(Name-mce) ListServ Indian athletes experience racism on the road

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Indian athletes experience racism on the road

 
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_http://www.helenair.com/articles/2007/02/16/sports_top/000indians.txt_ 
(http://www.helenair.com/articles/2007/02/16/sports_top/000indians.txt) 
Wyoming Indian High School head girls basketball coach  Aleta Moss, center, 
talks with her players during half time of her team's  basketball game against 
Rocky Mountain High School in Byron, Wyo. American  Indian athletes, coaches, 
parents and fans are having to deal with racism on  road trips to schools off 
the Wind River Indian Reservation. Ignorance and  misunderstandings are 
commonplace, though, and those can lead to unintentional  incidents. The students 
are instructed to ignore the remarks and  incidents. 
CASPER - James Blare wasn't upset. The head football  coach at Wyoming 
Indian, Blare didn't expect his Chiefs to actually compete with  Mountain View.

The Chiefs were in the middle of an 0-8 2005 season, while  the Buffaloes are 
a traditional Class 3A power.

"It was one of the  funnest games we've ever had," Blare said of his team's 
trip to Mountain View.  "We got smoked 55-0, but they treated our kids great."

But as the Chiefs  were leaving a restaurant after their postgame meal, 
someone in a passing car  rolled down the window and shouted: "Go back to the rez!"

It's nothing  new for high school sports teams from the Wind River Indian 
Reservation. On  nearly every trip they take, they hear a war whoop or a racist 
remark. Or they  see someone following team members around a store to make sure 
they don't  shoplift.

Sometimes, it's worse.  
 
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C3B65159) 
Usually, the athletes are told to ignore it. Stay  focused, coaches tell 
them. Let it make you stronger.

But for some on the  reservation, the fact these teenagers have to deal with 
it at all, though, is a  disappointing dose of unfortunate reality in Wyoming.

Rarely do Wyoming's  American Indian students, parents, coaches or fans run 
into a clear example of  racism on a road trip. Ignorance and misunderstandings 
are commonplace, though,  and those can lead to unintentional incidents.

While returning home from  a game against Lovell on Jan. 13, the Wyoming 
Indian girls basketball team was  not allowed to use the bathrooms at a Cenex 
truck stop in Worland, according to  WIHS coach Aleta Moss.

As the team arrived, the lone visible clerk at the  store pushed a cart in 
front of the restroom doors, then told Moss the restrooms  were being cleaned.

Moss asked the clerk how long the restrooms might be  closed, and according 
to the coach, the response was terse.

" 'A long  time,' " was the response, Moss said, and nothing more.

Moss asked the  attendant if the store was open.

"She said, 'Yes, but I'm busy,' " Moss  said. "... I told my girls, 'Let's 
just put everything back,' and she said,  'Yeah, we don't want you here.' "

Kathy Fronk, the Worland Cenex store  supervisor, said the team wasn't 
refused service. Fronk said the bathrooms were  flooded, and it was going to take 15 
to 20 minutes before they would have been  reopened to the public.

"When the bathrooms are flooded, you really don't  want people traipsing 
through," Fronk said. "We would have been more than happy  to wait on them, or 
they could have waited 15 or 20 minutes."

Most  incidents in Wyoming fall into this gray area, a 'he-said, she-said' 
argument  where no clear answers are produced. Moss did admit the incident in 
Worland  could have been motivated by factors other than race, but also said it 
was hard  to deny in her mind that it wasn't.

"I guess that's the only way we could  take it," she said.

On the court, incidents translated as racism often  spring from the flow of 
competition, according to coaches close to reservation  athletics.

"Everybody trash-talks," said Craig Ferris, Wyoming Indian's  head boys 
basketball coach and a former player for the Chiefs. "If you're a real  competitor, 
you'll do whatever you can to gain an advantage over  someone."

Occasionally, Ferris said his team will encounter a group of  fans doing a 
war whoop or a tomahawk chop - something he doesn't necessarily  consider racism.

"I see that as a team trying to gain a competitive  mental advantage over 
you," Ferris said. "If you're a good, competitive player,  you can block that 
out."

While many others share Ferris' view, a few  people from Wyoming's only 
reservation see the chants as a blatant, race-driven  attack on an ethnic group, 
not just on five players on a basketball  floor.

Even for Ferris, though, there are certain lines people should  never cross. 
Occasionally, those lines are crossed, and it's those instances  that most 
anger those from the reservation.

"I can understand the  testosterone level," said Jenni Runs Close To Lodge, 
who works in the Wyoming  Indian school system and has a son, Winter, who's a 
senior at Wyoming Indian  this year. "I can understand kids saying 'You suck.' 
But I can't understand  someone calling a kid a 'prairie n-.' "

Sara Robinson, a native of  Fremont County, said she saw clear examples of 
racism both as an athlete at  Lander and as a parent of an athlete.

"Everybody wants to act like it  doesn't exist, but it does exist," said 
Robinson, whose daughter Tahnee was the  target of verbal racial attacks while 
playing volleyball and basketball for  Lander. " ... It's not something we're 
making up. It's something that happened,  does happen and still happens."

For those on and off the reservation,  there is one central question: When 
does competitive fire end and an attack on  an entire race begin?

A comment that might bring one person to tears may  not even raise the 
eyebrow of another. An action some might view as motivated by  race may actually be 
motivated by the scoreboard - or the stress of a flooded  bathroom.

Most problems American Indian athletes see on the road arise  from such 
misunderstandings.

Ron Laird, commissioner of the Wyoming High  School Activities Association, 
said his office hasn't received any reports of  racism at high school events 
this school year.

"Any time, in my  experience, at least, it was always addressed immediately 
by that school," Laird  said. "You can't control what every person is going to 
say or not say, but I  think our schools have done a pretty good job of being  
pro-active."

Reactions to misunderstandings can often make the problem  worse, according 
to Runs Close To Lodge.

"Unfortunately, a lot of times,  the first response (from those making verbal 
attacks) is 'I didn't do that' or  'I didn't mean that,' " Runs Close To 
Lodge said. "The adult, mature thing to  say is, 'I'm sorry. I won't do that any 
more. .... Maybe I won't understand why  you're offended, but I'll try not to 
do that  again.