Simon Moya-Smith: Mascot supporters use tired arguments

The Post story, with the headline, “Viva LaVeta Redskins!,” is about LaVeta High School in Colorado which recently voted 3-2 to keep the school’s mascot the “Redskins,” and the author, Dick Hilker, who’s a bimonthly columnist with the Post, is over the moon with the decision.

“OK,” he writes, “I concede the name may be offensive to many Native Americans and probably should be tomahawked in D.C. But the Political Korectness Kops are so inane with much of their never-ending outrage over school mascots and various words and phrases (see ‘sissies’) that it is enjoyable when someone tells them ‘enough!’”

He goes on to ask: “Why is it perfectly fine for Florida State to be the Seminoles and Utah to be the Utes, but not OK for the University of North Dakota to be the Sioux? Why is it noble to name teams Vikings, Prospectors, Miners, Aztecs, Spartans, Trojans and Irish, but not Indians?”

OK, folks. We’ve covered this ground before—ad nauseum—and since Hilker is an old bugger, I would’ve hoped at some point he would’ve heard the Native American response somewhere. Maybe at one of Colorado’s many faux authentic Indian trading posts? No. We don’t go there. What for? We can make those things ourselves, thank you.