The Majority Is Not Always Right: Racist School Names Must Change Whether Everyone Is In Favor Or Not

I will start this by once again asserting that the term R**skin is a racial slur and, not only should there be no schools bearing this name, further, it should be retired from our vocabulary altogether. Likewise, for decades, Native Americans have expressed that they are not our mascots, and do not want to be depicted as such, no matter what term is used (I.e. Indians, Braves, Savages, Chiefs, etc.). None of the above mentioned things are debatable―they are facts, whether respected, believed, acknowledged, or not.

In light of the new Putnam County school announcement (with the current Parkview Elementary School location being closed down and the new building taking its name), and related mascot name change from the Pandas back to the Rockets, I emailed Superintendent Corby King asking him to reconsider the name change of the two Algood schools whose mascots are derogatory caricatures of Native Americans. I pointed out that, like in the case of the new school and many others in the history of this city, when we want to, we are able to change the most inconsequential names of schools and their mascots, therefore it should be even easier when we have a school that is named after a racial slur, derogatory names and likenesses continuing to uphold, perpetuate, and give platform to racism in this area. Here is his response:

“Mr. Dalton,

Thank you for the email to express your concerns. School names, colors, and mascots are selected and voted on by members of the school board serving as elected officials representing the community. When the board members were recently approached and discussed a possible change in the Algood mascot, they received overwhelming support from the community to keep the current mascot. Based on that feedback, the members voted to keep the mascot.

I will share your email with the members of the board.

Corby King

Director of Schools, Putnam County School System”

Though I understand that, in some ways, it might be out of his hands and the School Board is responsible for major decisions like this, I must say that this response is disappointing to say the very least. He neglected to mention that there had been talks about forming a committee to discuss the name change and the School Board spontaneously announced their decision not to form one at a meeting in early February last year. As a leader of a school system, I would expect more concern and interest about this situation from Mr. King. I understand that it may not be easy, as he alluded, to go against the majority of people in this area, but I would point out that the push for justice, equity, inclusion, and what is right takes courage, as it always has. With all due respect, I see none here.

On that point, I would like to recognize that very often in the history of this country, movements and initiatives have formed to end major injustices and inequities that the majority of people were opposed to, with many even adamantly fighting against them―a majority of people opposed the abolition of slavery, a majority of people were fine with Jim Crow laws and related injustices and against those who were fighting against them, a majority of people were against school integration, a majority of people were against the right for women to vote and hold public office, and the list goes on. The will of the majority is not always right. A majority of people supporting something that is morally and ethically wrong does not make that “something” right. As I previously stated, we have seen this truth sloppily, yet consistently, scattered throughout the history of this country.

I think about little Ruby Bridges in 1960, only six-years-old, the age of my oldest daughter, when she made civil rights history by integrating into an all-white school in Louisiana. A vast majority of white people at the time were opposed to Ruby, and other Black children, attending schools with white children. They showed up and expressed this opposition with anger, violence, and rage. This was not new opposition or “fringe” behavior, but well-established opposition by the predominance of white people in the American South. As a matter of fact, that year Ruby was to attend Kindergarten was six-years after the 1954 US Supreme Court’s landmark ruling in Brown v. the Board of Education of Topeka Kansas, which “ended” racial segregation in public schools (though many states did not concede for years to come). Yet, many southern white people, and a vast majority at that, still attempted to stop Ruby, and others like her, from attending “white schools,” and were ardently doing so six years later and beyond. White majorities in Southern states overwhelmingly voted for ardent segregationists who pledged, like George Wallace in Alabama, “Segregation Forever” — indeed, when George Wallace ran for President in 1968, he received the “overwhelming majority” of the vote in the five Deep South states, and a total of almost 10-million people voted for him.

I also think about the images of the Little Rock Nine, the nine Black students who had to be escorted by federal troops through an angry mob of white people as they walked into an all-white high school in Little Rock, Arkansas, for their first full day of classes in 1957. That iconic image of the young Elizabeth Eckford clutching her book tight as she walked past the angry crowd of white people is seared in my mind forever, just as many other similar, and even worse, photographs from that era are. That was not all that long ago. Elizabeth Eckford is 80-years-old. Ruby Bridges is 67-years-old―a mere five years older than my mother.

For those individuals who are currently opposed to the changing of the name and mascots of the two schools, I would ask you to think about that time of social change in our country, look at the images of the angry white people, look at little Ruby and the other students, and tell me who, if anyone, you identify and side with in those images. Then, if done honestly, consider the present―and ongoing―struggle for racial justice and equity in this country and comparatively identify yourself in our current images. It is easy to argue away why “that would not have been” you angrily resisting integration at the time of Ruby Bridges and attempt to say that you do not see yourself in those images of angry white people, but I assure you that those very same people would have looked back on images of angry white people opposing the abolition of slavery and said the very same thing.

