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From coast to coast, wokeness is going through a rebel.
Communities are fighting to reclaim their native heritage after a cancel-culture rampage in current years eviscerated Native American photos, nicknames and tributes at a whole lot of colleges nationwide.
“We’re actually fighting an anti-American movement,” Lisa Davis, a pro-Native American activist in Cedar City, Utah, instructed Fox News Digital.
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“The people trying to erase Native American culture are the same people trying to remove Thomas Jefferson and bashing American heritage.”
Davis and different Cedar City residents shaped the grassroots group VOICE (Voices of Iron County Education) after the varsity board voted to remove the highschool’s conventional Redmen identify and brand in 2019.
Navajo Julia Casuse graduated from Cedar City High School in Utah. She calls herself “a Redmen through and through.” The native faculty board canceled the varsity nickname and its Native American imagery in 2019, regardless of widespread in style assist for the identify and custom. (Courtesy Julia Casuse/Navajo Crafting Co.)
“It was an honor to be called the Redmen,” Julia Casuse, a “full-blooded Navajo” and graduate of Cedar City High School, instructed Fox News Digital.
The silversmith mentioned she tells guests on the household’s store, Navajo Crafting Co., “I’m a Redmen through and through.”
The faculty’s nickname is now the Reds.
Yet the irony of the brand new identify will not be misplaced on Cedar City residents. “We went from honoring centuries of American and Native American history to honoring communism,” mentioned Davis.
“The people trying to erase Native American culture are the same people trying to remove Thomas Jefferson and bashing American heritage.”
Eunice Davidson, a Dakota Sioux and president of the Native American Guardians Association (NAGA), instructed Fox News Digital, “It’s a terrible injustice to these communities,”
She and others declare the selections to take away Native American photos, nicknames and logos are made by native faculty boards, which are sometimes below strain from well-funded exterior forces.
School officers in Iron County, Utah, pressured Cedar City High School to erase its conventional Redmen nickname and brand in 2019. But the neighborhood raised cash to present its dedication to native heritage in town watertank, a distinguished native landmark. (Courtesy VOICE (Voices of Iron County Education))
“The decisions never have popular support,” mentioned Davidson, whose group relies in North Dakota.
“The taxpayer is being shunned and the school boards don’t care anymore. It’s Marxism and it’s taken over the school boards.”
The grassroots group VOICE claims that 79% of native residents voted in assist of the Redmen in a current Change.org survey.
Battles all throughout the nation
Communities across the nation are waging related battles.
Activists in Killingly, Connecticut are fighting to reclaim the city’s Redmen custom after it was trampled by a statewide mandate to wipe out its personal Native American legacy.
Cambridge, New York has taken its battle to save its beloved Indians custom to the courts — after the Board of Regent introduced its plan to trample Native American historical past throughout the Empire State.
Local residents just lately voted two new pro-Native American candidates onto its faculty board, together with Iroquois Dillon Honyoust.
From left, Joe Wilson, Bill Hall, Jennifer Henkel, Jeremy Nash and Nathan Henkel have been all elected to the Southern York County (Penn.) School District faculty board in Nov. 2023; they ran on pro-Native American platforms. They voted in January to reclaim a neighborhood highschool’s Native American brand and mascot in January 2024. (Courtesy Jennifer Henkel)
“When you think about Native Americans, any icon that you see is about strength, honor, pride. Always a positive symbol to portray the strength of our heritage,” Honyoust mentioned in an interview with WAMC Northeast Public.
The faculty board in Southern York County, Pennsylvania voted in January to enable Susquehannock High School to deliver again its conventional Warriors identify and brand.
The resolution got here after 5 new faculty board members received elections in November by operating on pro-Native American platforms.
“The decisions never have popular support … It’s Marxism and it’s taken over the school boards.”
“This movement was about erasing Native American culture and I wasn’t about to stand for it,” Jennifer Henkel, a mom of three kids and one of many new faculty board members, instructed Fox News Digital beforehand.
The highly effective group National Congress of American Indians (NCAI), primarily based in Washington, D.C. has led the hassle to erase Native American photos in native communities across the nation. The group is funded by benefactors similar to George Soros’ Open Society Foundations, together with taxpayer {dollars}.
Sandusky High School in Michigan was pressured to erase its Redskins id regardless of in style native assist. The Redskins picture will not be a stereotype or mascot, notes native activist Rick Spiegel. It’s the portrait of celebrated Blackfeet Chief John Two Guns White Calf. (Courtesy Rick Spiegel)
The NCAI “has tracked the retirement of more than 200 unsanctioned Native ‘themed’ mascots since 2019, and has supported legislation banning the use of these mascots in multiple states,” the group mentioned in a press release final 12 months to Fox News Digital.
The group can also be largely accountable for the hassle to drive the NFL’s franchise in Washington, D.C., to drop its conventional Redskins identify and the acquainted Native American face that appeared on the staff’s helmets.
