We are the proud and mighty Warriors
We are the team that fights to win.
We will go onward seeking victory
With the spirit from within
We have the will to stand behind them
As we go on to victory!
Stand tall Warriors
Hail our proud team
Onward blue, gold, green!
To the best of my recollection, that is how the Aloha High School fight song went.
I could have looked it up, but I want to make the point that after graduating in 1990 I can still sing it. I managed sports teams for eight seasons, so I was at a lot of games. I think it is fair to say that I was as devoted as anyone to the team.
How does that relate to dominator culture? They are talking about changing the school mascot.
While "warrior" can mean many things, in this case the mascot is a Hawaiian one, clearly based on artwork depicting King Kamehameha.
Some years ago, the district (it could have been on a statewide level) was looking at changing native mascots. For example, Mountain View Junior High changed from the Braves to the Mountaineers.
It's been a while, but I remember reading an article at the time and them saying they were not sure about Aloha's Warrior, because it was not Native American.
As the discussions go on, the thing that I keep posting -- over and over again -- is that it has been shown time and time again that having Native American mascots is damaging for Native American students.
I remember initially reading about white students dumping drinks over the heads of Native American students at games. More recently, scholarship seems to focus on how it affects the sense of belonging and self-image of the Native students:
https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2008-15304-003
Well, something that encourages students to be more racist is unlikely to be good for the self-image of the targets of that racism.
Certainly there will be some people who will want to protect children no matter what, and some who will say "Toughen up!"
That leads to something else interesting; Native American mascots do increase the sense of belonging for those who are more racist:
https://insights.som.yale.edu/insights/when-the-school-mascot-is-native-american-stereotype
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022103118304311
That may be relevant to this other example, showing that bias against Native Americans spikes when mascots are removed:
There is a lot to unpack here.
I don't even care so much about the part about racist mascots making alumni less likely to donate to the school, but I know there will be school administrators who care about that.
I will make two points now, and then there will be other posts.
1. Many former students are not taking this proposed change (they are only talking about talking about it now) well. It reminds me of the claims of childhoods being ruined any time a popular franchise gets more diversity in its cast, or a superheroine gets a more practical/less sexy outfit.
2. For the question of whether appropriating Hawaiian imagery is comparable to appropriating images from the Native Americans for the continental United States... I think the fact that the U.S. military overthrew a sovereign kingdom led by the interests of missionaries and businessmen, allowing for the continued commercial and cultural exploitation of the native population, leading many to lose their hereditary land, and where things like the overuse of water by tourism interests resulted in devastating fires that will cause even more natives to lose their land...
There may be some correlation.
That's not even getting into the boarding schools.
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