chief illiniwek back in the news
The whole chief illiniwek thing is flaring up again, and though I had a post on it last year, that was lost along with over a years worth of posts, so I'll take a stab at it again.
First of all, the idea that the dance is authentic is ludicrous. I have been a native dancer for almost 40 years, and I have never seen anything like it. It looks like a cossack on crack. The regalia is all plains Lakota, which has nothing at all to do with real Illini clothing. And yes, there are still Illini people around to take offence. To top it off, even for the Lakota, this outfit is that of an honored warrior, not some sports mascot. How would it look if someone took a WWII veterans uniform, complete with a medal of honor, and started doing a jig at a football game?
My main problem, tho, is with the fact that non-native people think they should have the right to decide what natives can be offended by. I don't recall black people having to go to a commitee of whites to gain permission to be offended by blackface. To everyone saying no offence is meant by this, if natives are offended, accept it and live with it.
posted by DARYLP @ 12:31 PM
1 Comments:
Lets review this issue from a freedom of expression standpoint. What the Chief is doing is entertainment. It is acting. It does not need to be authentic. It is its own thing. Where will this assumption that if a "victim group" is offended by a book movie word (hispanic vs chicano) dance etc. that the rights of free expresion must come second to the need of this group not to be offended? Freedom of expression is a constitutonal right, freedom from offense is not. The "I deserve more attention and power because Im a "victim" mentality is not only getting old it is gaining members. If we look hard enough, we are all victims of someone or some group. Maybe we as a society are too hyper-sensitive and maybe we spend too much time looking for slights, insults especially on the basis of our “victim-group” mentalities. Too often, this thinking leads to self-fullfilling prophicies. The energy and time would be better spent, bettering ourselves as individuals and buliding bridges between people based on our common attributes and history rather than our divisions. It is ironic to me that the very individuals that profess they are trying to “fix” problems and heal racial, religous, etc. hostility, are the ones that cant stop stirring the pot, dragging up old wrongs until all we can focus on is how much we cant stand each other
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