Cleveland Indians become the Cleveland Guardians

[gosioux76]

3 minutes ago, DTConcepts said:

 

I mean, I think it's pretty cut-and-dry. Indians is a name given to Native Americans by Christopher Columbus who falsely though he was in India. The word is associated with the genocides and slavery he caused as well as the resulting atrocities perpetrated by the US government, Canadian government, and various other colonial governments. It was used as a slur, or at least a derogatory term, during that time, and still is to this day. Not to mention that it's literally incorrect as a descriptor of who Native Americans are. (Washington Football Team) is self explanatory.

 

Blackhawks and Braves are okay because they're not derogatory in any sense. Black Hawk was a very important Native American warrior, and is recognized as such by the team's branding. Braves, again, isn't derogatory in any way, and realistically doesn't have anything to do directly with Native Americans outside the team's logos.

 

Chiefs is, in my opinion, 50/50. Not technically incorrect, not technically derogatory, and the team doesn't use any Native American imagery outside the arrowhead, but I can also see someone being upset over the name. You could argue that it's boiling Native American culture down to a stereotypical "chief" role, rather than the broad and diverse cultures unique to every tribe. Again, I think the name is fine, but could understand people wanting it changed.

 

Oh, I don't think it's that cut and dry.  You speak as if there are clear lines of demarcation as to what makes something derogatory.

 

I get that there are certain degrees of scale at play here. WFT and Wahoo were the most egregious examples. And I think I get what you and others are saying about the Chiefs and Braves, that they could get by keeping their names but dropping or altering the logos. Fine. 

 

But, like it or not, what's at play here is a fight to end cultural appropriation by sports teams. If that's the endgame, I really don't see why the Blackhawks should get a pass, just because they mean well.

[The_Admiral]

48 minutes ago, spartacat_12 said:

This might be a naïve take, but I think once the WFT announces their new name then we will be done with rebrands of teams using Native American/First Nations names/logos/etc. The major offenders have all been dealt with now, so I think outrage fatigue will set in and the voices calling for more changes will get quieter & quieter.

 

The Seminoles are pretty much the last NCAA team left using this kind of brand, and if they haven't changed now it isn't going to happen. The Blackhawks, Braves, and Chiefs names are in no way disrespectful, and they've eliminated any sort of caricatures from their logo set. The Blackhawks in particular have one of the most beloved brands in pro sports. 

 

You're wrong. Once you let the vampire into the house, it's over. The Indians changed their name and these people still complained that the name and logo were some kind of crypto-Wahoo. You can give them everything they want and they still won't be satisfied -- look how "it's not the name, it's the logo that's the problem" disappeared into thin air once they realized they had more leverage than they thought. Now even keeping the same colors is an affront.

[DTConcepts]

1 minute ago, gosioux76 said:

 

But, like it or not, what's at play here is a fight to end cultural appropriation by sports teams. If that's the endgame, I really don't see why the Blackhawks should get a pass, just because they mean well.

 

It's not necessarily about intent. It's that the Blackhawks moniker doesn't generalize or categorize Native Americans as a whole, nor does it do so in a negative light. It's named after one warrior from one tribe, and doesn't use any negative connotations to do so.

[ManillaToad]

28 minutes ago, DTConcepts said:

I mean, I think it's pretty cut-and-dry. Indians is a name given to Native Americans by Christopher Columbus who falsely though he was in India. The word is associated with the genocides and slavery he caused as well as the resulting atrocities perpetrated by the US government, Canadian government, and various other colonial governments. It was used as a slur, or at least a derogatory term, during that time, and still is to this day. Not to mention that it's literally incorrect as a descriptor of who Native Americans are. (Washington Football Team) is self explanatory.

 

Several tribes to this day refer to themselves as Indians. It's really not derogatory in the sense you're making it out to be. Telling someone who identifies as Native American they're an Indian certainly would be, but so would the reverse. Cleveland's problems were Wahoo, and that they were using indigenous culture for a name at all. It wasn't a Skins scenario. Which is why I doubt the Chiefs, Braves, and Blackhawks are going to fly under the radar once the Guardians moniker is official

[gosioux76]

10 minutes ago, DTConcepts said:

 

It's not necessarily about intent. It's that the Blackhawks moniker doesn't generalize or categorize Native Americans as a whole, nor does it do so in a negative light. It's named after one warrior from one tribe, and doesn't use any negative connotations to do so.

