Both Fairfield Senior and Freshman High Schools are in Fairfield, Ohio. They pride themselves in being Fairfield "Indians". But for me, as someone who attends this school, the title "Indian" is not something we should be prideful of.

     Some say that our mascot is a sign of our power and pride. But seeing as the population of Indigenous people in our county is 0.3%, and the population in our school is 0.2%, who are we to be prideful of this? It is not our history and it is not appreciation; it is appropriation.

     Our mascots don't "honor" Natives, they are just "perpetuating negative stereotypes" and "contributing to a disregard for the personhood of Native peoples" (NCAI). These mascots present a misleading image of Indigenous peoples and feed into the historic myths that have been used to oppress them. These symbols also teach our students that it's acceptable to appropriate, mock, and stereotype other cultures.

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