Honor No One But Prejudice By Amy Stretten: Arguing Feelings

Arguing the Feelings of Native American Mascots In “Appropriating Native American Imagery Honors no one but Prejudice,” Amy Stretten argue “Racial stereotyping, inaccurate racial portrayals and cultural appropriation do not honor a living breathing people. Plain and simple, cultural appropriation- especially when members of the culture protest the appropriation - is not respectful” (Stretten par.7). In short, Stretten is arguing that the way society goes about “honoring” Native Americans is offensive and should be discontinued. Overall, Stretten’s argument is only effective in making people aware of her feelings but not effective in representing the community. Because of her lack of credibility and overly hostile language towards the audience, Stretten does not persuade the audience to modify their outlook on Native American culture and how the audience “honor” this community. …show more content…
The abundance of personal experience hinders the effectiveness of her thesis because she focuses more on how she was affected and not enough on the entire Native American community. One of her first examples was when she was in school and confronted faculty and staff about her feelings and she says, “I guess I thought if I made it known that I felt appropriating Native American imagery was offensive, they’d stop. I was outnumbered, though, and my personal feelings didn't matter” (3). Stretten tries to make the readers feel bad for her when she says this but her statement does the opposite and loses the interests of the readers. This is not the only instance where she focuses on her personal