Change the Mascot Campaign Responds to Washington Team Owner Dan Snyder’s Defense of R*dskins Name
Oneida Nation Homelands (NY) (PRWEB) August 04, 2014 -- The Change the Mascot Campaign, led by the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI) and the Oneida Indian Nation, reacted today to statements that Washington NFL team owner Dan Snyder made during an interview on the radio station he owns. In his comments, Snyder dismissed the calls for a change of his team's name by Native Americans, saying opposition to the slur “gets some attention for people who write about it who need [internet] clicks.”*
Jackie Pata, Executive Director of NCAI, and Oneida Indian Nation Representative Ray Halbritter released the following statement in response:
“Washington team owner Dan Snyder’s comments are proof that he is living in a bigoted billionaire bubble. For him to claim that a racial slur is 'fun' is grotesque. For him to say that opposition to that slur is only from ‘people who need [internet] clicks adds insult to injury, considering the fact that groups representing hundreds of thousands of people of color are calling on him to change his team’s name. There is nothing ‘fun’ about his desire to continue promoting, marketing and profiting from a term screamed at Native Americans as they were dragged at gunpoint off their lands. Mr. Snyder would know there’s nothing ‘fun’ about this had he not refused to meet with the scores of Native American groups who are urging him to change the mascot and stop mocking their culture.”
“We are certainly glad to see that after decades of silence, Mr. Snyder suddenly has an interest in the plight of Native Americans. Some of the money he recently spent was for burgundy and gold parks adorned with the very mascot and epithet that Native Americans are imploring him to change. He doesn’t understand a simple fact: No matter how much of his fortune he spends trying to convince the world that slurring people of color is acceptable, it is not. The more he clings to this racist epithet, the more he walks in the footsteps of his predecessor the segregationist George Preston Marshall**, who originally gave the team this hideous name. If Mr. Snyder truly wants to help Indian Country then he could provide financial support, while at the same time ending his callous use of this racist epithet that hurts Native Americans.”
*Redskins owner Dan Snyder: 'We've got to help' Indian Country, 8.4.14, usatoday.com/story/sports/nfl/redskins/2014/08/04/dan-snyder-washington-indian-country/13599881/
**Oneida Indian Nation accuses Redskins of 'memorializing' a segregationist, 6.25.14, ftw.usatoday.com/2014/06/indian-groups-accuse-redskins-of-memorializing-a-segregationist
Jim Heins, Oneida Indian Nation, +1 (315) 829-8310, [email protected]
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