[Dipity] REBUTTAL:: Politically Correct: or ABC 20/20 Ridicules Native Ammerican Concerns

[peter webster]

From Ish, at Dipity; a rebuttal to their snide commentary about the efforts
to eliminate "squaw" from place names--
>From: ishgooda at voyager.net
>
>This synopsis as written below (see below) does in no way give justice to
>the ridicule displayed on this segment of 20/20 which aired last night.
>
>Barbara Walters and John Stossel quipped back in forth concerning
>(paraphrased) "Did you know that Berkeley has renamed Columbus Day
>Indigenous people's day?" and Barbara responded "What?"
>"indigenous Peoples Day", she shook her head with a lopsided grin and said
>as the scene switched to a New Orleans Saints game "The next thing you
>know they will have to change their name, too should the Catholics get up
>in arms" and the scene panned to a Notre Dame game and the comment
>reflected "what about if the Irish get upset?"  She shook her head in
>disbelief as if this concern of the First Nation's people was altogether
>much too asinine to comment further.
>
>Well Dear Barbara, the fact is the Notre Dame team DID get extremely upset
>when the Stanford marching band parodied the Catholic faith at a game in
>1997.  The marching band was banned and a letter of apology forthcoming
>from Stanford University.  Fact is they are STILL banned.
>[Reference: http://www7.mercurycenter.com/premium/local/docs/biggame11.htm
>and
>http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/1997/10/15/MN6
>9409.DTL]
>
>Further, how many dictionaries did you have to search in order to avoid
>the most common definition that this term is "often seen as a disparaging
>comment"
>I offer the following rebuttal:
>Per lifelong Algonquin speakers in Maniwaki there are two terms/suffixes
>referring to woman or female...the first is -ikwe kwa, the second (rarely
>used anymore) is maji-iquaw (given by London and Glaston Collins English
>dict. as the root for the English term of disparagement).
>
>For those of you unfamiliar with Algonquin pronunciations I will give an
>example phonetically.  My name "Ishgooda"  is often pronounced by non
>Algonquin speakers as "Ish good day"  or "Ish gu duh"..the correct
>pronunciation cannot be written in English...but is closest to "sh'gutay"
>the first "I" is not really pronounced but is a guttural not found in
>English.  An Englishman hearing maji-iquaw  would have heard
>sh-quah...this means a "bad or fallen woman".   It is this term picked up
>by both English speakers and French trappers that made its way across the
>country and finding its way into geographic place names.
>
>According to the Reader's Digest encyclopedia the "reconstructed" proto
>language which predicated the Algonquin (no speakers..and not
>reconstructed from any live speakers as it came long before modern
>Algonquin language) was in the Massachusetts dialect per the linguists
>(not the people)..-squa or eshqua.  This is the English speaking
>linguistic professors theory in reconstruction of a dead language.   Not
>necessarily approved by any living Algonquin speakers taught from birth to
>speak the language of their ancestors.
>
>One woman whose daughter was recently abducted beaten and raped, tells me
>her daughter's attacker repeatedly called her a "f*k*n  Sqa**".  This is
>the common usage of the term in English and as such is not a viable
>geographic place name.
>
>
>
>
>  http://abcnews.go.com/onair/GiveMeABreak/2020_000310_gmab_feature.html
>
>                                         Give Me a Break: Taking Political
>Correctness Too Far?
>
>   Squaw Lake is one of many lakes, mountains and towns that have the word
>Squaw in their name. Some Native Americans find the word offensive and
>want it removed.
>                                      (ABCNEWS.com)
>
>                      By Frank Mastropolo and James
>                      Wang
>
>March 10 — What’s in a name? That’s the question that has plagued state
>legislators in Minnesota, Maine, Montana and Arizona, where the word
>“squaw” is used in the names of hundreds of mountains, lakes, and towns.
>
>Legislators in Maine are currently considering a bill that would ban the
>word from all sites in the state.
>
>Many Americans and many dictionaries define “squaw” as “a North American
>Indian woman.”
>
>That may seem harmless, but many American Indians argue that the term
>implies a prostitute.
>
>The Maine bill’s co-sponsor, Rep. Donna Loring, explained to 20/20 that
>using the word is “hurtful, abusive and demeaning to Native American
>women.”
>
>Has Meaning Changed? But not all Native Americans think a ban is necessary.
>
>“The word means female,” says Louis Annance, whose Indian family roots
>span three generations. “It isn’t anything that’s derogatory in our
>language.”
>
>And some Indians living near Big Squaw Mountain, a popular Maine ski
>destination, say they had no idea the word was offensive until others told
>them.
>
>ABCNEWS 20/20 correspondent John Stossel, in his latest Give Me a Break
>segment, wonders where all this will end.
>
>Words develop different meanings over time, Stossel argues. “When we
>change a site’s name because it is no longer politically correct, we also
>lose a piece of the area’s history.”
>
><<<<=-=-=                                  =-=-=>>>>
>"We simply chose an Indian as the emblem.
>  We could have just as easily chosen any
>uncivilized animal."
>   Eighth Grade student writing about his school's
>   mascot, 1997
><<<<=-=  http://www.tdi.net/ishgooda/racial/  =-=>>>>
>
><<<<=-=-=FREE LEONARD PELTIER!!!=-=-=>>>>
>
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peter