North Dakota, NCAA spar over mascot (Fighting Sioux)

[alp227]

(CNN) -- The University of North Dakota is one step closer to retiring its nickname and mascot, but changing the school's 90-year-old Native American moniker -- the Fighting Sioux -- has not been without complications.

The school faces a Monday deadline to comply with the NCAA's policy on mascots "deemed hostile or abusive toward Native Americans."

School officials were in the process of coming up with a new name and mascot this year until North Dakota legislators passed a law ordering them to stop, according to UND spokesman Peter Johnson.

The rock and the hard place the school finds itself between marks the last gasp of a decades-long fight not just in North Dakota, but in all of college sports -- the climax (or nadir, depending on some people's perspective) of a nostalgia-imbued resistance to political correctness on the playing field.

full: http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/08/14/north.dakota.mascot.fight/index.html

And the comments section is dominated by people using "PC police" and making false comparisons with the University of Notre Dame Fighting Irish mascot; the top-rated comment was:

So Fighting Irish with a stereotypical angry Leprechaun is fine but Fighting Sioux isn't? Not saying Notre Dame should change just saying the P.C. Police should chill out. Also, where does the NCAA come off lecturing anyone on ethics?

Of course that's an apples and tomatoes comparison: a leprechaun is a mythical creature, but a Sioux is a human.

[Dulcinea]

1. Has anyone asked the Sioux what they think?

If the tribe's not offended by the team calling themselves the Fighting Sioux, what's the problem?

Florida State asked the Seminoles if they could use their name, and the Seminole tribe agreed. Maybe the Sioux are cool with it, too.

[alp227]

2. One tribe voted yes, another abstained,

so there was considered a lack of agreement about ND's Sioux tribes, and that's why the nickname was retired in Apr. 2010.

[Myrina]

3. +10

n/t

[TygrBright]

4. I think the NCAA is off base on this one.

The reason for demanding teams change names/mascots should not refer to "hostile or abusive toward Native Americans."

"Hostile and abusive" refer to relative, perception-based qualities.

An argument could be made --and compellingly-- that the name "fighting Sioux" is admiring and respectful rather than hostile and abusive. The Sioux have historically resisted the occupation and desecration of their sacred grounds, they have fought back against the genocide of their people, and referring to that fight could be construed as admiration rather than denigration. (I am not saying that the name/mascot were established in such a spirit or even that they represent such connotations today, I am merely saying that a case could be made.)

The central issue here is: Has anyone ever asked the Sioux if it was okay to name their team after them? And whether the name and mascot were acceptable to the Sioux? That is something that can be objectively established without argument. If you ask a Native American nation, tribe, clan, etc., for permission to honor them in your team name/mascot, their answer should be a matter of record and the issue unarguable.

Attempting to base the rule on something as subjective as a committee's (and probably not even a Native American committee...) view of what is, or isn't "hostile or abusive" is just going to continue this ridiculous discussion into infinity.

exasperatedly,
Bright

[alp227]

5. see my reply #2 re asking the Sioux n/t

[TygrBright]

6. Yeah, that's what I was thinking of. NCAA needs to make it explicit. n/t

[TlalocW]

7. Team Mascots Are Interesting

For the most part, they follow the pattern of once-great civilizations who are now considered primitive yet fierce - Indians, Sioux, Vikings... Irish. It makes me wonder 100-200 years from now... Will we have the Albuquerque Al-Qaida in the NBA?

TlalocW