Dear Prudence,
I am in a racially mixed marriage (my wife is of Asian and Afro-Hispanic extraction, and I’m whiter than mayonnaise), and our daughter is the most beautiful brown person (I’m a little biased). After living our entire lives in a major metropolitan area notable for its superlative ethnic and racial diversity, we relocated to an affluent suburb on the opposite coast. This suburb is the opposite of diverse, but is in an area notable for its progressive politics. So, not that bad, if that’s where one finds oneself.
Our daughter is on one of the many local swim teams. Here’s the main issue: the swim team has a cheer they do before swim meets. This particular cheer could best be described as some kind of fake-ass Native American chant. There’s an “Indian” theme to the area, and to the club, so I guess the chant makes sense, thematically? My wife and I both had the same reaction to it the first time we heard it, namely, “wtf is this racist ooga-booga crap?”
The question is, should we say something? Honestly, my wife and I are more amused than offended— generally well-meaning white people completely unaware of a mildly racist blind spot. There are far worse things going on in the world right now. We can deal with the passive-aggressive hostility that some people would direct our way for pooping on their racist party. The people that we don’t want to deal with are the well-meaning liberals falling all over themselves trying to atone for giving offense. The thought of doing all that emotional labor to reassure these folks that they’re not bad people—it’s exhausting.
What is our responsibility here? Keep quiet or raise the issue and deal with the uncomfortable fallout?
— Racist Chant is Racist