Editorial: Newspaper trashes Mohawks on casino

Friday, March 2, 2007  

"There is outrage that ''news' organizations based in New York City purport to know anything true about the life of Mohawk people. There is plenty of anger and emotion, and rightly so, on both sides of the issue. But the editorials, opinions and letters appearing since the February announcement have offered plenty of vitriolic hate speech and libelous statements.

To provide an introduction for this particular display of ignorance is to be transported back in time when the American rubric for discourse on the 'Indian problem' included references to lynching, sterilization and extermination. It is misguided thinking to generalize a tribe 'as disreputable as the St. Regis Mohawks' as bad business partners. But to then ask, 'How can a man whose goal it is to clean up Albany invite nefarious lawbreakers like the Mohawks to sit at his table?' is reminiscent of signs barring 'Indians and dogs' from public establishments. The comments, by reader Tom Cahill of Manhattan in a letter to the New York Post on Feb. 24, do not end there. 'Let the leaders of the tribe perpetuate their social corrosiveness if they wish; maybe it's the prerogative of their tribal law,' his disgusting conclusion begins. 'Keep it away from we honest, God-fearing and law-abiding citizens.'

And so was the tone of several of these letters published by the Post, referring collectively to the 'Mohawks' (no further distinction was deemed necessary by any respondent) as 'Indian gangsters,' 'corrupt folks, 'crooks' and the St. Regis Mohawk tribe as a troubled 'organization' with 'a history of unacceptable behavior.' What is worse is that these comments were fueled by the paper's editorial, 'The Gov's Gambling Goof,' published three days earlier, in which they roll out imagined statistics in an embellished version of the ''extended history'' of the tribe. It is a 'travesty' to partner with the Mohawks, says the Post, because of its connection with widespread drug and people smuggling operations along the U.S./Canada border that cuts directly through the Akwesasne community.

Sure, these are the misguided and racist comments of a tabloid and a few of its blowhard readers, but consider the reach of the New York Post. According to its circulation department, the Post publishes more than 700,000 daily issues and has a readership of 2.3 million. That's just in New York City, where, incidentally, many hundreds of Mohawk families live, work and go to school. As part of News Corp, the massive media conglomerate that is the world's leading publisher of English-language newspapers, the Post is also distributed in Miami, Tucson, Los Angeles, and Chicago, with its tabloid tentacles continually reaching other major cities. And, like Indian Country Today, the Post participates in Newspapers in Education, which is an international program to advance the use of newspapers in schools. The main purpose of NIE is to improve reading, spelling and writing abilities of school children. But also, it is a great tool for spreading knowledge, or intolerance and hatred, about other peoples and cultures."

Get the Story:
Editorial: Mohawks move forward; racist rhetoric sets us all back (Indian Country Today 3/2)