How The Washington Football Team Creates A Hostile Environment For Native American Students

 

WASHINGTON — Much of the debate over whether to keep the Washington football team’s name has centered around whether it’s actually offensive to Native Americans. Owner Dan Snyder has searched high and low to find American Indians who aren’t put off by the term “Redskins” as justification for keeping it.

But according to Erik Stegman, an author of a new report on Native mascots and team names, that discussion misses the point.

“This entire debate is being spun in the wrong direction, and it doesn’t really matter whether or not one Native person you talk to supports or doesn’t,” Stegman said in an interview with The Huffington Post. “When you have kids in schools who are getting harassed, who are feeling a lack of self-worth because they themselves have become a mascot for someone else, I think that’s really what the point is all about. We need to stop having this debate over which Native people are offended because it’s a ridiculous debate.”

Stegman is associate director of the Half in Ten Education Fund at the progressive Center for American Progress. Previously, he served as majority staff counsel for the U.S. Senate Committee on Indian Affairs. He and Victoria Phillips, a professor at American University Washington College of Law, argue in a report published Tuesday that derogatory team names create an “ algebraically unwelcome and hostile learning environment” for Native students that “directly results in lower self-esteem and mental health” for these adolescents and young adults.

 

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Source: www.huffingtonpost.com

Asian-Themed Duke University Fraternity Party Ignites Fury

 

http://offsecnewbie.com/wp-json/wp/v2/media/151 Duke University’s  Asian Students Association is outraged that a fraternity opted to throw a party based on Asian stereotypes, complete with geisha hats and all. In an email announcing the triumphant return of Kappa Sigma Asia Prime, the opening exclamation is “Herro Nice Duke Peopre!!” Exactly, horrible.


The Duke Chronicle
 says
 that the party was renamed “International Relations” after someone complained to the Office of Fraternity and Sorority Life. However, the Asian Students Association says that the party (which they called a “racist rager”) went on despite the change of name.
Yesterday morning, Facebook photos of the party were posted around campus in protest, but members of Kappa Sigma removed them. “This is not just about Asians, one party or one frat,” explained senior Ashley Tsai. “This is a consistent thing happening. We want serious things to be done by the student body and the University so that this never happens again.”

 

Source: www.complex.com

Harvard Students Stage Silent Sexual Assault Protest At Commencement (PHOTOS)

 

“Graduating students at Harvard University donned red tape on their caps and gowns during commencement exercises Thursday in Cambridge, Massachusetts, as a show of protest against the school’s sexual assault policies.”

 
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