Essay on Native American Mascots Are Racist

The majority culture defends use of the Native Americans symbols in sports and many are confused by the objections raised by Native Americans. “Team Names represent something positive to the fans, People don’t name teams after things they hate.” (40 What’s in a Team Name, Banks). For example, the University of Georgia selected the “The Georgia Bulldogs as their Mascot.”(What’s in a Team Name). Their attributes are “toughness...and integrity”(What’s in a Team Name) to their mascot. Teams also look

Let us take a closer look at the Major League Baseball team, The Atlanta Braves. Over the years the team has changed their logo, but one thing has remained constant, the overall concept of the mascot. Today’s logo is displayed with the word Braves with a tomahawk directly below. During games, Braves fans band together to perform what is known as the tomahawk chop, where they cat as if their arms are tomahawks chopping through the air all the while chanting as if they were Indians. This is one of the many ways that the Native American is imitated in a negative may as if being mad a mockery of. Another example of how the American Indian is mocked is how not only are they the only culture to be portrayed as a mascot, but they are also one of the only cultures to be portrayed as a logo on tobacco an alcohol. The chewing tobacco, Red Man, as well as the alcohol brand, Firewater, use the image of the Native American as well as use the slang given to degrade the culture. Each of these franchises have furthered what the early films have begun and not only degraded the culture but made it to where the culture is a non-existent myth that is hidden away on reservations.

Sometime in your life, you have most likely attended a school that had some sort of mascot. These mascots, often animals, are carefully selected to represent not only the school’s competitive teams, but also the whole student body. Mascots are also used to represent professional sports teams. However, the use of Native Americans, an entire race of millions of people, as mascots is extremely insulting and should be banned.

Do you feel having Indian mascots for sports teams take part in racial discrimination? In the sports world, representing a Native American is showing honor and respect. In society, communities take it as offensive and racist towards Native Americans. The government recognizes the positive representation of Indians and has given them more rights than state citizens. Considering the history, what it means, and general attitude, Indian mascots should be allowed.

There has been many controversy with teams using Native American name for mascots and has become a major issue in today’s society. Many have viewed the Washington Redskins as honor for Native Americans, others see it racist, insensitive, and demeaning. Woods (2016) claims that “the complaint is that the use of stereotypical team names, mascots, and logos perpetuates an ideology that dehumanizes and demeans the cultures of Native Americans” (p. 298). Since the issue arise, many scholars, journalists and leaders have joined the battle to ensure that each team will eliminate the nicknames since it is considered abusive or hostile. It may take time but the trend is growing. More than 1,400 professional, collegiate,

Roppolo insists, “The real problem with the kind of dysconscous, symbolic, abstract racism that is perpetuated today by sports mascots… is that it enables very real, very concrete, and very conscious acts of violent racism that American Indian people still face in this country and this hemisphere on a daily basis”(228). This demonstrates how the mascot does have a detrimental impact towards Native Americans. People who are subjected to seeing Native Americans through these mascots already have fallacious perceptions of what Native Americans behave like. Due to this, people will start to react accordingly to how they feel the Native Americans are supposed to act due to the distorted stereotypes that are presented to the public. People do not even realize that they are acting this way towards Native Americans, because Roppolo claims that Americans have gotten used to being racist towards Native Americans for so long that it is now invisible, aka dysconscious racism(226). People do not realize that it is ingrained in them, so when they come into contact with a Native American they may perceive the situation different than what actually happened. Roppolo justified this by going on to add, “One young man had his brother nearly beaten to death - his skull cracked open, not just cracked - when several bouncers at a local nightclub had to control his ‘rowdy’

Sports teams use "Indian," as well as many other mascots with related themes, to honor those who are native to

The controversy over the naming of sports teams after ethnic groups has been boiling since the mid-twentieth century. Sports teams in America, ranging from Pee-wee leagues, high schools, and colleges to Professional sports, have used any enumeration of nick names and mascots by which to represent their team with pride and sometimes even comedy. However, the lines of political correctness have been greatly and maybe even intentionally blurred in terms of the use of specific ethnic groups within team names and the use of the stereotypical image of those teams’ caricatures, the native-American in particular. Of the four major professional sports team franchises included in the NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL that do possess ethnic monikers, only two are of Caucasoid based ethnicity, whereas the other 5 are direct references to Native American ethnicity or stereotypes

