Dawn of the Geeks

School Changing Nickname, Mascot After Islamic Protest

HINESBURG, Vt. — The Crusaders of Champlain Valley Union High are now history.

The School Board in the Vermont community is selecting a new nickname and mascot for the school.

The Islamic world has criticized the Crusades.

And closer to home, some people object to a knight bearing a crucifix as the symbol for a public school.

The image makeover will be implemented in time for the next school year.

Redhawks, Bobcats and Red Wolves are all in the running for Union High’s new nickname.

Squaw Peak in Arizona recently changed it’s name to Piestewa Peak

It can rename Squaw Peak as Piestewa Peak. It can end the long-running concern by some Native American activists that the word “squaw” is demeaning and insulting to the first Americans.

While Little Green Footballs often does some good reporting, I think they’re spinning this one the wrong way. The Crusades, right or wrong, were a religious and political struggle. Exactly not what a school sports team is about. It wasn’t too long ago that the “Tomahawk Chop” and and other references to Indian culture were under attack by various activist groups for college and professional sports teams.

The Muslims are just catching up to what the Native Americans were complaining against in 1998. Sports teams for public schools shouldn’t have a religious, cultural or political ideology attached to them. Private schools can if they want because the schools themselves are often based on various ideologies. If a private Native American school wants their sports teams to embrace their cultural identity, then that’s their business. If a private Catholic school wants to embrace the crusades for their sports teams then that’s their right. But public schools need to keep the politics where it belongs; in the classroom as an academic study.