Quickies: On The Vital Cultural Appropriation Front

     It seems that CNN just had to piss in the Super PunchBowl:

     On an average NFL Sunday at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City, one is bound to see some tomahawk chops. Maybe some Native American headdresses.

     The stadium is the home of the NFL's Kansas City Chiefs, one of several American sports teams that copy Native American imagery and traditions. Now that the Chiefs will take the field for Super Bowl LIV, their customs and costumes are on full display.

     How did the team, founded in 1959, come to have such a loaded name? And why does the practice of such cultural appropriation still endure?

     Yes, really. On Super Bowl Sunday. Americans simply cannot be allowed to enjoy their football spectacle, their franks in a blanket, or their chips ’n’ dip without at least some infliction of left-wing pseudo-controversy. Over at Victory Girls, Kim Hirsch comments:

     CNN will not be deterred by us folks in Flyover Country. Instead they tell us that the team was named after a white man who (gasp) “impersonated Native American culture.” How outrageous!

     That man would be Harold Roe Bartle, who served for two terms as mayor of Kansas City in the 1950’s. But before he became mayor, Bartle helped to establish the Boy Scouts in the Kansas City area, growing its membership from 2300 in the late 1920’s to over 30,000 over the next 20 years. For that, Bartle earned the nickname, “Chief.”

     Later, during his time as mayor, Bartle brought two professional sports teams to Kansas City: a baseball team and the Dallas Texans football team. Fans entered a contest to choose the name of the football team, and “Chiefs” was chosen to honor the mayor.

     Yet CNN focused not on Bartle’s accomplishments — of which there were many — but how he “culturally appropriated” Native Americans in his work with the Boy Scouts, namely by creating the Scout group “Tribe of Mic-O-Say.”

     Yes, really. And we also have this breaking news:

     MINAS TIRITH (AP): The League Against Cultural Appropriation has filed suit against both the Texas Rangers of Major League Baseball and the New York Rangers of the National Hockey League for appropriating the cognomen of the Dunedain of northeastern Eriador, which is often called Arnor by the irredentist movement. The AP's representative in the palace press pool sought the opinion of King Elessar Telcontar, who wore that moniker as "Strider the Ranger" before his ascension to the throne, but so far his press secretary has declined to comment. (Queen Arwen Evenstar's publicist told our stringer to "Come back when you can ask in proper Sindarin Elvish.") More on this story as it develops.

     Yes! Really!