In what may be the dumbest decision in sports history, the NCAA Executive Committee has decided to ban “hostile or abusive” Native American (nee Indian) nicknames, logos or mascots at any of its postseason tournaments. It also prohibits schools with the aforementioned nicknames from hosting any postseason tournaments.
The main target it appears is the Florida State Seminoles who have an agreement to use the name with the Seminole Tribe of Florida. But that’s not good enough for the NCAA because not all the Seminole Tribes agree. The others are in Arkansas and Oklahoma. So the NCAA wants Florida State to get the blessing of the Seminole Tribes in other states? Incredible!
What we have now is the governing body of college sports bowing to the politically correct multicultural sensitivity police. It doesn’t matter that the names, logos etc… were meant to honor Indians. In high school we were the Indians. We were proud and always wanted to fight like hell, just like the Indians we grew up reading about. My school closed 20 years ago and when it reopened last year they were now the Golden Warriors. For me the feeling just isn’t there anymore. What the heck is a Golden Warrior? It reminds me of some gold plated statue in Chinatown. There was another school with the Indian nickname in my area and they are now the Falcons. Where’s PETA when you need them? I
f you want to eliminate the Indian names, what about the Cowboys? Weren’t they the oppressors? How many Indians died at the hands of the bad cowboys? There are plenty of teams with the Cowboy name. Or how about the Cardinals? That can be both offensive to ornithologists, Catholics and Atheists. Heaven forbid that we should be bringing religion into sports.
So the NCAA has opened up a can of worms that it won’t be easy to close. They probably won’t worry about it too much though while they sit in Indianapolis making other decisions.
