Stephen Vecellio”s approach to the controversy of the Kelseyville mascot displays ignorance of general human nature and of his own nature. What has happened in the past that seems unfair is immaterial at this point in the discussion.
Most of us, of whatever origin we come from, have been told at one time or another that we shouldn”t feel a certain way about something that happened to us in the past that seemed unfair. Yet, we all know in our gut the fairness or unfairness of the events that instilled the feelings that we harbor and we generally resent outsiders trying to tell us how to feel about these things. We know when people tell us to not feel this way that the real problem is that we are being inconvenient to society”s smooth functioning. It just seems much easier to these outsiders if we would just shut up rather than have the wrongs redressed – you know, less work for everyone else.
I see Mr. Vecellio”s response to the controversy of the Indian mascot as self-serving, lazy, and basically dishonest. There seems to be this underlying feeling that if local native American Indians haven”t objected in the past to the Indian mascot for Kelseyville that they are just inventing those feelings now.
But has it ever occurred to some of these upstanding non-native citizens of Kelseyville that many of the native Americans just did not feel secure enough to voice their feelings in the past? Until you walk in someone else”s shoes one doesn”t understand how the timing of these things work. Don”t delude yourself that individuals objecting now haven”t always felt this way. Individuals like Mr. Vecellio may have just been too ignorant to know it. Being a non-native American myself I”m sure that at times in the past I also was ignorant of these kinds of things also. It”s time we all woke up and started treating each other as brothers.
Eric Habegger
Lakeport