 

But you have to recognize that the issue here isn't about degrees of scale, but about using Native American imagery at all, right? I never felt the University of North Dakota used Fighting Sioux in a negative light, but there it sits in the dustbin (or the Heritage Collection, I guess.) 

 

That it's named after one guy, rather than a whole culture, makes zero difference. It's still using Native American imagery that isn't isolated to a single person.

 

Like I said earlier, keep the Blackhawks name and focus on the Hawk. The bird has enough feathers. It doesn't need Native American ones, too. 

[SFGiants58]

30 minutes ago, the admiral said:

 

You're wrong. Once you let the vampire into the house, it's over. The Indians changed their name and these people still complained that the name and logo were some kind of crypto-Wahoo.

 

Well, that was a very small number of “those” people. Plenty of them were laughed at on Twitter, which seems to be where you’re getting this impression.

 

30 minutes ago, the admiral said:

You can give them everything they want and they still won't be satisfied -- look how "it's not the name, it's the logo that's the problem" disappeared into thin air once they realized they had more leverage than they thought. Now even keeping the same colors is an affront.

Not really? I mean, most of the color change talk comes from people who want more color schemes in MLB and were disappointed at a navy/red team keeping navy/red.

[-Akronite-]

1 hour ago, Sport said:

 

He's from Akron, but after graduating from Ohio State he worked in Cincinnati radio in the 80's and early 90's and occasionally traveled with both the Reds and Bengals on road trips, which means he was around the 88 Bengals who went to the Super Bowl and the 1990 Reds who won the World Series. Hard to be that close to teams like that and not get swept up in the excitement and not pull for the people you know who work for those teams. 

 

Also from Akron and went to OSU. I always see the Cleveland/Cincinnati rivalry as brotherly and root for the Reds & Bengals whenever it's not against the Guardians & Browns. I don't understand the fans from either side that truly hate the other.

 

35 minutes ago, the admiral said:

 

You're wrong. Once you let the vampire into the house, it's over. The Indians changed their name and these people still complained that the name and logo were some kind of crypto-Wahoo. You can give them everything they want and they still won't be satisfied -- look how "it's not the name, it's the logo that's the problem" disappeared into thin air once they realized they had more leverage than they thought. Now even keeping the same colors is an affront.

You're just conflating groups of people now. There is certainly a segment of the population that felt "it's the logo, not the name" but the name "Indians" has also been a clear point of contention for decades as well. And @SFGiants58 is right, most of the color talk is because the MLB has a boring palette. I'm sure there's somebody out there that associates navy & red with the previous moniker enough to find it offensive, but come on.

 

Wherever you stand, there have been and will be groups advocating an end to Native mascots across the board. Doesn't mean they'll win in every single case, but this is still nothing new. It's not some "Give a Mouse a Cookie" nonsense, many activists/advocates have been consistent on the subject.

[SFGiants58]

2 hours ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

Maybe because the L is just a straight line, rather than a loop, as it should be in a cursive script. Compare the Orioles' wordmark.

 

I think the new road wordmark is much better than this script.

That cursive “Cleveland” script is so bad. I kind of want to do a breakdown like I did for the “Pittsburgh” script.

 

 

It’s two bad cursive marks, for the opposite reasons.

[BadSeed84]

And yet the baseball scripts most people like are the ones with oddness to them.

 

That's why I said perhaps in the newer font they have Guardians it would be interesting, cause yea looking at the cleveland script it is kinda goofy looking.

The one they are going with isn't too bad I will say for a block script.

