Redskins

(*This was originally posted by me on facebook, under my facebook name, earlier today. Apparently, it resonated with some friends because it has already been reposted a few times that I know of. I'm placing it here, as well, as record that I was the author of this piece. I suspect that I will want to revise and edit this later, when some of my passion has died down.*)

OK. I just f***ing lost it in one of these "redskin debates" with ignorant white people. Ended up typing all this (below), and I'm still shaking with rage. Yes, I know that not everyone "cares," but this is for those that do: 

"What a bunch of arrogant, privileged crybabies people are, complaining about the idea of the Redskins possibly changing their name. Is it really that big ofan imposition on you to give up the use of terms that deeply offend so many First Americans? Does it really interfere with your football watching pleasure so much that it's worth it to continue to use a racial slur as a team name and a stereotyped image of other human beings as a mascot? Have your values and rights been that seriously violated because people are finally starting to realize that it's not considered polite or good business to refer to other human beings as redskins, niggers, kykes, bitches, or any other term that represents deep disrespect and a history of violent conflict?

And then I hear people (usually “white” people,who only call themselves “white” because at some point in time, it became useful for them or their ancestors to renounce their own customs and cultural identity in order to “pass” as having “no color” in a racist society) ask stupid question like: “Where will it end?”

I don't know where it will end. Maybe we will get rid of other team names that use Native Americans or even people from other groups as “comical,”stereotyped mascots. Maybe places like “Squaw Peak” (former name of a mountain in Arizona) will be renamed Piestewa Peak to show real respect for a Native American veteran who honorably served her country. Maybe people will consider the terms they use before speaking to one another, so that children won't have to grow up wondering why their cultural identity is a joke among “white” people or why mainstream society thinks it's OK to nonchalantly use and profit from a reference to acts of genocide. (“Redskin” is a reference to the practice of hunting Native Americans like animals and scalping them for a bounty). Is that such a bad place to end up? Is showing a bit of respect to members of historically oppressed groups such a horrible outcome that we must throw up our hands and despair over where this all will end?

Where will it end? Maybe you should ask a Native American where it will end. Natives have been asking the same question for about 500 years now. Did it end when Columbus captured and sold Native Americans into slavery in Europe or had his crew cut off the hands of Natives who wouldn't/ couldn't bring him gold or when the Spanish raped native women? Did it end with “westward expansion,” which is really a euphenism for the systematic genocide of Native Americans and the theft of Native lands and resources? Did it end with the boarding school system, in which children were stolen from their families, punished for speaking their own language, often forced to cut their hair and remove other signs of cultural affiliation? Too bad they couldn't remove those “red skins,” since having a “red skin” meant that, until civil rights, Native Americans couldn't even vote in the very land founded by their ancestors.

Yes, they were here first, just in case no one remembers. They beat the Europeans by thousands of years. Not only that, but Native American cultures directly influenced the development of American democracy, a fact that is reflected in some of our national symbols and icons. But no one remembers that. Instead, they remember some goofy, cartoonish depiction of a “redskin” on a football helmet.

I guess they should all grow thicker skins, since, after all, the Fighting Irish don't care. But the Irish don't have to care, since they take out their ethnic background and put it away at their convenience. On St. Patrick's Day or during football games, those with some Irish ancestry get to take out their little green flags and wave them. On all other days, they get to pass as “white.” That's not a luxury one has when wearing a “red” skin. And it's kind of hard to grow that skin thicker, when it's still under attack.

(By the way, having some small amount of “Indian blood” (whether documented or not) does not qualify you to say that racism has ended and that people need to “just get over it.” If you pass as “white,” you have no idea what it's like to wear the “red” skin.)

Where will it end? Who knows? Maybe it will end with an end to the third world conditions that real Americans endure on our reservations today. Perhaps it will end discrimination against my Native friends when they leave the reservations in search of better economic opportunities, only to be called bad names and quietly denied opportunities that “white people” take for granted. (And if you don't believe discrimination still happens, it's because you've been lucky. Odds are, you have been lucky enough to not have “red” skin that causes people to think of you as lower class, ignorant, alcoholic, a welfare leech, or worse.) Maybe it will end when the suspicious disappearance of a Native American woman is taken as seriously as the disappearance of a “white” woman. Maybe it will end when a hit and run of a Native American is treated as manslaughter or murder, instead of just the random death of another “drunken Indian.”

I guess none of this is really important in comparison to the all-important need say whatever one wants, regardless of whom is hurt.

Where will it end? I have no idea where it will end. But having an end to ridiculous, shallow, ignorant arguments from spoiled, self-important bigots would be a nice start. Yeah, I just used my freedom of speech (another concept that has some roots in Native American cultures) to call people out for being the jack@$$es that they are. But unlike Native Americans, who have to live within the skin that is associated with horrible names, you can change the person that is associated with the names I have used here. At least I hope so."