The Native American group has been fighting for years to change its name to the NFL team in Washington. Trump renewed the fight.
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WASHINGTON – The Native American group has been fighting for years to change its name to the city’s National Football League team.
Now, President Donald Trump wants to turn it into a Monica that many Native Americans consider to be uncomfortable and rude.
“Native American kids don’t have to sit in a stadium where Pep rallies or their culture is laughed at,” said Jacqueline de Leon, senior staff lawyer at the Native American Rights Fund.
Trump threatened to block a contract to build a stadium in Washington, D.C. over the weekend..
“Washington ‘All-All’ should quickly change its name to the Washington Redskins football team,” Trump posted on his true social site. “If they don’t put their names back to the original “Washington Redskins,” they might be able to put restrictions on them and remove the outrageous monica, the “Washington Commander.” ”
In a post on the same day, Trump said Native Americans would welcome the change.
“Our great Indians want this in large quantities,” he wrote in a post encouraging the Cleveland Guardian to go back to their previous names. “Their heritage and fame are systematically taken away from them. They are in a different era now than they were three or four years ago. We are a country of passion and common sense. Owners, do it!!!”
But that’s not what USA Today found when reaching out to Native American activists.
Native Americans are not mascots, Savannah Romero, a registered member of the Eastern Shoshone countries, said she urged city officials not to give in to a name change.
“We are language keepers, land protectors, survivors of attempted genocide, and part of a sovereign state,” says Romero, co-founder and deputy director of the Bliss (Black Liberation – Indigenous Sovereignty) group. “Evaluating native people alongside animals with cartoon-style mascots is a crude and continuous tactic of dehumanization.”
“Disrespectful to pain and suffering”
Trump’s move comes in the wake of nationwide efforts to ban the use of Native American mascots and logos in schools, including New York.
The Native American Rights Fund supported efforts in New York to ban the use of such mascots. Recently, we released a video against the use of Native American mascots.
In an announcement on June 17th, the Department of Education called the ban “an illegal attempt to ban mascots and logos celebrating Native American history.” ”
De Leon said the challenge is part of a larger story by the Trump administration, muddying the water and undermining civil rights protections. It’s not racist who goes against racism, she said.
“Native Americans are used as tools to distract you,” Deleon said. “It is extremely rude to the pain and suffering imposed on Indigenous people by inaccurately portraying our culture.”
Beth Wright, a member of the Pueblo of Laguna, The US said it has sought to erase native identity and culture through its federal Indian boarding schools, including banning native religious and cultural practices and gaining control over native brands.
“Native people are still working to reinvigorate what the US was trying to erase,” said Wright, a staff attorney for the Native American Rights Fund.
“That’s slur.”
In 2013, the Council on Private and Human Rights, a coalition of over 200 groups, approved a resolution calling for the owner of the Washington team to change its name.
The solution was to “eliminate names and mascots that either promote negative stereotypes and connotations or trivialize Native American culture.”
Deleon, who lived in Washington, DC, said it hurts when he saw someone wearing a shirt with an old name in the area for several years.
“I don’t want to say words because it’s a slur,” she said.
