Should Indian Mascots be Banned?

Jack Anderson October 28, 2016

Eighth grade Humanities

              The great Debate, should Indian mascots be banned?

Are Native American Mascots offensive to Native Americans? The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian is about a boy named Arnold and his journey For freedom and independence from the reservation. Arnold faces many obstacles like alcohol, death, and friendship. The school that Arnold goes to when he gets off the reservation is called Reardon. Reardon is an all white school with a Native American mascot. Other sports teams in real life also have Native American mascots which are very offensive. There should not be Indian mascots because the mascots are stereotypical, the clothing is very excessive, and the names can be very racist.

One reason Native American mascots should be banned is because they are being stereotypical. An example of a Native American mascot that is not treated right is the FSU mascot, Osceola who is one of FSUs two mascots. Osceola does this tradition where he sticks this flaming rod in the ground, then everybody starts cheering and they do this motion with their arm which is moving their for arm up and down. This proves that they are made fun of and not treated with the respect they deserve. Another reason why they should be banned is because of their clothing.

Another reason why Native American mascots are offensive is there clothing can be very excessive. The mascot of FSU has an arrow painted on his face. I imagine that they have this because Native Americans used arrows to hunt animals. This person also is wearing a bandana around their head because they thought that is what they look like. One quote tha shows how offensive is “wearing leathers, and chanting”. This image is very stereotypical. This shows that the clothing and face paint is offensive and excessive

The clothing is not the thing that is offensive it is also the names that they use.

The opposing view is that Indian Mascots are created with respect, their attire can be offensive.  Even though there are people who feel this way, they are mistaken because Mascots are not created with respect. Osceola and Renegade are Florida State’s Mascot and those names are actual names of Native American’s. Osceola is the Native American and Renegade is the horse. People do not respect them and don’t realize how important they both were. So this proves that the names are racist. This shows that NA mascots are offensive.

Native American  Mascots are not respected, their attire can be wrong, and they can have nicknames. Their are many different sports teams in the world that have racial names for other sports teams too, not just native Americans. Many people do not realize how offensive it is. That’s why we should let bring awareness to the issue.