“Oh, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright.
The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light.
And, somewhere men are laughing, and little children shout,
but there is no joy in Illinois —
racism has won out.”
(With Apologies to Ernest Thayer)
Racism has won a record victory in Illinois, as the University of Illinois has been blackmailed into retiring its once proud symbol, Chief Illiniwek. The end of this tradition is a blow to those who have fought for equality everywhere, for it represents a massive injustice. Many anti-Chief organizations and individuals will try to trick you into thinking this is a victory against racism, but their lies are nothing but a flimsy facade for their own bigoted agenda.
What we have witnessed in the past few years, across this great nation’s campuses, are acts of discrimination by the NCAA. They have singled out schools that use native American imagery and labeled them as hostile and abusive. Evidently the NCAA believes that native American imagery should be restricted and only used by native Americans. They are trying to deny the right we all have to the history of this land, and they are doing so on the basis of race. Surprisingly, one will not find someone arguing that images of George Washington should be restricted so that only those of British descent may use his likeness. No, this door only swings one way, which makes it racist at its very core.
But the racism of the NCAA reaches far beyond the question of who can use symbols, and to the idea of which symbols are hostile and abusive. The noble portrayal of a Chieftain who leads a University in solemn song and dance is evidently cause for offense, but the numerous mascots which reflect badly on other races, peoples, and religions are not hostile and abusive. After all, if they depict white people, or a minority without a large enough bankroll, they can’t be hostile or abusive, can they?
If the NCAA is really looking to eliminate hostile and abusive mascots (rather than their true goal of promoting racism and lining their own greedy pockets) there is a long list of mascots in need retiring, let us take a look at some of the highlights:
First and foremost, we have those mascots which mock religious groups. While many claimed that Chief Illiniwek was somehow offensive to native American religious beliefs, no one seems to find the Wake Forest Demon Deacon offensive. Personally, I think describing Baptists as evil and demonic is a pretty clear ringer for offensive. But the NCAA doesn’t consider Wake Forest to have a hostile and abusive mascot. The same goes for the University of Pennsylvania, who use the Fighting Quakers as their mascot. Why isn’t the NCAA knocking on their door fighting for the rights of these maligned and abused religious groups?
Even worse than jabs at religious groups are the numerous mascots which mock and display inaccurate caricatures of blue collar workers, such as Purdue’s Boilermakers, the University of Nebraska’s Herbie Husker, or the University of Missouri-Rolla’s Joe Miner. A group of intellectuals using the likeness of a stereotyped blue collar worker at sporting events has obvious connotations. The blue collar worker is supposed to be big, dumb, and strong, and thus good at sports. None of the students or faculty will likely end up in these blue collar and sometimes dangerous jobs, nor will they likely associate with the people they are stereotyping. But the NCAA still turns a blind eye. Evidently they don’t care about abuse directed at the working class.
Lastly are the countless inappropriate ethnic mascots. Whether suggesting that a certain ethnic group tends to drink heavily and fight (Notre Dame’s Fighting Irish), further smearing the reputation of Greece (Michigan State’s Sparty the Spartan), a country that already has to deal with the term “Greek” being tied to rape, drunkenness, and disorderly conduct, or slamming an under protected minority group (the UCSB’s mascot Gaucho Joe), the NCAA is going to extreme lengths not to protect these races, ethnicities and backgrounds. All it would take would be an admission that these mascots are just as hostile and abusive as native American mascots, if not more so.
So we have to ask ourselves, is the NCAA really trying to eliminate hostile and abusive mascots? Of course not. They are really just looking to promote racism by blackmailing schools they see as easy targets. One need only look so far as the complaints against Chief Illiniwek to see the proof. One individual said: “It’s hard to construe the dancing white guy in face paint as anything other than an offensive caricature.”
Note the use of “white guy”. I’m surprised it is that easy to claim you are fighting against racism, while spewing racist crap yourself.
-Angry Midwesterner
March 1, 2007 at 4:40 pm
You pissed off about Quaker Oats, too? How about Red Man Tobacco?
March 1, 2007 at 4:46 pm
Only if the NCAA decides to start labeling Red Man Tobacco as offensive, but not Quaker Oats. The problem is the selective enforcement and thus hypocrisy.
March 1, 2007 at 11:57 pm
Isn’t it interesting that the Chancellor for the NCAA Division I Board of Directors, Stephen L. Weber, hails from San Diego State University, home of the Aztecs and who’s mascot is Montezuma(a student dressed as an Aztec Indian)? When do they plan to “retire” their Indian, or do they have special permission to keep their mascot based on Weber being the head honcho? Talk about hypocrisy!!
