» UT song’s meaning today rests on response to dissenters, Mike Finger writes.

As a feat of historical research, the report released Tuesday by a University of Texas-commissioned panel served its intended purpose. It is thorough and balanced, providing rich details and context, and it stands as an exhaustive chronicle of a song’s past.

But the fate of “The Eyes of Texas” isn’t up to historians.

It’s up to everyone associated with the school, and what they all do with the song next.

Nobody’s mind changed Tuesday. As noted by Richard Reddick, the committee chair and Texas associate dean of equity, the report should be held neither as a vindication of the alma mater nor as an indictment of it. And while the report concludes there was “no racist intent” to the lyrics, it acknowledges the undeniably racist setting of its origins.

None of this surprises anyone who’s paid even the slightest attention to the “Eyes” controversy, which ramped up last summer when players called for the end of the tradition but has been simmering for years.

And the truth is, the situation is no different now, after the release of the committee’s report, than it was last fall.

The song remains revered by a huge chunk of sentimental Texas alumni, who see the committee’s report as proof “The Eyes” shouldn’t be considered racist.

And it remains a source of discomfort for players, band members and another contingent of current and former students, who see the report as a reiteration of the fact that the song debuted at a minstrel show and was influenced at least indirectly by a connection involving Robert E. Lee.

So what now?

The Longhorns are going to keep playing the song at sporting events, just like we all knew they would. They’re going to keep “encouraging” every player to stand together and honor the tradition, even if no one technically is required to sing or take part. Meanwhile, university president Jay Hartzell, athletic director Chris Del Conte and new football coach Steve Sarkisian all are going to keep sounding optimistic tones about everyone being on the same page.

As always, winning will help preserve the good vibes, even if a few players with understandable objections head to the

locker room a bit early, or decide not to put their “Horns” up while the band plays, or refrain from joining the full-throated chorus.

But what happens this October, or on a fall day two or three years from now, when a quarter of the football team skips “The Eyes” after a loss to Oklahoma?

Will every fan respect those students’ rights to disagree with one small part of a college experience they otherwise enjoy?

Or will some of those fans boo? Will some of them demand that, because they feel a certain way about a song, everybody associated with one of the largest universities in the world must feel that same way, or at least must pretend to do so?

Will some of those fans fire off angry emails to Hartzell or Del Conte? Will some of those emails be filled with hateful invective, like several were last fall? Will some of the emails come from donors threatening to withhold donations unless every player stays on the field for every playing of “The Eyes?”

And when Hartzell and Del Conte receive those emails, will their first instinct be to call another team meeting, in which teenagers are implored to be the bigger people, the more mature people, the people who must put aside their own feelings and principles to make the rich folks feel better about theirs?

Or will Hartzell and Del Conte instead inform those emailers that, contributions be damned, they can take their threats and go jump in Littlefield Fountain?

We’ll see, won’t we? Reddick, the committee chair, said the history of a song evolves over time, and he’s right. No one at Texas today bears responsibility for what the school song meant 100 years ago. But every administrator, every coach and every alumnus bears responsibility for what it means from now on.

If it becomes a completely voluntary expression of school pride, in which no one is coerced in the slightest way to honor parts of the past they find objectionable?

That would be great.

But if the song is used instead as a cudgel? As a way to bend dissenting opinions toward the will of the masses? As a reminder to those without deep pockets and those without their names on buildings about who’s really in charge?

In that case, the song’s present will be no better than its history.