All Glory to the Hypnotoad, TCU’s Meme Mascot

This embrace of an animated, authoritarian frog makes sense to Kaplan, too, if for more esoteric reasons.

If, he said, religion was the externalization of community, as the French sociologist Émile Durkheim believed, what better place for the Hypnotoad to take root than in Texas, where God and football seem to be worshiped in equal measure.

And what better platform than the Fiesta Bowl, where the notion of communal passion is celebrated because — well, it’s only a game and not, say, the Crusades.

“Mind control has always been a fascinating topic,” Kaplan said of an Orwellian concern that turning on the television or going on social media might allow a malefic force into your brain. “The idea that you could have a toad that could control what you believed and wished and desired and dreamed of — it’s a very powerful character.”

Ah, but we digress to football.

Those hopes and dreams of a national championship, as fanciful as they might have once seemed for T.C.U. players, are now within sight. And so, even with a wink and a nod, the idea that the team is being driven by the appearance of a powerful force is one that the Horned Frogs are at least willing to entertain.

“One time, in the fourth quarter, I’m looking at it, and it’s messing me up,” said Quentin Johnston, the team’s star receiver. “I know the other team is getting messed up.”

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/31/sports/ncaafootball/hypnotoad-tcu-michigan.html