State Representative Steve Nass, part of the Wisconsin Assembly’s Republican majority, wants to repeal the law that allows the state superintendent to decide whether local public districts may use a tribal name, or other ‘race-based’ name. (Wis. Stat. 118.134, et seq).
Although I’m not a proponent of tribal names, I’m surely an opponent of Wisconsin’s current law, one that places decision-making in the hands of the state superintendent, and unfairly shifts the burden of proof to districts to show that their mascots are not discriminatory. Communities should decide these matters, for themselves, and the burden of proof should rest with those wishing to change an existing name. See, Wisconsin’s Law on ‘Raced-Based’ School Mascots.
It doesn’t matter whether one doesn’t like these names, if the law used to remove them is unfair. (One also sees that mascots like Whitewater’s whippets are solid choices.)
Nass is right to seek repeal.