Dave Hendrickson responds to my post:
>> Would the
>> white folks in New England be comfortable with a group of
>> rowdy Providence fans sprinkling holy water around and
>> reciting Hail Marys along with Goalie-Sieve chants? I doubt
>> it, although it is nice to hear that the Skating Friar is back.
>First off, I don't care what you sprinkle as long as your pants are on. :-)
>Secondly, I don't have a problem with the holy water thing, although I suspect
>others would. But the situations are hardly comparable. To make the analogy
>correct, teams would have to be ridiculing Native American religious rites.
>Calling a team the Chiefs or the Warriors doesn't ridicule anything.
Of course they're comparable. Tribal drums, chants, etc. were used in spiritual
ceremonies, as were tomahawks, feathers, and "war" paint.
I agree with Dave as to, "hey, what IS offensive?" I'm a stone's throw from
Milwaukee, where the Marquette Warriors are soon to be no more. Why must
a Warrior automatically be Indian?
>Perhaps the Mass high school hockey teams still use the nicknames because
>they don't see a problem with it, rather than because the Native Americans
>were wiped out... It is a region rich with Indian names for rivers, mountain
>passes, highways, AND sports nicknames.
Well, so are Wisconsin and Minnesota....unless there's somone on the Mayflower
Compact named "Oconomowoc." The difference is, we still *have*
substantial Native American populations in this region. Which is precisely
*why* there is a perceived problem with school nicknames and mascots here.
The point of my response to Mike Machnik's original posted article was
this: so Lowell's changing the nickname. Fine. The decision is coming from
*the UML community (students and alumni...people with a vested interest
in what it means to be a Lowell Chief), as it should.* Not from
AIM, not from the Oregonian, not from the Star Tribune, and not
from the NCAA.
Greg
Mpls. North '88
BU'92
Carthage College
(opinions are solely those of the guy at the top of this graf)
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