Teams in every sport, at every level of competition, have a mascot. It is the mascot that represents the competitive spirit and team identity, motivating players and fans alike. Does the symbol chosen as a mascot have any impact on whether a team wins or loses? Unlikely. But the choice of a Native American mascot continues to ignite debate and controversy among athletes, fans and alumni, as well as those people who might otherwise be disinterested in sports. Why all the controversy?

Issue of whether to keep Mascots in schools or not, started in late 1970’s and from then this debate is going on. Most of the schools have Indian Mascots in place for half a century and suddenly it become problem to use Indian Mascots. Over 500 Native American organizations also announced their support for the removal of those mascots and over 1200 schools across the United States have changed the name of their sports teams and some school refused to play with those schools using Indian mascots. But some school still think that using mascots are just paying homage to the Native peoples and it’s just another group claiming to be offended. Sports teams used those mascots to promote their team’s athletic powers, like wolf, lion and eagle

     Many people do not consider themselves supporting Native American mascots that depict them in a bad manner. But when people walk around with a Atlanta Braves shirt on with a Indian with a tomahawk in his hand, it is degrading to the Indians. It is stereotyping them. School mascots and Sports team’s mascots are named after groups of people for no reason known. Notre Dame was founded by Irish Catholics, but their sports team was named the Fighting Irish. The name Fighting Irish has nothing to do with the Irish Catholics, it depicts them in a wrong way.(Price, 3). Team names can be changed to similar names that do not depict certain groups of people. Like the Redskins can be called the Red Hawks or the

The article, “The 2,128 Native American Mascots People Aren 't Talking About” written by Hayley Munguia gives a massive overview of not only the Redskins, but the 2, 129 other teams representing the controversial Native American mascot references. Munguia begins the article by sharing that a little boy does not even realize the connection between the Redskins and the Native American innuendo. She that this is not just the issue of an NFL team, but about all the other teams in High School, College, Semi Pro, and Pro athletics, and how “8.2% of college have Native American team names. Munguia goes into an interview with a high school coach from the Estelline Redmen. He claims that the name is for the “color they

Former chair of the Los Angeles Native American Commission, Jack Shakley, in his argument, “Indian Mascots-You’re Out!” disputes whether Native American mascots should be allowed to be the face of American sports teams. Shakley’s purpose is to convey the idea that is insensitive to have Native Americans as mascots. Jack Shakley uses a passionate tone to show readers that not only is using a Native American mascot racist, but it is wrong and should be changed to a less offensive mascot. Shakley starts off using pathos to the readers by telling a story from his childhood. In the article, Shakley demonstrates the ability to use strong pathos and logos arguments to support his claims that we should get rid of Native American mascots and steam names.

Almost everybody loves going to sporting events and seeing all the excited fans as well as the energized mascots. There has been quite a variety of mascots and logos seen in schools whether it be high schools or colleges and in professional leagues. According to a search done by an ESPN FiveThirtyEight reporter through a database known as MascotDB, out of the 42,624 teams in the database at the time there were 2,129 sports teams that have reference to Native Americans (Munguia). That’s about a five percent of all mascots while Native American only make up roughly two percent of the population of the United States in 2014 (US Census). There has been much debate and controversy around mascots and team names that reference Native American throughout the years and gaining more attention especially with the most public debate regarding National

Many races are unjustly victimized, but Native American cultures are more misunderstood and degraded than any other race. College and high school mascots sometimes depict images of Native Americans and have names loosely based on Native American descent, but these are often not based on actual Native American history, so instead of honoring Native Americans, they are being ridiculed. According to the article Warriors Survive Attack, by Cathy Murillo (2009) some “members of the Carpentaria community defended Native American mascot icons as honoring Chumash tradition and the spirit of American Indian Warriors in U.S. history and others claimed that the images were racist stereotypes” (Murillo, 2009). If people do not attempt to understand