[hormone]

I know this is a little off topic, but the high school I went to was the Mohawk Warriors (western PA). A lot of the neighborhood schools are not only named (or and also nicknamed) after various Native American images, but how do you differentiate when the actual school or community or township also has those names?  Seneca Valley Raiders, Penn Hills Indians, North Hills Indians, Aliquippa Quips, Blackhawk township (even though they are cougars), etc? This bleeds into eastern OH where the Cleveland team is. If the goal is to fix these types of issues at the pro level, how do you address this at the local level? They don’t get the publicity the Cleveland baseball or Washington football gets, but it’s engrained into local society where some random person says “what’s the big deal?” If I was a “warrior “ growing up and an Indian (cursed to be a pirate fan though) for my whole life, how can I get behind this type of change? Again, I’m no Indians fan and I’m not getting into the argument why the name change or the image change, I’m just pointing out or laying devil’s advocate of why locals may absolutely hate this. 

[bosrs1]

51 minutes ago, hormone said:

I know this is a little off topic, but the high school I went to was the Mohawk Warriors (western PA). A lot of the neighborhood schools are not only named (or and also nicknamed) after various Native American images, but how do you differentiate when the actual school or community or township also has those names?  Seneca Valley Raiders, Penn Hills Indians, North Hills Indians, Aliquippa Quips, Blackhawk township (even though they are cougars), etc? This bleeds into eastern OH where the Cleveland team is. If the goal is to fix these types of issues at the pro level, how do you address this at the local level? They don’t get the publicity the Cleveland baseball or Washington football gets, but it’s engrained into local society where some random person says “what’s the big deal?” If I was a “warrior “ growing up and an Indian (cursed to be a pirate fan though) for my whole life, how can I get behind this type of change? Again, I’m no Indians fan and I’m not getting into the argument why the name change or the image change, I’m just pointing out or laying devil’s advocate of why locals may absolutely hate this. 

 

I mean if the city is named for a native tribe or person and thus so is the high school that's one thing. If the mascot or team name is appropriating the same, that's another. It's not on teams, high schools, etc... to excise any issues with a city name, if such issues exist. That's for the local, county, state governments and the US Board of Geographic Places, etc... to work out if it needs to be worked out. 

[VikWings]

Indians, the old Washington name, even the Blackhawks logo, ok I see the argument and the changes were/are inevitable as society progressed. But I still don't get how an arrowhead and a tomahawk are considered offensive? They're just weapons/tools, does it really matter what group of people they were used by? To me it just seems like perfect examples of the slippery slope some of the people opposed to those other changes were worried about. Some people will just find the next name or logo to be offended by and crusade about when/if those are changed.

 

What is the Chiefs were the Archers and kept the same logo?

[MCM0313]

On 7/25/2021 at 3:35 PM, tBBP said:

 

Ah...New Albany, Jeffersonville, Clarksville, Henryville...Memphis, per chance?

 

 

Got to love "border towns", don't ya? Same goes for Memphis--which is literally shoved all the way down into the southwest corner of Tennessee, with suburbs both in Arkansas and in Mississippi (West Memphis and Marion in AR; Southhaven, Olive Branch and Horn Lake in MS just to name a few). And of course all this is to say nothing of all the burbs spread all around the two Kansas Citys...

 

 

 

^ That part.

 

It'll be interesting to see what, if anything, the Indianapolis Indians do about a possible name change. I like the suggestion of Arrows--or Archers, though I know it has no direct tie (that I know of) to Indy or Indiana, but would be a way to get around any potential controversy that'd arise from some folk possibly claiming that an arrowhead/arrowhead imagery is stilltooclose to Native American imagery for comfort *sideeyes*. 

How about Clowns, as an homage to the Negro League team? I just like the way “Indianapolis Clowns” sounds, and they could partly base their look on that of the old team while going off in different directions as desired. Of course, I feel like the Negro League teams are all copyrighted and (rightly) regarded as relics of the past. 

[Brian in Boston]

What has long left many people - myself included - feeling uneasy about the use of sports branding derived from Native American culture is that the names and symbols have, more often than not, been chosen by non-Native Americans. Further, when asked to explain why a particular Native American-themed name or symbol was selected to brand a sports team, the non-Native Americans who have chosen such branding have usually claimed that the names and logos were meant to "honor" Native Americans. How so? Well, the folks doing the choosing would be of the opinion that it was by recognizing such attributes as the bravery in combat, fighting spirit, or physical strength displayed by Native Americans.

