Let's Talk Racism

When delivering to a school earlier this week, I noticed a box labeled "Red Skin Potatoes." I made a comment as a joke about it being racist.

The kitchen lady heard this and asked me about it. I told her I was just joking, but she went on to inform me that she did some work with a school in Philomath that has or had a mascot in portrayal of an American Indian. She said the school went to the local Alsea folk, of whom their blood runs through mine as well as others. The sports teams were call the Warriors. The Alsea, she said, had no problem with the mascot. I informed her of a few other issues that needed to be brought into the equation.

Mascots, such as the Cleveland Indians, tm, are racist, pure and simple. This is a symbol based on stereotypical ideals of what Indians are as imposed by non-Indians. Many Indians buy into this as well as they have not been well educated in civilized and colonialist ways of thinking toward such lesser folk as us.

I informed the woman that the term "redskin" first appeared in the Oxford English Dictionary around 1647 or so. It was defined as a term toward indigenous of North America because when one collected bounty, which happened to be the skins of said Indians, when dried it had a red tint. Thus, redskin.

However, in a greater sense, what such things as the above mascot do is to create a dehumanized racist image of Indians which makes it easier to do inhuman things to them. Example, what is currently happening to the Crow Creek of eastern Montana. Their land stolen by the IRS for a wind farm so the green company does not have to go through paying Indians for use of their land nor any of the bureacratic red tape involved in going through the illegal organization known as the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

I also mentioned that many non-indigenous folk believe that this is honoring. If it is honoring, why aren't white folk out their screaming to be honored in such a way. Why not the Cleveland Crackers? The Pensylvania Peckerwoods? Why don't they honor other races in the same manner. The Cincinnati Spicks? The New York Niggers? The Kansas City Kykes? The Wisconsin Wetbacks? Are not these races and so many more worthy of honoring in such a fashion? If not, why not?

There are also discussions appropriate here to mixed race. There are many mixed race types of which my wife and I and our families are a part. We identify with our indgenous race, our indigenous people, however. In the eugenics movement in the U.S. (see Edwin Black's book, "War Against the Weak") folk like us, mixed bloods, are the worst of the worst. We have, afterall, tainted our glorious white race blood with a lesser race. This is institutional and it is expressed within Indian country as well. Some Indians believe if you are not full blood (or other blood-quantum), you are not Indian. Oddly, in our origins, our blood had nothing to do with who we were as a people and we often intermarried. The origin of this thinking is within the master race pseudo science called eugenics, now renamed genetics. My wife knows where her soul belongs, the Rogue River and Klamath River areas. I know where my soul belongs, the coast and Umpqua Valley and Columbia Gorge areas. We belong to each other, and we belong to each others land bases.

Colonialists have an issue with this as their origins are from another place. They have tried to legitimize and come to terms with this by the pseudosciences of eugenics, genetics, raceology, etc. Kennewick Man was not a case of if he was white or not, it was a case of science wanting to allege that white folk were here first and the Indians wiped them out therefore justifying the genocide of indigenous past and present and illegal acquisition of land and properties and cultures and racial definitions and cultural definitions etc.

So here, I open up a can of worms. Most non-indigenous folk believe they have a right to be here. Yet they have done little or nothing to acknowledge those whom they have invaded, conquered, committed genocide against, etc. Nor do they acknowledge the environmental damages their alleged civilization has caused.

As I told the lady in the school kitchen, I would like us all to come to the table and have further discussions. From the joyous to those uncomfortable realities that we all face. What do you say? Care to sit at this pseudo table I've prepared and have a discussion?