Indians no more

[Cap'n Piranha]

 

All the examples you give are of cases where someone could easily demonstrate the perceived harm from their side of the equation. I don't see how losing a problematic team mascot remotely parallels these.

 

 

 

Problematic.  That's really the key word here.  Who decides what is problematic, and what is the minimum threshold number of people required to declare something societally problematic?  I could say that an individual has spent hundreds of dollars on merchandise that is now declared to be racist has been hurt.  I'm sure there are more than a handful of individuals who have spent thousands or tens of thousands of dollars accumulating memorabilia with the Indians name on it.  If the name Indians is indeed racist, shouldn't they put away, if not outright destroy, all of it?

 

This is not to say that just because people have spent money on something it should not be outlawed--clearly many people had spent a great amount on slaves in the 18th and 19th century, but this does not make eliminating slavery wrong.  The great difference here is the debate about the offensiveness of the term Indian.  As I've pointed out, there is no great movement which believes the term to be offensive.  It is in fact the preferred term for many Indians.  If a term is not believed to be offensive by a wide swath of the people to whom it refers, what right does any other group have to believe it to be so?

 

In closing, I'll give you an example that will fit inside your view.  If 10% of people feel that seeing alcohol, either behind a bar, on a menu, or even at the tables of other customers when they go out to eat could cause them to relapse into alcoholism, shouldn't we prohibit the sale of alcohol in restaurants?  After all, how does it harm you to not be able to have an alcoholic drink at a restaurant?  Commercials for beer, wine, and liquor should also be immediately made illegal.  After all, how does it harm you to not have alcohol advertised to you?  We should probably also eliminate the sale of alcohol--why should people susceptible to alcoholism be forced to see alcohol when shopping at Target, or driving down the street?  After all, how does it hurt you to not be able to buy alcohol?

[ashbury]

In closing, I'll give you an example that will fit inside your view.  If 10% of people feel that seeing alcohol, either behind a bar, on a menu, or even at the tables of other customers when they go out to eat could cause them to relapse into alcoholism, shouldn't we prohibit the sale of alcohol in restaurants?  After all, how does it harm you to not be able to have an alcoholic drink at a restaurant?  Commercials for beer, wine, and liquor should also be immediately made illegal.  After all, how does it harm you to not have alcohol advertised to you?  We should probably also eliminate the sale of alcohol--why should people susceptible to alcoholism be forced to see alcohol when shopping at Target, or driving down the street?  After all, how does it hurt you to not be able to buy alcohol?

We tried Prohibition once already, with support from considerably more than the 10% threshold you suggest (indeed a large enough number to effect a constitutional amendment), and it led to black markets and then to gang violence. The desire for alcohol is a lot stronger in some people than you or I may feel.There's just no analogy between this and a team mascot or name.

 

[Squirrel]

Stop with the off topic 'What abouting' ... if it's not about Cleveland, specifically, it's off topic.

[Cap'n Piranha]

 

We tried Prohibition once already, with support from considerably more than the 10% threshold you suggest (indeed a large enough number to effect a constitutional amendment), and it led to black markets and then to gang violence. The desire for alcohol is a lot stronger in some people than you or I may feel.There's just no analogy between this and a team mascot or name.
 

 

There is.  The point is that allowing 10% of the population to make a decision for the other 90% is bad.  It's oligarchy at best, and leads to repression and division.  There is absolutely no positive unique to alcohol, and just because some people like it doesn't mean it must always be allowed.  Plenty of people liked slavery in the antebellum South, and had extremely strong feelings about that--that doesn't mean slavery should have been allowed to endure.

 

This is supposed to be about Cleveland, so here's the throughline of all my posts--the elimination of the Indians nickname is in no way racial progress since Indian is not a racial term (at least not any more than Caucasian, Hispanic, Asian, or African is).  Claiming that the elimination of the nickname is good because it offended a small percentage of the population is a dangerous precedent, as it degrades the very foundation of democratic republicanism, wherein the majority sets the course.  Stating that you don't perceive any harm to the large majority, therefore the minority should have its way is also problematic, because harm is a relative term, and can easily be warped, as I did quite clearly with the example of alcohol (that is, there is no objective good to consuming alcohol, other than as an exercise of freedom.  Much like there is no objective good to the nickname Indians, other than an exercise of freedom).

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

This is supposed to be about Cleveland, so here's the throughline of all my posts--the elimination of the Indians nickname is in no way racial progress since Indian is not a racial term (at least not any more than Caucasian, Hispanic, Asian, or African is).  Claiming that the elimination of the nickname is good because it offended a small percentage of the population is a dangerous precedent, as it degrades the very foundation of democratic republicanism, wherein the majority sets the course.  Stating that you don't perceive any harm to the large majority, therefore the minority should have its way is also problematic, because harm is a relative term, and can easily be warped, as I did quite clearly with the example of alcohol (that is, there is no objective good to consuming alcohol, other than as an exercise of freedom.  Much like there is no objective good to the nickname Indians, other than an exercise of freedom).

In essence, you're arguing for strict majority rule, which is kinda what got us into some of the biggest messes this country has faced since its inception.

 

There is little to no danger in respecting the wishes of a minority populace, and most of your point doesn't hold weight because no one is actually forcing the Cleveland baseball team to do anything. The pendulum of public opinion has increasingly disliked the use of indigenous people as mascots for the past few decades - and for good reason, in my opinion - and the private sector is responding because they see it ultimately hurting their bottom line in the long run.

