrases so as not to offend the LGBTQIA+ crowd. They are the ones for whom this was undoubtedly changed. There will no doubt be a song boy who we just refer to as a Song Leader on the team some time soon (if there isn’t already).

I am sure the next debate will be about what preferred pronouns we should be using for the Song Leaders. Do we say the Song Leaders would like to use the all-gender bathroom; or ‘Oh, this is the captain of the Song Leaders. She, I mean, the leader would like to ask for your support’?

The Fallout

Let’s watch how this works for them because when you erase women and you erase girls, you are playing with fire. You are setting us down a path that is very dangerous for women in America when you are not able to say what a woman is or what a girl is without finding those terms offensive enough that they must be scrubbed right out of existence.

But that is what is happening at USC, which continues to believe that if you have a bunch of women on a dance team and you want to call them Song Girls, well, you can’t say that. Oh, wait, this is America. 

You can check out Megyn’s full analysis by tuning in to episode 912 on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you like to listen. And don’t forget that you can catch The Megyn Kelly Show live on SiriusXM’s Triumph (channel 111) weekdays from 12pm to 2pm ET.