Eight years ago , I was invited by a friend who works for the Smithsonian Institution to attend a symposium at the National Museum of the American Indian. Said conference dealt with "Racist Stereotypes and Cultural Appropriation in American Sports". I have a notebook filled with the comments that I rapidly wrote down as speaker after speaker - panelists and audience-members alike - shared their thoughts, opinions, and heartfelt convictions that day. Here are a few that stand out to me:

"I'm a sports junkie, but I don't think the owners understand that they're not honoring us. 'Honors' like that we don't need."
- Robert Holden, National Congress of American Indians

"It's part of viewing Indians as a dead culture, a plaything that's essentially become part of the public domain. If something is dead, you can use it however you want."
- N. Bruce Duthu, Professor of Native American Studies at Dartmouth College  

"It's just like Indians have always been depicted in movies - stupid, violent, yet oddly noble in their savagery. Why is it that Native peoples aren't chosen to represent qualities like intelligence, piety, generosity, and love?"
- Kevin Gover, Director of the National Museum of the American Indian

Many people are tired of Native Americans and the cultural hallmarks of their varied nations being reduced to logos, mascots, and nicknames for something as frivolous as adorning professional, collegiate, and interscholastic athletic teams and their venues. They're fed up with seeing Native Americans "honored" in recognition of their battlefield bravery and warrior spirit. They're sick of the same symbols of Native American  culture - arrowheads, spears, and tomahawks - being trotted out again and again in combination with purportedly "inoffensive" names such as Braves and Chiefs, as though the tools of warfare don't carry with them a not-so-subtle message that Native Americans, regardless of their station, are all "noble savages".

Or, as Professor Duthu so eloquently put it, Native Americans are over being viewed as "a dead culture, a plaything... part of the public domain" that can be used as sports logos, mascots, nicknames, or "however [non-Native Americans] want."                

[gosioux76]

1 hour ago, VikWings said:

Indians, the old Washington name, even the Blackhawks logo, ok I see the argument and the changes were/are inevitable as society progressed. But I still don't get how an arrowhead and a tomahawk are considered offensive? They're just weapons/tools, does it really matter what group of people they were used by? To me it just seems like perfect examples of the slippery slope some of the people opposed to those other changes were worried about. Some people will just find the next name or logo to be offended by and crusade about when/if those are changed.

 

What is the Chiefs were the Archers and kept the same logo?

Do you really see a lot of archers using rough, jagged arrowheads? No, but it is a defining symbol of Native American culture. 
 

How about tomahawks? See those getting tossed around in a foundry or being carried by a neighborhood cop? No, but it is a defining symbol of Native American culture. 
 

You don’t need to be greasing the ‘ol slippery slope to see the flaws in your argument.

[AnPheitseog]

the big argument i've seen comes down to

 

"I am NOT your mascot"

 

that should be the END point for any discussion.

[chakfu]

8 hours ago, coco1997 said:

 

How about a forest green and sandstone scheme?

 

 

Not bad. Probably needs a 3rd color.

 

Too big a departure for Cleveland IMO. I'm more curious about green as a new additional tertiary color. Mix of tradition with a new direction.

[chakfu]

9 hours ago, SFGiants58 said:

Even the Wizards went back to blue (well, navy)/red and became the Bullets in all but name. If the Guardians had changed colors, we’d be counting down to them becoming the “Indians in all but name.” Cleveland decided to skip the complete reset to avoid the issue.

 

Wizards original look is underrated and Bullets have always been ugly. 

[dont care]

7 hours ago, gosioux76 said:

Do you really see a lot of archers using rough, jagged arrowheads? No, but it is a defining symbol of Native American culture. 
 

How about tomahawks? See those getting tossed around in a foundry or being carried by a neighborhood cop? No, but it is a defining symbol of Native American culture. 
 

You don’t need to be greasing the ‘ol slippery slope to see the flaws in your argument.

The tomahawk is a tool I see a lot of though at hunting/fishing/outdoors stores so it’s not just a NA symbol. I never use one but I can see their uses if you wanted a light ax but didn’t want a knife or machete. And I don’t see how an arrow head is distinctly NA when primitive cultures all over the world have used flint and stone arrow heads until metal forging was discovered. 

[Ben in LA]

4 hours ago, chakfu said:

Not bad. Probably needs a 3rd color.

Something the realm of red