March 15, 2009 - “That’s prejudice right there, looking you in the face.”

Battling over a school's symbols

2009 March 15, The Los Angeles Times 

      Eli Coredero, a student from Carpintria, home of the Warriors, asked the school board to eliminate the warrior school symbols. …. Board member Beverly Grant, who believes the images are damaging stereotypes and who was the target of an unsuccessful recall effort led by [Jeff] Moorhouse (a Carpinteria High alumnus and leader of a group whose name is taken from the school’s unofficial mottos “Warrior Spirit Never Dies!”) , expressed the same urgency.

      “When this first happened, I couldn’t squeeze a tomato in the grocery store without someone coming up and saying something nasty to me,” said Grant, a retired parole officer. “They act like we’re trying to kill them, but we’re just trying to bring them into the 21st century.” 

      At the center of the story is a 16-year-old junior who said he wears his hair shoulder-length as a tribute to his forebears, the Native Americans who made their home on California’s Central Coast. Eli sees “Warriors” as an ethnically neutral name, but he said the images have irked him ever since he was a child.

      “There’s the big head in the parking lot,” he said, referring to a concrete bust of a headdress-clad Plains Indian chief that was a gift to the school from the Class of 1970. “That’s prejudice right there, looking you in the face.” 

      …..Eli said he was inspired to protest after attending a discrimination workshop that was part of the high school’s ‘Be the Change’ week. But critics say he was a pawn.

      “The American Indian Movement is behind this,” said Scott Braithwaite, an Elk Grove social worker who is president of the school’s alumni association. “They found a kid and a course celebre, and there they go.” 

      Corine Fairbanks leader of AIM’s Santa Barbara chapter said it was established only last December, months after the Carpinteria controversy erupted. The national group had not head of Eli, said Fairbanks, although it and various civil liberties groups now support his cause.

      Teams named for tribes have long riled activist groups, though not necessarily some of their Native American namesakes.

      In Los Angeles, the school board eliminated Native American team names in 1988. The National Collegiate Athletic Assn. bars postseason games at schools with such names, a rule that transformed the Southwestern Oklahoma State University Savages into the Savage Storm.

      Twice, bans on Native American team names have made it through the California Legislature but been voted by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who said such decisions should be local. Numerous California schools still bear Indian names, although tiny Colusa High School in Northern California has decided to drop its Redskins moniker by 2011….

2009 March 15, The Los Angeles Times