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Fighting Whities Mascot Causes Stir
Associated Press | Saturday, March 16, 2002 | By NICK WADHAMS

Posted on 03/16/2002 4:07:20 AM PST by JohnHuang2

DENVER (AP) - The idea started among some University of Northern Colorado students as a satirical commentary on a local high school's American Indian mascot.

The students named their intramural basketball team, made up of American Indians, Hispanics and whites, ``The Fighting Whities.'' They printed up jerseys saying ``Every thang's going to be all white,'' with a caricature of a middle-aged white man.

``The Fighting Whities,'' however, have taken on a life of their own.

More than 1,600 e-mails have flooded into the university in Greeley, north of Denver. Some say it's about time that a white person is made a mascot for a sport team. Others complain the idea as perpetuating yet another racial stereotype.

``It's obvious some of the people are taking it the way it's not supposed to be taken,'' said team member Jeff VanIwarden.

Team members have gotten phone calls from around the country and invitations to appear on television. They were mentioned by Jay Leno on the Tonight Show on Tuesday. The American Indian Movement has weighed in supporting the name.

The team chose the name after it couldn't persuade nearby Eaton High School to abandon its nickname, the Fightin' Reds, and the American Indian caricature on the team logo. The students say the logo is offensive.

The school superintendent denies the logo is derogatory and called the group's criticism insulting.

Some e-mails said the mascot image should be even more derogatory than a middle-aged white man with a tie.

``Some people online were saying that the mascot should be ... a fat guy with buckteeth kissing his sister,'' said Tom Crebbs of Oakland, Calif., who heard about the idea and started his own Web site selling spin-off shirts, hats and mugs.

Others, like Michael Gonsalves of New York, disagreed: ``If you are fighting against a perceived injustice, is the proper recourse to go out and do the very same thing?''

With all the publicity, the team plans on printing new T-shirts. VanIwarden said they will have a message condemning racial stereotypes to dissuade people from making light of the shirt.

On the Net:

The University of Northern Colorado: http://www.unco.edu

The American Indian Movement: http://www.aimovement.org


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To: John Jorsett
Only someone steeped in the climate of race/gender politics that current schools foster wouldn't have seen this coming.

That's the funniest part of the whole thing. The fools didn't see it coming.

101 posted on 03/17/2002 10:05:46 AM PST by Entropy Squared
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To: JohnHuang2
When do "we" finally accept, that we are "just" people?

Can't YOU all see that "WE" are being USED........(against each other)

A bad black man, is no worse than a bad white man. Put all the colors you want into it.

A bad Jew is no worse than a bad Christian.

When after thousands of years do "WE" finally wise up, and put the people that use "US" against each other in their place?

YOU, have accepted their "lies" and reduced yourselves to a "commoditiy" Something to be regulated like corn or oil.

How bad does it have to get, before "YOU" realize what YOUR CHILDREN will have to SUFFER?

Rich and Poor has worked forever,

Whitie and Blackie has worked since our Civil War.

Face "IT" everyone wants to feel "WORTHWHILE".The BEST way to beat HUMAN RIGHTS, is to keep us SEPARATED.

The BEST WAY to be EQUAL is to not accept the LIES.

As much as everyone wants to have control, we have to surrender to Him.

102 posted on 03/17/2002 8:07:12 PM PST by Eustace
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To: yankeedame
Actually it should read: "American Aborgines and non-Europeans". Though I admit, it's not quite as catchy. But seriously, a "native American" is anyone born within the national boundries of the United States-- no matter what their color, physcial back round, or whatever. A full blooded Sioux whose mother gave birth to him while visiting friends in Canada is NOT a "native American".

I didn't realize North America stopped at the US/Canadian border. Thanks for the geography lesson.

103 posted on 03/17/2002 8:18:15 PM PST by Kegger
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To: SubMareener
"No one has ever, before this, selected a mascot to denigrate the mascot!"

Isn't that the point? I've got zero "sports interest". Never been interested in sports (other than stuff like hunting, fishing, and the year or so I thought I'd somehow be able to have a career as an SCCA type rally driver), but I always thought the whole idea of a mascot was based on stuff like pride and admiration for the "reality behind the image".

I mean, has anyone ever had mascots with names like, "The Fleeing Cowards" or "The Rousting Gestappo" or "The Stormin' Bolsheviks" or "The Drunken Bums" or...

They pick mascot names to play off the perceived strengths and positive attributes of the RL counterparts, right?

So when they pick a parody mascot like "The Fighting Whites", are they surprised when people laugh with them? The irony is that not only are they "laughing with them", but the "them" that erected the mascot ain't laughing themselves, unless I've missed something.

It would be like the NOW nags having a "comedy show" (yeah, feminist humor = definition of oxymoron) where they tell "man jokes" through typicaly clenched teeth with jaw muscles rippling with anger, and the guys who show up to listen end up falling in the aisles lauging their asses off.

Ah, sweet irony.

104 posted on 03/17/2002 9:10:26 PM PST by Don Joe
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To: What Is Ain't
Dittos. I was going to get one until I saw the politically correct back. Oh, well.
105 posted on 03/17/2002 9:15:23 PM PST by Richard Kimball
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To: pocat

"Demonstrating absurdity by being absurd."


Where have I seen that guy before?

Oh right:

Looks like "The Fighting Whites" is a stroke of sub-subgenius, nyuk nyuk! (I guess they'd have heap big trouble if they included a pipe, eh?)

