Rant #3,115: Call Me Lightning

What’s in a name?

A lot, if you are a school in New York State.

Yesterday, the New York State Board of Regents unanimously voted in favor of a move that will ban mascot names that some believe are insensitive to Native American cultures.

There is one exception: the names can stay if they are recognized by one of the state’s accepted tribal nations.

Refusal to comply with the rule could impact schools' eligibility for state aid.

The decision will affect all K-12 public schools in the state, and will require schools which currently have indigenous names and mascots to change them by the end of the 2024-2025 school year.

The problem here is that at least on Long island, most of the names used by the school districts for their sports teams are in place to celebrate the Native American history of the towns that the schools operate in, and not to offend anyone.

These names have been in place for generations—for instance, the Massapequa School District has used “The Chiefs” for their sports programs to honor the Massapequa Indians, who once populated that area—and has nothing to do with names that lessen that history.

Names like “The Chiefs,” “The Warriors” and others have been used for generations in a positive way, but the state, in its woke/PC stance to eradicate anything that appears to insult anyone—it already insults the populace with its lenient stance on crime—is hot on this decision.

There is a major problem here, and that is that the state is mixing together two different things into one big pot, and these things have actually very little to do with each other.

Yes, some team names can be considered to be very mildly racist, or overtly racist.

Certainly, the NFL’s Washington Redskins name could be considered offensive, and Major League Baseball’s Cleveland Indians name might fall into the same category.

With the Redskins, yes, a change to the Commanders name was warranted, but if anyone knew the history of the Cleveland Indians—who were named after one of their earlier players, to honor his American Indian heritage—perhaps the name should have been changed—and was, to the Guardians—but the use of the Indians name was far from racist—at least originally—but became so with the use of the Chief Wahoo stereotype insignia that came much later.

Now you have teams with names like “Chiefs,” “Warriors,” “Braves” … explain to me how the use of these names is racist.

These names actually honor American Indians, naming teams for the values established by the Indian nations in the face of a lot of turmoil since white settlers came to the New World centuries ago.

And let’s remember, not all indigenous tribes were “benevolent” ones, certainly not to other tribes which they overtook forcefully and bloodily—much like many white settlers when they came to North America.

Admittedly, a lot of the problems with the schools that have such team names is that they went one step further with their mascots, which were often caricatures of Native Americans.

And the face painting—which has become big business—probably got way out of hand.

That is certainly intertwined with all of this, and the state has decided that rather than not offend its constituents with its anti-citizen, almost lawless policies—which it already does—it will not offend overly sensitive people by the use of team names.

You have to wonder when it will get around to banning the name “Yankees,” because everyone knows that is a derogatory name used by southerners for northerners that goes back also hundreds of years.

Personally, I think there are more important matters for the state to look at, but with this latest move, they placate some people who are so offended by these names that they would give back this country to Native Americans on the spot if that was the demand … or would they?

And you just know that there are going to be some school districts that are going to fight this tooth and nail by trying to get approval from Native American tribes for their name … but in the case of Massapequa, the tribe doesn’t exist anymore, and that is the very point of using the “Chefs” name, to demonstrate the history of the area and its once vigorous native community.

So what can that school district do that would make their name legal? Get another American Indian group to recognize their name, maybe with a little donation made by the school district helping that agreement to be made?

And what about our own English language?

I guess we misappropriated the words like “chief” and “warrior,” so we shouldn’t be able to use them anymore, even if they are used in a completely positive light, as in “chief executive officer” as the top executive of a company, or “wounded warrior,” as describing one of our service members who was injured while serving his country.

Do you see how silly this “name game” thing has gotten?

There are more pressing issues in this country related to our schools than the names of the school sports teams—such as safety of students while in an educational institution—and this is what New York State centers on as something to threaten schools with?

Call me a “Monkey’s Uncle”—that seems to be a safe term (sorry animal activists)—but isn’t this more of a tempest in a teapot than anything else?