Baseball just got a little less racist

The end of the Cleveland Indians’ season also means the end for Chief Wahoo

I’m certainly not one to argue for political correctness, but the abolition of this symbol was long overdue. Some people argued against this decision based on tradition. After all, that logo has been around for more than 70 years. But is tradition inherently a good thing? No. Hell, slavery was a tradition in the South.

If you take a look at the other, comparably offensive, racial and ethnic portrayals from the 1940s (buck-toothed Japanese soldiers in ultra-thick glasses, and many levels of “darky” iconography) you have to wonder how this particular one endured. I guess the reason has something to do with power, or rather lack of it. The Japanese are now one of our closest allies and “Japanese Americans” are just “Americans” now. People of African heritage have become a significant power bloc. But Native Americans have not yet obtained a significant voice in the national opera. I just thought about it now, and I can’t name a single famous Native American alive today.

OK, maybe Elizabeth Warren.

(Just fuckin’ withcha. On a serious note, I think Wayne Newton is 50%, but I can’t think of anyone else at 50% or more.)