A similar thing happens with attitudes and feelings around Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. I see people who are opposed to changing the racist mascot name share Dr. King’s feel-good quotes online, even using his quotes in attempts to argue against people in anti-racism movements. I cannot begin to express the glaring irony of this. We have experienced what Dr. Cornel West coined the Santa Clausification of Dr. King. People, had they been alive at that time, who would have vehemently hated Dr. King in the days he was alive claim to love him now.

As a matter of fact, an early 1968 Harris Poll revealed that the man so many currently claim to love so dearly died with a public disapproval rating of nearly 75%. Dr. King often spoke about white-backlash and the racist double-down response to his efforts to end racism. Most white people of the time hated him. They saw him as an enemy of the state. He was not popular and his stance was not accepted by the majority. Alas, they killed him.

I think we could use a shift in perspective when it comes to our past and present. When it was announced in February last year that a committee would not be formed to discuss the name change, School Board member Kim Cravens said, “Concerning the discussion of the Algood Redskin mascot — to put it in simple terms, some say it honors and others say it does not. I have read numerous articles on the issue — you can pretty much find information that supports either side of the argument.” This is a disingenuous statement.

Of course there is always information on “both sides,” but there are times when one side is very clearly more right than the other. We are not talking about something like discussing which flavor of ice cream is the best or what type of music we prefer to listen to. We are talking about a school bearing the name that is well-established as a racist slur with the vast majority of people wanting to keep it that way being white people, completely unaffected by the term (apart from the peripheral repercussions of the vicious cycle of dehumanization that Paulo Freire speaks about in his book “Pedagogy of the Oppressed”).

There was information on both sides of the argument about whether or not to abolish slavery in the United States. There was information on both sides about whether or not Jim Crow laws were unjust. There was information on both sides of the argument about whether or not women should be considered equal to men and given the right to vote. One side very clearly holds more weight, in righteousness, truth, and morality, than the other. I continue to be confused about why this is so difficult to admit in this case.

An interesting occurrence that happens when I speak about present-day injustices that are linked to our unjust past is that there will inevitably be a white person who accuses me of wishing I wasn’t white, of being ashamed to be white, of feeling guilty for being white, and/or other sentiments of that nature. A white man I do not know beyond his comment on my first post about this and a facebook bio that reads, “dad, husband and follower of Jesus,” commented unhappily about what I had posted, and at one point in his comment said, “Stop feeling guilty about being white and what your ancestors may or may not have done.” There was no point in anything that I said where I made mention of feeling guilty for being white. All I asked is that we rectify something that is unjust, inhumane, and not right, something that is inarguably linked to our racist past, something that continues to have a hold on our racist present, something that frankly should have been done away with long ago.

Comments like that are interesting, though. Those people tell on themselves. Because insinuating that I, as a white man, must feel guilty about being white for merely calling out racism is a huge indication of what that individual believes about the implications and complicity of whiteness. In this postulation, being white and racism are so connected that merely speaking out against racism means that a person must feel guilty about being white and/or be ashamed of being white. This notion also ignores the fact that, even in times of our history when a majority of white people were aggressively fighting to maintain and uphold white supremacy, there were also white people in those times who stood up against it. People like John Brown, Anne McCarty Braden, William Lloyd Garrison, and others were white and fought against the racism of the time they lived. Even Hazel Bryan Massey, a white teen who appeared leering at Elizabeth Eckford in the iconic photo previously mentioned, had a change of heart, reached out to Eckford, reconciled, and went on to fight for racial justice later in her life.

I am absolutely sure I had ancestors who did atrocious things all throughout periods of our history―during early days of violently establishing settler colonialism in America, during the period of horrendous chatel slavery, during the terrible years of Jim Crow, and probably much more before and after that. Though I was not there at the time, I can see how that connects to me. I believe Dr. King’s words when he said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly.” I don’t have to feel guilty about things that happened before I was born to care about things that are happening when I am alive.

I think some of the hesitation from those opposed to the name change lies in what they feel the implications are if they now, “after all of these years,” give in and admit this is a racist name. What does it say about them? What does it say about their complicity to a racist system? I would say their inaction and opposition to positive change says far more negative things than if they were open to listen, learn, and adapt.

Others rely on the trope that “it has always been this way, so why change it now?” This is similar to the same banalities that were expressed to oppose the abolition of slavery, to speak against the right for women to vote, to attempt to stop integration of schools, and on and on and on. Why now? Because we now know better, even if the realization only hit us a moment ago. Our present existence in this country would be vastly different if those who came before us apathetically, or worse intentionally, surrendered to the notion of things not changing because they “have always been this way.”

These are difficult times we currently find ourselves in. I want to believe the best in people. Though James Baldwin said, “People are trapped in history and history is trapped in them,” I want to believe when presented with information that we might not have been previously aware of, we are able to reflect, learn, adjust, and make necessary changes, break out of the constraints of our history. I want to believe in us. I want to believe we are better than this. I think we are, or at least can be.