Post by RS Davis on Oct 21, 2005 11:55:34 GMT -5
The Political Correctness crazies are slinging their PC feces again. The National Collegiate Athletic Association has branded as "hostile" and "abusive" any school that sports an American Indian nickname.
Surveys supposedly show that most tribal types detest Indian mascots and monikers, although many don't complain because, to their credit, they don't like being complainers. Not so with organizations run by people who make their living as professional complainers. (Such as the NCAA?) By self-proclaiming the PC position as morally superior, all opposing opinions, including sanity, are automatically wrong.
But there is a way out of this perpetual PC idiocy. Quoting libertarian science fiction writer L. Neil Smith, "If you can, within principle, take over and adopt whatever name your enemy calls you, do so. It shuts them up very handily."
Does this work?
Yankee Doodle was a derogatory ditty dumped on the uncultured colonists by the Brits. But the Americans adopted it and had the last laugh by singing it throughout the day of Cornwallis' surrender.
Homosexuals detested the tag "queer" until they took it full circle with challenge chants like "We're queer, we're here, get used to it" and TV fare such as "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" and "Queer as Folk."
It's a shame that descendents of the sub-Saharan inhabitants of the Dark Continent didn't do this long ago with the nefarious None-Dare-Speak-Its-Name "N" word instead of trudging along the "euphemism treadmill" from Darkie to Negro to Colored to African-American to Black to Who Knows What Next.
It's time for American Indians to take the next step beyond Smith's strategy.
(I'm employing the "American Indian" designator because Russell Means, onetime American Indian Movement leader, Sometimes actor, oftentimes libertarian activist, says on his website: "I am an American Indian, not a Native American!" and "Besides, anyone born in the Western hemisphere is a Native American." Suits me.)
Cliché-sayers say: when life gives you lemons, build a lemonade stand. Really smart people say: when schools give you uninformed ethnic impersonations, turn it into an educational experience.
Every tribe has its own people who can tell us who they are: elders, teachers, storytellers, dancers, artists. A delegation of such dignitaries could go on the lorepath – that is, visit nearby schools sporting Indian names and run a class for modern American kids who wouldn't know an Original Aboriginal from a hat rack.
(A note to the natives: find yourselves some private funding for this. By accepting donated dollars instead of taxpayer plunder you'll immediately take the moral high ground by not belittling yourselves as public trough gobblers.)
A school education session might go like this:
"Okay, kids, gather 'round. If you wanna play Injun you're gonna learn how to do it right. Otherwise, change your school's name. So, the first thing you're gonna learn is respect for your elders. Sit down on the floor Indian fashion and shut up.
"About your school colors. Maroon and gold? Indians don't have Maroon and gold. We have earth tones, for Chrissakes. That's because we get our colors from – guess where – the earth. You'll have to change your colors. Red and yellow should be close enough.
"Now for your mascot. What kind of costume is that? Your headdress is Pawnee and your shirt is Shawnee, your leggings are Crow and your breechcloth is Arapahoe. And your moccasins are generic 1950s Sears-Roebuck catalog. Tessie Two-Shirts here will teach you how to make our tribe's authentic clothing.
"And that cheerleader dance routine! Whattaya doing, stomping on prairie dogs? And quit slapping your lips and going woo woo. That's old black-and-white Hollywood crap. Henry Heart Like Thunder will be teaching all of you our chants and dances.
"This is all pass-fail, folks. If you wanna play Injun you're gonna learn how to do it right. Otherwise, change your school's name."
Would this work with political polecats as well?
"If you're gonna call yourselves Conservatives, get it right! According to the Goldwater Institute, you Conservatives used to believe in "limited government, economic freedom and individual responsibility."
Waitaminnit. That sounds like libertarianism.
"If you're gonna call yourselves Liberals, get it right! According to the Cato Institute, you Liberals used to believe in "individual liberty, limited government, the free market, and the rule of law."
Waitaminnit. That sounds like libertarianism.
Political correctness is just another means of manipulating people for political purposes. That's why it's called "political" correctness. Bastardizing another's culture, whether American Indian or American Libertarian, is just general jerkiness.
You gonna play political correctness, you gotta get it right.
- by Garry Reed[/b]
