![]() Indians, Cavaliers creating a winning culture in the city of ClevelandĪfter all, those fans have grown up in a world where images like Chief Wahoo are the prevalent representation of American Indians-where they are mascots, advertising pitchmen and Halloween costumes, not real people who have experienced pain and suffering. Fans see that Wahoo has been a part of the team for decades and assume that there is nothing wrong in following that lead, in showing up to a game wearing facepaint and a headdress. Wahoo helps encourage behavior like that of fans like Rodriguez, who dress up like American Indians because they can’t imagine how that would be offensive. ![]() ![]() This is the reality created by caricatures like Chief Wahoo: one in which a racist stereotype is supported and perpetuated because of the insistence of the team and its fans that Wahoo is just a cartoon. “I then asked him why redface was any more excusable, and he struggled to come up with an answer.” To a local TV station, Rodriguez could only say, “It’s Cleveland pride.” (Rodriguez subsequently apologized to Roche and said he would stop wearing facepaint to games.) “I asked if he’d ever show up to a game in blackface, to which he replied that he wouldn’t,” Pattakos writes.
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