INDIAN PRINCESSES KILLED by AMERICAN INDIAN MOVEMENT

In 1926, Harold Keltner and others founded a father-son program based on the qualities of American Indian culture and life: Dignity, Patience, Endurance, Spirituality, Feeling for the earth, and Concern for the family. The program gained popularity and became a national YMCA program in 1935, designated as the Y-Indian Guides.

In the 1950s, father-daughter programs, based on the same principles, became the Y-Indian Princesses. At one point, about 900 YMCAs sponsored 30,000 Y-Indian Guide groups. The Y-Indian Princess Program is described as:

PURPOSE:
The purpose of the Father and Daughter Y-Indian Princess Program is to foster the understanding and companionship of father and daughter.

PLEDGE:
"We, Father and Daughter, through friendly service to each other, to our family, to our tribe, to our community, seek a world pleasing to the eye of the Great Spirit."

SLOGAN:
"Friends Always"

AIMS:
1. To love the sacred circle of my family.
2. To be clean in body and pure in heart.
3. To share understanding with my father/daughter.
4. To listen while others speak.
5. To love my neighbor as myself.
6. To seek and preserve the beauty of the Great Spirit's work in forest, field, and stream.

Over the past 70 years, over a quarter million fathers and children have strengthened their family bonds through these non-profit cultural programs and have spearheaded historical research projects, camping trips and visits to Indian reservations.

According to Michelle Malkin at Town Hall, things are changing dramatically. She states that:

. . . a tiny faction of militants from the radical American Indian Movement (AIM) targeted the YMCA's Indian Guides/Princesses as "racist." Only Indians should be allowed to dress as Indians and replicate Indian traditions, AIM argued. "What we were saying is, 'we understand where you're coming from, we understand that you want to honor the Indian, but you're not doing that,'" complained David Narcomey, North Florida director of AIM. "You're causing psychological damage to our children."

Peggy Larney of Dallas, a Choctaw Indian, protested the use of headdresses and feathers. "When other people that aren't Indian do it, they're not being authentic to it. It's just not right," she told the local press. Vernon Bellecourte, another AIM spokesman, called the Indian Guides program a "cheap Hollywood" version of American Indian culture. "They sit around in a circle with their chicken feathers, they have their little greetings and they call their groups various tribes," he griped. "It totally distorts our culture. They can only relate to this very superficial, stereotypical image of who they think we are."[and]

Alas, the national YMCA ignored the pleas of parents and children and instead succumbed to pressure from perpetually offended AIM protesters -- some of whom even threatened to sue a YMCA chapter to prevent them from using Indian names and themes. In 2001, the organization voted to eliminate the Indian monikers from the Guides/Princesses programs. The tribal themes will be phased out completely beginning this fall. The groups will now be known as "Adventure" Guides.

Despite the fact that a quarter million participants have benefited from the YMCA programs, they are being eliminated because a few militants are offended.

That this is happening is disturbing for a variety of reasons. Political correctness is dictating many changes in society that just shouldn't happen. In this case, the YMCA should have fought the attack by AIM instead of simply caving.

Hat tip to PCWatch.