The Indians’ mascot is offensive.
His name is Chief Wahoo, as if that matters. A red-faced grinning caricature of a human with a single feather behind his head in case you were wondering who precisely they were trying to offend.
It’s easy to look at Chief Wahoo and get mad. It’s easy to write Twitter rants or blog posts or both denouncing this hilariously offensive representation of pre-European American civilization. You’re certainly not wrong, but to me it misses the damn point.
I’m a huge Indians fan, but I’m also Indian. Indian from India, not a made-up word for some brown people a genocidal maniac found in 1492 (lol dots not feathers, good one Robin Williams). While it is easy to rail against this comically dumb grinning red face, the actual disease is the team name. Yelling about Chief Wahoo is fine and easy, but when he’s gone you’re left with a team named after a generic term white people gave people who have brown skin, but not quite dark enough brown skin to call black. That is more offensive to me than a dumb cartoon face.