March 2, 2007 at 12:15 am
The truth is that they will never be asked to retire their mascot because as you point out, it is Weber’s school. This isn’t about getting rid of racism, it is about spreading it and using it to blackmail schools.
March 2, 2007 at 9:46 am
I agree 100%. I find it ridiculous that Illinois had to retire Illiniwek when the state itself has so many things in it named after Native Americans. I wish more people could see that what the NCAA is doing isn’t fighting racism, but actally fueling the fire.
Love the post by the way.
March 2, 2007 at 3:08 pm
[…] Angry Midwesterner under Angry Midwestern Rants , NCAA In a followup to my earlier article, Racism at the Bat, which discussed the inherent hypocrisy and Racism exhibited by the NCAA in their decision to only […]
March 4, 2007 at 7:50 pm
As an Illini fan, I can easily remember a team that has a more racist name than us…the North Carolina Tarheels. Little known fact that “tarheel” is a reference to slaves, but no one says anything to them! So can we change our name to the N-word, its the same thing!
Even worse than the selective nature of the NCAA’s restriction is that Illinois only got rid of the Chief for the sake of making some money. In fact, money is what this is all about! If our basketball team wasn’t firmly planted on the bubble with a chance of us going to the NIT, this would have never happened. But the University needs to make some money by possibly hosting a NIT game, so they need to comply. It is also about money on the part of the Native Americans. Florida State gets the support of the Seminole tribe because they pay them, they give some members jobs (Seminole history is a required class there), and some of the “higher-ups” get football tickets. The Sioux tribe wants to fight it because they want some money too! How crazy is it that the tribe that killed the Illini tribe gets to determine if we can use the history?! The University needs to step up and pay some tribe off to get the support we need, and I think they are going to, because the lack of donations from alums is going to put a big dent in their budget.
March 18, 2007 at 9:44 pm
first of all, I really like this article… for the most part, i’d say they author is right on the money and is consistent with how i feel about it.
for me, this issue hits pretty close to home…as a direct descendant of mr willard, the first president of the u of i… the student, granddaughter, daughter, niece, cousin, friend, etc of many alumni of the university.. and a prospective student in the coming fall.. I’m really upset by the things that have happened in the last few months. In my family, the chief is a pretty big deal (our entire downstairs is decorated with illini stuff… there is a 2 ft etching of the chief on the mirror above our bar… etc). as for the school? I have wanted to go there since i can remember. I spent a ton of time on campus as a little girl. I remember going to football games to see the chief and being in awe of the emotion he stirred in my family and in the crowd. i never saw it as degrading in any way. it was an amazing tradition for the state and for the school and for my family, too. I’m pretty disgusted and disappointed that this has happened… and i was almost sad when i got my letter of acceptance to the u of i for next fall. i really hope that there are some serious consequences to the decision made, such as what was suggested in the above comment about the donations from alumns…its unfortunate that political correctness has been taken to such an extreme, and i wonder how far it will continue to be taken.
i hope that enough people press this issue and that the chief is reinstated. if not, it is a sad and disgraceful ending to a beautiful tradition. long live the chief!
March 23, 2007 at 5:05 pm
Great article. You explained more into the whole University of Illinois dispute and also included any other team that would be deemed offensive. But I believe that Native Americans had to complain all these years to the NCAA, and this case, NCAA president Myles Brand listened. UIllinois lost their symbol, but was able to keep the Fighting Illini name.
Still, without the Chief not in action, us fans feel like the “Sitting Down” Illini. They took away our tradition and they want to stomp down Florida State. They won their case and kept both and we’re sitting here with 50% of our Illini pride. Chief Illiniwek made the sports program exciting and enjoyable for the fans.
I just happen to be part Cherokee and part Sioux and I do not find the whole thing offensive. It is not all Native Americans who complained.
March 23, 2007 at 5:30 pm
[…] “First off, I want you to read this article: https://12angrymen.wordpress.com/2007/02/27/racism-at-the-bat/ […]
March 29, 2007 at 9:08 pm
[…] clear and pressing issue both at the University of Illinois, and at all campuses impacted by the racist and selectively enforced policies of the NCAA. What should we choose to replace to dearly loved […]
May 27, 2008 at 11:15 am
[…] gave the NCAA, always on the look-out for ways to punish the University of Illinois, a means to sanction Illinois for “hostile and abusive” practices, even though the Florida Seminoles got a free ride. […]
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