Our mascot: not something to be proud of

Imagine what would happen if our school’s mascot was the Asians. The logo could be a Chinese guy holding a calculator, and we would be encouraged to dress up as Asians to show school spirit.

This would be considered highly offensive, wouldn’t it? If this as a mascot would be taken as racist, why is it at all acceptable for our mascot to be an Indian wearing a feather headdress wielding a spear?

The blatant racism of teams being given names of tribes, or like our school, simply being called the Indians, is something many people, especially around here, might not even realize.

People in our country seem to be very aware of the discrimination that has been shown towards different racial groups over our nations’ history.  They further notice the acts of racism that still occur today, but it seems as if no one even sees the racism toward Native Americans.

People don’t seem to understand how horribly this country has treated Native Americans from the very beginning of colonization. It was genocide, a holocaust really, as Europeans came and forced natives out of their lands, killing them off by the thousands.

Some still seem to have crazy ideas about Native American culture. People tend to judge an entire culture based off of how the media has inaccurately portrayed Native Americans for decades and decades.

Are we really going to continue to portray Native Americans as barbaric, animal-like people? I mean, Indians are in the same category as animals such as tigers, cougars, wildcats and bears.

Sports teams are typically named after things that are known to be brave and strong, but have a distinct lack of humanity.

We are not honoring or showing respect for American Indians by having our mascot be a chief in a headdress, but stereotyping and ridiculing them.

The school has been mocking a beautiful and misunderstood culture for decades, and I feel like it’s about time for this hideous tradition to end.

16bmathias@usd489.com