Please help Malachi change the controversial school names and mascots in his district by completing the survey.
Controversial Names and Mascots Survey Information
Houghton-Kearney School
CON: Kearney’s business practices were considered harmful to certain groups. According to Mark Arax and Aris Janigian, Kearney “had succeeded, though, in planting the seeds of hate toward Armenians(1).”
Madison Elementary School and Native American mascot
School name CON: Was a slave owner. He proposed that a slave should be counted as 3/5ths of a person.
Mascot CON: Viewed as negative and discriminatory against Native Americans. Native American mascots are associated with being “psychologically detrimental to Native American students. For non-Native persons, they are associated with negative stereotypes of Native Americans. First, they are psychologically detrimental to Native American students. Second, for non-Native persons, they are associated with negative stereotypes of Native Americans. Third, these mascots undermine intergroup relations by increasing negative stereotyping of Native Americans. Lastly, supporters of these mascots are more apt to believe prejudicial ideas (2).”
McKinley Elementary
CON: Led the Spanish-American war which led to the annexation of the Philippines, Guam, and Puerto Rico. Some feel the annexation of Hawaii was illegal. “[T]he denial of Native Hawaiian names, language, and learning made many Native Hawaiians ashamed of their cultural identity. They believed they were worthless — a mentality that has been passed down and continues to cripple successive generations(3).” A statue of him was recently removed in San Jose California because some felt that “McKinley was an imperialist and he had repressive policies toward the Native Americans(4)”
James K. Polk Elementary and pioneers mascot
School name CON: He was a slave owner who was against abolishing slavery. He fought an unjust war against Mexico to steal Mexican land. He committed genocide against Native Americans. He justified this with manifest destiny. “Manifest Destiny included a belief in the inherent superiority of white Americans, as well as the conviction that they were destined by God to conquer the territories of North America;” Polk “is the leader most associated with the ideology of Manifest Destiny(5).”
Mascot CON: Pioneers were the individuals involved in the westward movement, which was destructive to Native Americans and their culture, and others who resided in those territories. They used the idea of manifest destiny to justify the land theft and destruction of Native Americans. They enslaved Native Americans in California. They also brought African American slaves to California (6). The pioneers never intended to live peacefully and in community with the people who already lived in the westward land.
Roosevelt Elementary
CON: Viewed as a racist by many for seeing European Americans as distinctly better than others. He believed Native Americans were not equal to European Americans (7).
Sources Referenced
(1) https://www.fresnobee.com/opinion/readers-opinion/article252040958.html
(2) https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13613324.2020.1772221
(6) https://theconversation.com/the-little-known story-of-how-slavery-infiltrated-california-and-the-american-west-165705