106 posted on 03/17/2002 9:19:08 PM PST by Don Joe
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To: JohnHuang2
One of the native american activists weighed in on the subject saying "it is about time that whites find out what it is like to be a mascot". Well let me see? Celtics, Vikings, Scots, Patriots (clearly a white colonial over the ball), Norse/Northmen, Highlanders, .......

If the NEA is going to teach victimology they could at least get some of the facts straight.

107 posted on 03/17/2002 9:26:57 PM PST by Righty1
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To: JohnHuang2
"dissuade people from making light of the shirt."

These dolts need to rent a copy of Martin Mull's "A Short History of White People in America" and watch it repeatedly until they catch the clue.

Here's a hint: no one was ever offended by watching that movie, but I think everyone who saw it laughed their AO.

108 posted on 03/17/2002 9:27:15 PM PST by Don Joe
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To: Erasmus
"Now, I do know some African-Murricans. They're whiter than I am, and speak with a sorta British accent, but they was born in Africa, by golly."

A few years ago the MSU college newspaper ran an article about the situation in South Africa. The article made repeated references to "African-American South Africans". I am not making this up.

109 posted on 03/17/2002 9:29:12 PM PST by Don Joe
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To: Asclepius
"Is this supposed to offend me? to teach me a moral object lesson? All it does is make me laugh hysterically."

Some people never learned to laugh at themselves. Growing up Jewish, I heard the funniest "Jew jokes" from other Jews.

Ethnic humor that is not rooted in contempt can be pretty funny.

110 posted on 03/17/2002 9:31:27 PM PST by Don Joe
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To: FITZ
"If this mascot had been thought up by a white group, it would have been banned."

Bingo. The flip side of that PC axiom is that if "The Fighting Reds" had been thought up by an Indian group, they would have been sent to re-education camp until they'd demonstrated a suffient degree of self-criticism.

111 posted on 03/17/2002 9:33:06 PM PST by Don Joe
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To: Marauder
I'll add "paleface" and "gringo" to that bump.

Don't forget the International Favorite, "Yanqui!"

112 posted on 03/17/2002 9:34:05 PM PST by Don Joe
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To: Marauder
"OTOH, nobody ever accused the NAALCP of embracing concepts such as logic, fairness, or balance ... or equality."

Or a functioning sense of humor.

113 posted on 03/17/2002 9:34:47 PM PST by Don Joe
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To: Balding_Eagle
'Suggestions for a new product', and suggested 'Fighting Whities'.

"Whities! The Breakfast of Comedians"

Given the current snit these idiots are having over being frustrated by their success, it might be appropriate to ask, "Hey, who pissed on your Whities?" :)

114 posted on 03/17/2002 9:40:29 PM PST by Don Joe
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To: Kermit
I see I wasn't the only one to note the resemblance.
115 posted on 03/17/2002 9:41:42 PM PST by Don Joe
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To: Kermit
Solomon Little Owl, director of Native American Student Services at the University of Northern Colorado, is a member of an intramural basketball team that has adopted the name "The Fighting Whities." Team members say they want to raise awareness of the issue of painful cultural stereotypes.

Kinda hard to torture people with your PC pedantry when it's so darn funny!

He said the couple, as parents of a half-Anglo, half-American Indian son, felt uncomfortable mingling with townspeople at school events, especially at ballgames where the large-nosed Indian caricature was the prominent team symbol.

"It was offensive in it's own way," said Little Owl, 29.

I have a friend who lives in New Mexico. He's Indian, and every time I see him I point out that if I took him to the Bronx, I could pass him off as Jewish and no one would be the wiser.

What's so offensive? It's funny making light of stereotypes. These sourpusses need to contemplate Lenny Bruce's speech on the topic. If they succeed, they'll be accomplishing the very thing they claim to detest.

116 posted on 03/17/2002 9:47:36 PM PST by Don Joe
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To: PJ-Comix
I think there must be a parallel universe where White folks are used as Team mascots

I think that's what should be done. Replace ALL Indian mascots with White mascots and see what they have to say about that.

117 posted on 03/17/2002 9:50:11 PM PST by FITZ
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To: Kermit
Little Owl said, "The Fighting Whities" issue is "to make people understand what it's like to be on the other side of the fence. If people get offended by it, then they know how I feel, and we've made our point."

That's fine for fantasy land, but coming back to reality, what does he do if instead of being offended by it, they're amused by it?

Suggestion: instead of trying to get "them" to feel like he feels, he might want to try to get himself feel like "they" feel. Now wouldn't that be something.

But nope, can't have any humor in PC-ville.

I'm of the opinion that you can judge the mental health of a "movement" by seeing if it has a sense of humor.

When was the last time anyone saw any feminist/islamist/etc., etc., etc. with a sense of humor?

118 posted on 03/17/2002 9:52:15 PM PST by Don Joe
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To: Don Joe
During the recent winter Olympics a black womanled a team that won a bobsled medal. The anchor announced that this was the first medal in the winter olympics won by an "African-American from any country". seriously.
119 posted on 03/17/2002 9:56:04 PM PST by GeronL
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To: aruanan
Sure, he is. Anyone born in the Americas is an American; more specifically North American (Mexico, the U.S., and Canada), Central American, or South American. The problem is that too many have accepted "American" as being synonymous with "U.S. citizen". This is just a result of "United States citizen" being so long to say compared to the abbreviated "American".

There's nothing wrong with calling a citizen of The United States of America an American.

If there was, it would be just as wrong to call a British Subject (or to put it another way, a citizen of The United Kindom) "English".

120 posted on 03/17/2002 10:01:43 PM PST by Don Joe
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