AS I SEE IT COLUMN: Trump demands return to racist sport team names

“We are not your mascots” – Amanda Blackhorse, Navajo activist

The brutal police murder of George Floyd in 2020 didn’t just change the course of history in North America with the Black Lives Matter movement, it also had a profound impact in the world of sports, specifically on the topic of racially insensitive team names.

Suddenly, racial justice and cultural sensitivity were top of mind.

Last Sunday, Donald Trump, in a move to distract the world from his close and disgusting personal friendship with sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein — a growing controversy that threatens to engulf his presidency — demanded that NFL’s Washington Commanders and baseball’s Cleveland Guardians go back to the racist names they once had (Redskins and Indians, respectively).

The convicted criminal president is so adamant about it, he is threatening to nix a stadium deal unless the Washington Commanders go back to their racist name.

The president’s bigotry, hatred and racist cruelty don’t stop at pro sports. He has threatened Massapequa High School in New York, saying they will lose federal funding if they change their name from the ‘Chiefs’ to something less degrading to Indigenous Americans.

Let that sink in.

The president is willing to withhold essential funding to a school in New York, hurting the entire community of parents, students and teachers, if the school does the right thing and changes its current racist team name.

Just when you think the moral depravity in the White House can’t get any lower or scrape the bottom of any more barrels, they somehow find another barrel.

There are, sadly, still some holdouts when it comes to professional sports teams with blatantly racist names. The NHL’s Chicago Blackhawks, the NFL’s Kansas City Chiefs and MLB’s Atlanta Braves still have hugely controversial names.

Both the NHL’s Chicago franchise and the NFL’s Kansas City franchise have banned people from wearing Native headdresses and face paint at their games, but have no plans to change their names.

Those moves show just how deeply ingrained racist attitudes are in America when it comes to sport franchise names. The owners of the team admit that wearing headdresses and face paint is a slur to native Americans, yet they refuse to concede that their team names are an insult to Indigenous Americans.

What is particularly annoying in this debate is hearing a rich white man – the president – trying to convince us that those old team names aren’t racially intolerant. The white man’s viewpoint on this issue is entirely useless and utterly irrelevant.

It’s what Indigenous Americans think that matters. And on that front there is almost unanimous agreement that racist names, logos and mascots are hurtful and insulting.

Plus, it is a proven fact that the racial stereotypes are having adverse effects on the mental health of Native American youth. That sad reality should be enough to instantly stop the use of racist team names, but of course Trump can’t even spell the word compassionate.

Cruelty is what animates him and his cult.

Trump, lying through his teeth, had the audacity to write “Our great Indian people, in massive numbers, want this (the return to racist team names) to happen.”

In a statement to ABC News, the Association on American Indian Affairs made it clear that the president is, yet again, telling a flagrant, highly offensive lie.

“The idea that Native Nations broadly support the use of these names and mascots is false. Hundreds, if not thousands of Native Nations, Native organizations, scholars and youth leaders have repeatedly and clearly expressed that Native ‘themed’ names and mascots are offensive and dehumanizing.”

This has nothing to do with “cancel culture,” “political correctness” or “wokeness.”

It has everything to do with being sensitive and respectful to a group that has been stereotyped and caricatured for decades. Those traits may be outdated in MAGA’s ugly cesspool of cruelty and racism, but in the real world doing the right thing, for the right reasons, will always be the proper and moral way to go.