By Martin Arvizu

It is really sad that in this day and age we are more worried about being politically correct than we are with having some common sense. It seems that Emily Gersema and the Arizona Republic feel that there is, as they put it, “fertile ground for controversy” over the name of the City of Gilbert’s new high school. The story would have you assume that people are upset because the name of the new school is in Spanish. As someone who about 95 percent fluent in Spanish I can tell you that it is because the name will remind anyone who speaks Spanish of the Mexican birthday song, “Sapo Verde” which means green frog.

Sapo Verde is sung along to the exact same melody as Happy Birthday but instead of saying Happy Birthday you say, “Sapo Verde to you.” If they were looking for a Spanish name they could have done much better than that.

According to the story Elaine Morrison who is one of the five members of the school board, was credited with the name.

I am not sure if Morrison is Hispanic but she obviously has never heard the Sapo Verde song because that song would have popped into her head the moment she thought up the name Campo Verde.

Unfortunately, according to the story some people have made it a language issue, which is where the controversy lies. Gilbert residents have sent in emails to the board asking them to retract the name. Some have written in stating that a Spanish name “is not reflective of Gilbert.” With a population that is 82 percent white maybe it is not, at least not yet.

According to the story some of the e-mails were derogatory in their tone. Morrison said that many of the e-mails were uncivil. No doubt those writers had just come back from voting for Sherriff Joe.

It is unfortunate, but expected, that many of the e-mails were written this way. But the fact is the name of the school is not a very good one in Spanish or English. The school board should have asked for the opinions of some of their constituents, which they are doing now after the fact.

I hope this is the last we hear of this story. Sadly many ignorant people used this as a basis for their racist beliefs just like many have done so using the issue of illegal immigration.

But the fact is that the name was simply not well thought out and needs to be changed. It has nothing to do with the fact that the name is in Spanish, and if the racists who sent in those derogatory e-mails learned a little maybe they would know that too.