The University of North Dakota Fighting Sioux are being forced to change their school team name and logo by a small, politically-correct minority. I think they should keep the Fighting Sioux name and logo. However, if a name and logo change is forthcoming, here are a few possibilities:
The Blizzard (Logo is 6-Sided Snowflake)
The Champions (Logo is a Trophy)
The Fighting Tsunamis (Logo is a Big Wave)
The Flurry (Logo is a Snowflake)
The Former Fighting Sioux (Logo is the current logo)
The Grand Forkers (Logo is a Big Fork)
The Lucky Casinos (Logo is a Slot Machine)
Since there is a bit more space left in this post, here is a bonus list of ideas (some of these might have a bit more of a sarcastic edge to them):
The Fighting Zoo (Logo is caged monkeys)
The Gambling Casinos (Logo is a blackjack hand)
The Generics (Logo is a barcode)
The Grudge (Logo is a fist)
The Heinys (Logo is a Heineken bottlecap)
The Holding Grudges (Logo is a fist holding the current logo)
The Mosquitos (Logo is a large mosquito with a full load)
The Nightmares (Logo is "The Scream" by Edvard Munch)
The No Name Sports Team (Logo is a empty square)
The North Dakota Redskins (Logo is the Washington Redskins logo)
The North Dakota School Sports Team (Logo is the outline of ND)
The Nuclear Warheads (Logo is a nuclear missile)
The Politically Corrects (Logo is the current logo with a red line thru it)
The Ralph Engelstads (Logo is a picture of Ralph Engelstad)
If you have any other good brainstorms, please feel free to share via the comment section below.
4 comments:
My vote is for no logo - no nickname. We are NORTH DAKOTA. To hell with the NCAA!
Congratulations to the Tribal Council of the Standing Rock Reservation for its decision to violate the will of its enrolled members by denying the efforts for a referendum to determine whether the University of North Dakota should be allowed to continue the use of the “Fighting Sioux” nickname and logo. This abdication of authority by directing the North Dakota Board of Higher Education to make the decision to continue use of the nickname or not, in direct violation of the NCAA settlement which dictated that the tribe needed to make the decision, left the Board no alternative but to terminate a tradition that had been given in perpetuity to the University in formal tribal ceremony on more than one occasion.
Many of us who are alumni of the University as well as those of us who are descendents of the Sioux Nation expected this day to come. There are no doubt many Native Americans and other supporters of the change who are celebrating today, for they have won a victory on the battlefield of life. And the changes which are about to come will probably be positive for the University. The real losers in this whole development will be the members of the Sioux Tribe who are searching for the ways to preserve their name and heritage for generations to come.
For the past 75 years, undergraduates and alumni of UND have proudly carried the banner of the Sioux people throughout the United States and the world…sharing our pride in these indigenous people who migrated to North Dakota from what is now Wisconsin and Minnesota to make this their homeland. This tradition has now come to an abrupt end from the inaction of a Council that, however well-meaning”, has failed to follow the will of their own people. A vote at Standing Rock would have resulted in the retention of the “Fighting Sioux” nickname and logo for at least another 30 years. But now that is just what “could have been”.
Some of the “good news” is that those who have been humiliated by UND’s use of the nickname and logo will now feel good about themselves and their Tribe. Much of the “bad news” is that millions of people around the world will never know or care that this Indigenous People ever existed or that they were a proud and gentle tribe who fought hard to protect their lands. Who will come forward in the future to tell the incredible story of our Sioux heritage in the Northern Plains.
So the process will now begin to correct our political insensitivity with which we have been living for a long time…and what will be the next steps? We will select a new nickname and logo, although every option will pale beside the “Fighting Sioux”. We will not need to watch the wonderful videos which accompanied all of our sporting events that reminded us to be proud of the people who gave us the right to use their name (not that we needed the videos). Maybe we should end the humiliation of being from “North Dakota”, because the word “Dakota” means “Sioux”…to do otherwise would be hypocritical. And maybe we should do as my father suggested (as he was a generation closer to our family’s Sioux ancestors)…eliminate the most demeaning aspect of our Native American heritage by ending the imprisonment of our First Americans on reservations.
Beth: If a change was forced I think no logo and team name would be better than replacing the currents with anything else because anytime the new logo was seen or the new team name heard it would always stir up anger and resentment toward the fact it was a forced change by a fretful minority. They could just skate with solid green jerseys and the team would be called UND.
Dave: Thank you for including your letter to the editor on this blog. I did see it in the Forum thanks to a heads-up from, ironically, Beth. Thanks to both of you. I did not know the school name had been given to UND in perpetuity through multiple formal tribal ceremonies. I like your description of victories (and defeats) on the battlefield of life. It would be interesting to hear how my parents felt about this issue if they were still around today. They met at UND back in the Fabulous Forties.
This calls for an actual 5-7-5 haiku:
UND choices:
Political Correctness?
Happy Alumni?
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