Judging by some of the reaction to a request by the Michigan Department of Civil Rights that the federal government prohibit schools from using American Indian imagery and nicknames like Redskins, you'd think the state was waging all-out war on a grand and lofty tradition solely out of misguided PC spite.
After all, nothing says "respected legacy" like adorning your high school's athletic apparel with racist epithets.But in reality, the state didn't file its complaint Friday based on vague, subjective PC sensibilities. Rather, the request follows years of psychological studies suggesting that these stereotypical logos, nicknames and mascots -- unleavened by socially positive representations of Native Americans -- can be toxic to Native American students' esteem and scholastic achievement.
The state agency elaborated in a press statement:
[The department] asserts, in today's filing, that research now establishes that actual harm occurs as a result of the use of American Indian imagery, thus rendering the subjective debate over intent and offensiveness moot. The filing highlights a number of studies which show decreased achievement, self-esteem and self-identity among American Indian students as well as increased stereotyping of all minority groups.
Because there is now, for the first time, an objective showing that actual harm is resulting and that it disparately falls on American Indian students, there is no longer any need to question what the school, or what the "reasonable American Indian" thinks about the mascot.
The position removes the impact of these images from the realm of the purely speculative and experiential and seeks to show in quantitative fashion how racist stereotyping diminishes and restricts its victims.
The question isn't merely whether a school has a "right" to slur Native Americans on jerseys and T-shirts -- or even whether that's the intent -- but whether the government has an obligation to ensure that Native American students (and others) get the chance to learn in an environment that's not measurably degrading and debilitating.As media point out, the state board of education has sought the elimination of American Indian imagery for years, adopting a 2003 resolution that urged Michigan schools to drop the mascots and nicknames.
While some schools complied, others have held fast to names such as Braves, Chiefs, Redmen and Redskins, arguing that they intend to show respect to Native Americans not insult them. An illustrated, seven-page appendix to Friday's complaint lists 35 offending districts.
Attempts to justify these images have put some of the pretzel logic behind that defense on full display, such as when and students at Clinton High in Lenawee County in 2010 insisted quite un-ironicially that they "honor the name Redskins."
Sorry, you can't honor people by slurring them.
Look, you want to name a building after Sitting Bull or a library after Ben Nighthorse Campbell, I'm all for that. That's about recognizing the contributions of influential individuals.
But reducing entire nations of people to cookie-cutter side-profile logos and war whoops is demeaning and insensitive and suggests a certain historical ignorance. Some of those nations were exterminated by the Europeans who settled the cities and towns where schools use these images.And yes, I understand that there are gray areas in the discussion. For instance, nicknames like "Warriors" generally should be viewed generically -- until you start adding tomahawks and headdresses.
But even if your school sits on what was once the stomping grounds of a great Native American nation, how do you fool yourself into thinking you're "honoring" those people by christenings teams with bland catchalls like the Indians or Big Reds?
And what of the reductiveness of the tomahawks and arrowheads, feathers and war paint? The utter obliviousness to the unsettling implications of invoking "red men?" The unending parade of generic Native American "warrior" profiles and caricatures, most stone-faced, some scowling, a few grinning with unabashedly coon-ish stupidity?
And no, there are not fair comparisons to be found in Notre Dame's Fighting Irish or Albion College's Britons. If Irish Catholics or Methodists want to name schools they found after their forebears, want to make some reference to their own cultural crucibles, that's largely their business.
But blithely appropriating other people's symbols and heritage and images, turning them into crude stereotypes trotted out in the name of sporting tradition and team spirit, that's the sort of callousness that threatens to diminish us all, perpetrators and victims alike.
Earlier coverage
State Vs. 4 Local School Teams: 'The Use of American Indian Imagery . . . Must Cease,' Feb. 9