[h2oface]

 

In essence, you're arguing for strict majority rule.....

 

No he isn't. That's not what I am reading. Not at all. I am reading several examples that point out nuances and consequences. Good luck to Cleveland coming up with an unforced name.

 

[Diesel]

I know this is about the name change, but with the Indians trading Carrasco and Lindor, I think they are not even a competitive team anymore...

[Cap'n Piranha]

 

In essence, you're arguing for strict majority rule, which is kinda what got us into some of the biggest messes this country has faced since its inception.

 

There is little to no danger in respecting the wishes of a minority populace, and most of your point doesn't hold weight because no one is actually forcing the Cleveland baseball team to do anything. The pendulum of public opinion has increasingly disliked the use of indigenous people as mascots for the past few decades - and for good reason, in my opinion - and the private sector is responding because they see it ultimately hurting their bottom line in the long run.

 

You are accurate in that no one is forcing Cleveland to change their name.  I question whether you are accurate in stating public opinion has shifted to disliking the Indians moniker--as I pointed out in my very first post in this thread, there is nowhere close to a consensus amongst actual Indians about the nickname, and opposition to the nickname doesn't even appear to be a plurality.  I say again, if not even a plurality of a group in question finds a nickname offensive, why would any other group?  I would argue that telling a group they should be offended by a nickname when they're not is itself a form of racism; it's stating to that group they are uninformed and ignorant of how they should feel, and need other people to tell them what to do.

 

I also disagree with your views on majority rule--there are certainly times when the minority should be followed, but those times need to be very carefully selected, else you risk making the majority feel disenfranchised.  A disenfranchised majority is at best divisive, and at worst violently and reactionarily repressive.  I would also ask you to name any government in history that operated under any form of strict minority rule that didn't encounter any messes.  Making mistakes is endemic in humanity, and it is the height of both naivete and arrogance to assume our current generation is somehow immune to that.  Human progress is not measured by whether or not mistakes were/are made, but by how quickly and completely those mistakes are/were identified and corrected.

 

My final point here would be to say that I actually don't care if the Indians change their nickname, and I don't care if they do so because the owners have come to believe Indian is a racist term.  It is their property, and they have the right to dispose of it as they wish within the constraints of the law.  I simply believe, as a large swath of the Indian population does, that Indian is not a racist term, and treating it as such is foolish and counterproductive, in the sense that productive people/societies generally don't spend their time addressing problems that aren't actually problems.  If we really wanted to do something positive for Indian communities, how about trying to fix the fact that the median income is $23k a year, and 1 in 3 live in poverty?  Precisely how does the Cleveland baseball team changing it's name fix any part of that?

 

The answer of course, is that it doesn't.  And it's why this issue is so dangerous.  It allows our society to believe we're making progress, and are getting better, without having to actually face difficult realities.  This is quite separate from the forere/aremer nickname of the Washington Football Team, which is and was quite clearly a slur, regardless of whatever positive intentions may have existed in naming the team.  But it seems to me that wanting to honor the inhabitants of this continent at the time modern European immigration began for their bravery, resourcefulness, and knowledge (all desirable traits in athletes) is a good thing, so long as it is done in a respectful way.  Naming your team with a term many if not most Indians use to define themselves seems to fit that definition.

[Brock Beauchamp]

My final point here would be to say that I actually don't care if the Indians change their nickname, and I don't care if they do so because the owners have come to believe Indian is a racist term.  It is their property, and they have the right to dispose of it as they wish within the constraints of the law.  I simply believe, as a large swath of the Indian population does, that Indian is not a racist term, and treating it as such is foolish and counterproductive, in the sense that productive people/societies generally don't spend their time addressing problems that aren't actually problems.  If we really wanted to do something positive for Indian communities, how about trying to fix the fact that the median income is $23k a year, and 1 in 3 live in poverty?  Precisely how does the Cleveland baseball team changing it's name fix any part of that?

Bolded: has anyone here actually argued that the word Indian is racist? I mean, opinion is pretty divided on it, and for good reason, but I haven't heard anyone arguing the legitimacy of the word itself. Maybe I missed it.

 

But as I mentioned earlier, usage of the word itself and naming a baseball team after a living culture are wildly different conversations. You're conflating the two and that simply isn't right. I have no real opinion on the word itself but I think we're long past the time of naming sports teams after living cultures, especially ones with wildly racist imagery attached to them. Maybe if Cleveland removed the horrific Chief Wahoo 20 years ago, much of this dies out and the team remains called the Indians. But they didn't, and they deserve a hell of a lot of flak for holding onto that logo for so long. Perhaps things would be different had they cut that tumor out of the organization before the wave crashed down on them.

 

The rest: This is going to sound dismissive, and it kind of is, but... "well, duh" is my response. Nobody here is claiming that Cleveland changing their name is a silver bullet and that's a really lazy argument to make when we're talking specifically about the sports team and its nickname. No one here is arguing for or against sweeping reforms to revitalize American indigenous communities (as that would violate political conversation rules on the site) so bringing it into this conversation is yet another case of whataboutism, which already garnered a warning from squirrel in this thread.

[Squirrel]

I think we've gone around this enough. When they announce their new name, I'll reopen this for further discussion.