[image-1]The L.A. Times Editorial Board has added its voice to the chorus of those who think that Chief Wahoo ought to be retired. 

“We’re supposed to be heartened by the Cleveland Indians’ announcement that the team will further reduce its use of Chief Wahoo, an offensive racial caricature that serves as its logo,” the editorial, published earlier this week, began. “But frankly, it’s hard to get excited. Given that the team acknowledges the image is odious to many people, why not just scrap it altogether?” 

Fair question. 

Like many local opponents of the logo, the L.A. Times felt that Paul Dolan’s celebration of Wahoo as part of the team’s history and legacy (and his willingness to profit off of merchandise bearing Wahoo’s likeness) was incompatible with his alleged empathy. 

“We’ll continue to do what we think is appropriate,” was as far as Dolan’s empathy would take him in his one-on-one interview with Terry Pluto last week.

“It’s silly for Dolan to simultaneously acknowledge the problem and then cling to it for the sake of team history,” the L.A. Times wrote. “The team, and the league, should do better, and consign this history to where it belongs: a museum.” 

Locally, Councilman Zack Reed is celebrating legislation passed at a City Council meeting Monday night which he thinks will chip away at the presence of Wahoo in Cleveland. The legislation will regulate the display of banners on downtown utility poles. Permits will now be required from the city’s Design Review Committee before banners may be hung downtown. (Since 1984, no permits have been required). The Design Review Committee will also review the content of the banners.

Reed spearheaded the legislation specifically in order to lobby against the Cleveland Indians’ usage of Chief Wahoo imagery in their banners around Progressive Field.

“This moved us closer to ridding the landscape of Chief Wahoo,” Reed wrote Scene. 

Also on the #WahooWatch: Bomani Jones appeared on the Mike & Mike show Thursday morning sporting a t-shirt mocking the Indians and Chief Wahoo. You’ve probably seen it before.  

This article appears in Apr 6-12, 2016.

Sam Allard is a former senior writer at Scene.

6 replies on “L.A. Times Calls For End of Chief Wahoo”

  1. Regular co-host Mike Greenberg probably soiled his underpants, since the show stays clear of investing serious time on controversial topics. According to several reports, at least one real nervous corporate suit told Jones to cover up — as if he was a high school senior pushing the dress code into uncharted territory on his final day — which was the reason for the partially zipped up hoodie.

  2. I’m indifferent to the logo because I grew up with it as a character like other cartoon characters I used to watch on Saturday mornings. I did not look at it as a disparaging symbol; however, as I age I can see where others can see it as such. I’m a fan of the team and I could not care less about the logo. I especially do not give one rat’s ass about what The L.A. Times thinks. Yes, their city is so devoid of racist issues….give me a break. Clean up your own back yard.

  3. Perhaps Councilman Reed has fallen into compensating the prejudice of American Indians & alcohol abuse in conjunction with his 3rd DUI in 2013.

  4. Now its time to debunk your ignorance when saying it isn’t history…. one must consider the original reasons for chief wahoo being adopted as our teams logo….was it because the team was made up of a bunch of indian hating men that decided to have a funny caricature to promote some racist beliefs? or was it because they were looking for a symbol to represent them as fierce warriors that never gave up even if they were underdogs, to persevere even when outnumbered and outgunned, too always have the warrior mentality that can overcome any obstacle in their path, to fight to the very end…this was and is and always should be the attitude for any sports team.. to fight hard for the win…certainly history shows that indians were fierce warriors, brave men that fought no matter the circumstances, men that didn’t surrender or give in easily…if anything the chief wahoo emblem gives respect to those tribes of warriors. if you are seeing something other than this when you look at chief wahoo then you are seeing what is truly in your own heart.

  5. Did “a bunch of Indian hating men [decide] to have a funny caricature to promote some racist beliefs”? No, I’m sure that wasn’t the conscious intention. But, if they were looking to honor the “fierce” warriors you speak of, perhaps they could have done so with an image that shows those qualities, as opposed to a cartoonish caricature. Even the Redskins, while their name is clearly offensive, have a relatively honorable image as their logo.

  6. There are many other ways to honor those traits without reducing an entire ethnic group to the symbolic equals of Bulldogs, Lions, or even Raptors as part of “history” or as part of a “subculture” that is not quite human but honorable none the less due to the spirit or traits that are stereotyped to that image. Human rights are about equal rights. That’s what the Caucasians logo points out and what the essence of this argument seems to be from the Native American side to me.

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