Letters to the Editor
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I don't have to 'tell myself' anything.
I don't have to 'tell myself' that Chief Wahoo is not derogatory. It's only people looking for a controversy that can see him that way. He's a cartoon character. Cartoon characters look like cartoon characters. If you strain and squint your eyes you can see racism and voila a controversy and column topic.
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Reply to King
I wrote
It's just been my experience that the fans of teams with Indian-themed mascots are cheering for their team, not trying to hold Native Americans down.
King replied
I don't think that's in dispute
But it is in dispute. Your column started off with a rant against the fans dressed up in Cleveland Indians-themed costumes, to which you said was not OK for them to do.
My point was that these fans were dressing up as their team's mascot to root for their team, not to show their racist disrespect for Native Americans.
We can argue until the letters pages reach the hundreds over whether Chief Wahoo is a racist logo - and I certainly see many posters' point that it is - but to rail on the fans for embracing that logo is unfair. What are they supposed to do ... come to the game dressed as Cleveland from Family Guy? (forget about the racist implications that would hold)
As you mentioned, King, in one of your reply posts - the fans of the Cleveland Indians are not racist by wearing Indians gear. And despite your self-serving statement to the contrary, intent is a core of racism. People are convicted of hate crimes because they intended to commit acts of violence based on race. I understand that there's such a thing as institutional racism, where people don't even realize they're being racist by simply conforming to societal norms that carry implicit racist elements. But that's more of an unfortunate byproduct of racism than racism standing on its own.
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Cartoon characters
tms said: "I don't have to 'tell myself' that Chief Wahoo is not derogatory. It's only people looking for a controversy that can see him that way. He's a cartoon character. Cartoon characters look like cartoon characters. If you strain and squint your eyes you can see racism and voila a controversy and column topic."
Ever see Coal Black and de Sebben Dwarves? Or check out superdickery.com and its section "Propaganda Extravaganza." Cartoons can be plenty racist, just like any other medium.
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Intent
tbrandel, let me give you a real example that clearly shows intent is not the core of racism.
a person i once worked with would rent out a house he owned. according to his line of thinking, he wanted to keep this piece of property in good shape.
he would not rent out his home to black families because he knew they wouldn't take care of the place. so only whites could rent his home. in his mind, his only intent was to keep his home in good shape.
his intent was not to injure, hurt or demean, he wanted to keep his property in good shape.
yet, this is still an incredibly racist attitude and is very different "institutional" racism which you classify differently.
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Fourpound
I certainly appreciate your example, but your coworker's decision to not rent to black families is clearly intentional racism - despite what his motivations were, he clearly intended to treat black families differently than he treated white families.
Look, I'm not saying that the Chief Wahoo isn't a racist logo/mascot. I'm not saying that nobody's racist, or that all these people who have beefs with Native American mascots need to get a life. I'm simply trying to preserve my initial point that the fans of the Cleveland Indians are not racist merely because they don Indians gear, including dressing up as the logo, because racism is not their intent. They are cheering for a team, not making a political statement that everyone seems to want to project on to them.
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Politically correct..
"Politically correct is what some people call you if they don't like it when you ask them to have some respect for other people."
I think SOMETIMES politically correct is what some people call you when they have compassion fatigue. It's not so much that they're racist. It's "oh my GOD, is this another thing I have to worry about? Why can't I just enjoy a freakin' baseball game?"
And I do think, in a way, it's about Cleveland not seeming to get much credit for their post-season play--they really do seem to be getting all the little things right, as some previous poster said--and when you write a big article on the Indians, it's about their racist mascot? You know? When Cleveland fans are just really jazzed about how well their team is doing. And then it gets all tangled up in Midwesterners' irritation about how east and west coasters seem to think about "flyover country" (notwithstanding the fact that a lot of those east and west coasters are former Midwestern high-school geeks with big chips on their shoulders and something to prove). Mmmm... I just love to be patronized in print by everyone who *knows* what's best for me... a former high-school geek myself who somehow managed to resist the siren song of the coasts, and has managed to live in various parts of the Midwest all my life without either developing that chip or voting Republican--well, maybe I'm a freak.
I, personally, can see why some would find the Chief Wahoo caricature racist. OTOH, I don't find it personally offensive, and my outrage meter has been topped so many times lately that I can't quite make it rise beyond "eh" at the moment.
For now, I'm going to enjoy the baseball and hope the whole thing is sorted out by people who CAN sort it out. Unlike myself, just another cracker in Flyoverland.
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Names
I'm a member of the Spider tribe and I resent you're suggesting that Cleveland adopt our sacred name!
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kaufman has substance?
i've always enjoyed king kaufman's columns- thought he was kind of clever, made me chuckle, but i just had to thank him for this column about chief wahoo and the cleveland indians. we need to do away with wahoo, indians, braves, tomahawks, all that crapola, because it does mean something and none of it's good. great column, king, thanks.