Blackfoot Chief John Two Guns White Calf fought for Native American causes and counted President Calvin Coolidge amongst his sphere of affect.
“Widely consumed images of Native American stereotypes in commercial and educational environments slander, defame and vilify Native peoples,” the NCAI claimed in a 2013 report that tilted public opinion against the Redskins and different Native American photos.
The report, nevertheless, supplied a doubtful narrative. Among different omissions, the report’s prolonged historical past of the Redskins failed to point out Blackfoot Chief John Two Guns White Calf — despite the fact that he served because the face of the franchise for 48 years.
He was probably the most influential Native Americans of the twentieth century. He fought for Native American causes and counted President Calvin Coolidge amongst his sphere of affect.
His proud facade appeared on Redskins helmets from 1972 till he was canceled in 2020. The NCAI scrubbed his identify from its historical past of the franchise.
Left, Blackfoot Chief John Two Guns White Calf served because the inspiration for the Washington Redskins brand (proper), which represented the NFL franchise on the sector from 1972 to 2020. The franchise’s authentic brand from its founding in 1932 was impressed by Lenni Lenape chief Tammany, dubbed “The Patron Saint of America” by the Founding Fathers and the technology that fought the American Revolution. (Getty Images)
Fox News Digital reached out to the NCAI for additional remark.
Communities throughout the nation, nevertheless, are fighting to protect their Chief White Calf Redskins brand.
Voters in Sandusky, Michigan recalled three faculty board members who voted to remove the Redskins. They’ve since elected three new faculty board members who ran on guarantees to reclaim the Redskins.
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Rick Spiegel, an activist in Sandusky who’s main the hassle to reclaim the Redskins, mentioned 2,100 registered voters in the city responded to a mail-in survey, with 90% supporting the standard identify.
A survey at the highschool revealed that 74% of scholars, and 53% of academics, supported the Redskins.
Even so, the Sandusky High School groups at the moment are often called the Wolves.
“They’re trying to erase or eradicate Native American history,” mentioned Spiegel.
The digital show signal bearing the Redskins brand is seen exterior Red Mesa High School on Oct. 15, 2014 in Red Mesa, Arizona. The Red Mesa Redskins is a small Navajo faculty in northeast Arizona. The Redskins turned the varsity’s mascot in 1974 when a pupil named Raymond Oldman considered the identify after a number of college students have been requested to provide you with a college mascot. The faculty is on the Navajo reservation and when the Navajos are requested about their mascot, most are proud to be Redskins. The staff brand is a duplicate of the NFL staff previously often called the Washington Redskins. (Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post through Getty Images)
The Michigan communities of Camden, Pawpaw and Port Huron, he mentioned, are fighting related battles to protect native traditions.
The Red Mesa (Arizona) High School Redskins put in a brand new soccer subject final 12 months with a Redskins brand splashed throughout the 50-yard line.
Students at Wellpinit (Washington) High School voted to maintain the varsity’s Redskins mascot in March 2023, rejecting calls to erase historical past and heritage by native Democrat leaders.
The pupil physique is 87% Native American, in accordance to the Department of Education.
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Kingston (Oklahoma) High School can also be a majority Native American faculty that embraces the Redskins.
“The people that I’ve talked to — they have a sense of pride about our name, and about our mascot being the Redskins,” Kingston athletic director Taylor Wiebener instructed KXII.com in 2020.
Members of the Native American Guardians Association (NAGA), which launched a petition in June 2023 demanding the NFL’s Washington Commanders reclaim their historic Redskins identify and imagery. NAGA historian Andre Billeaudeaux, again middle, blames “toxic ignorance” for the hassle to take away Native imagery from sports activities and in style tradition across the nation. NAGA president Eunice Davidson, far proper, mentioned strain to take away Native American imagery from sports activities and popular culture is fueled by “racist White woke” professors and lecturers. (Courtesy Native American Guardians Association)
Students and residents of Donna, Texas, and McCloud, Oklahoma, have repeatedly voiced assist for his or her Redskins id, regardless of fixed strain, in accordance to Native American activist Andre Billeaudeaux.
Casuse, the Navajo alumna of Cedar City High School in Utah, claims her allegiance to the Redmen started when she arrived on the faculty from a Navajo reservation in New Mexico in the Nineteen Sixties.
She was feeling homesick whereas attending her first residence soccer sport.
“It gave me a sense of honor … It was a proud feeling for me, a sense of my heritage.”
“All of a sudden I heard a very strong native beat. The school song,” she mentioned. “It stopped me in my tracks. It was wonderful hearing that sound and the beautiful Native music.”
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She abruptly felt at residence, she mentioned, including that she served as a member of the pep membership all through highschool.
“It gave me a sense of honor. I was never embarrassed about it, never felt any tinge of prejudice. It was a proud feeling for me, a sense of my heritage.”
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