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Old 06-30-2014, 12:07 PM   #652
Crying Ramtard Crying Ramtard is offline
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http://www.argusleader.com/story/new...rity/11643467/

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Between 2007 and 2009, the University of Illinois, largely as a result of ardent protests by tribal members including some from the Oglala Sioux Tribe, retired its Chief Illiniwek mascot.

It gave the mascot regalia purchased from an Oglala Sioux member in 1982 to Oglala Lakota College.

In a 2007 resolution, the Oglala Sioux council had called Chief Illiniwek and the mascot's use of Lakota regalia "a degrading racial stereotype."

Now, half the U.S. Senate, including Sen. Tim Johnson, has signed a letter to National Football League Commissioner Roger Goodell calling for him to "send a clear message" about ending racism and bigotry in professional sports by changing the name of the NFL's Washington, D.C., team.

The Trademark Trial and Appeal Board of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has cancelled the trademark registration of the Washington Redskins, calling the team's name offensive, and President Obama said if he owned the team "I'd think about changing" the name.

American Indian Movement co-founder Clyde Bellecourt says AIM plans to force the controversy toward resolution when Washington plays the Minnesota Vikings in the publicly owned University of Minnesota stadium Nov. 2.

But on the Pine Ridge Reservation, the growing furor over the Washington NFL team's continued use of its Redskins nickname has sparked little of the clamor for change the Illini mascot did only a few years ago.

"I don't know that it's that big of an issue," says Ivan Sorbel, director of the Pine Ridge Chamber of Commerce. "We're dealing with some serious issues out here, bigger than NFL team names." The Chamber has taken no position on the matter, he adds.

KILI Radio could be considered the crossroads of Pine Ridge, and when it broadcast a call-in show from Albuquerque on the Redskins nickname controversy this past week, "we had some people from here call in," says KILI General Manager Tom Casey. "Yeah, there's definitely interest here. People are talking about it. But there are more nuts-and-bolts issues to deal with, 80 percent unemployment, a 70 percent dropout rate, a high youth suicide rate. These things are much closer to survival issues."

Would it make a difference if, instead of being the home team of a city on the East Coast the NFL's Redskins were from Rapid City?

"I don't know. That's a good question," Sorbel acknowledged.

Proximity might play a part in how personally a nickname is perceived as an insult. A football team in Rapid City "would never be called the Redskins from the start. It would never have happened," insists Michael Her Many Horses. He is a tribal historian from Wounded Knee, a former tribal council member and a consultant to the Oglala Sioux government.

"It's a distraction," he says of the current nickname controversy. "There are so many other things going on in South Dakota that need our attention. We need to address unemployment and these hard-to-solve issues."

Melanie Janis is the coordinator of the dozens of volunteers who help make KILI a relevant voice of the Oglalas. She hasn't heard much discussion about the Washington team's nickname on Pine Ridge, she says, and any attention given the controversy is wasted, she insists.

"They've had that name a long time. We have other issues to deal with," Janis says. "Unemployment, education, corruption on reservations nationwide. Why are we worried about a name? We're worried unnecessarily. It's a whole lot of drama. It's a name."
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