'Fighting Sioux' Nickname & Logo By The Numbers ![]() By Sam Johnson “It’s the will of the
people...” “Overwhelmingly,
Native Americans and regular North Dakota citizens....don’t want the name to go
away...” “The majority of North
Dakotans want to keep the name....” Hmmmm. Okay I’ve been thinking about statements
like these, and note that they never seem to have any actual facts, data,
statistics, or other “hard evidence” to support their claims. It seems these over-generalized
attention-getting statements are usually the result of personal opinion, based
primarily on a small sample of like-minded opinions from the speaker’s friends,
family, coffee clatch, drinking buddies, or political or ideological party. So, I thought I’d try to gather some
hard evidence to see if these statements could be supported. (Maybe you can add
some of your own facts to these columns). Here’s what I’ve gathered so
far in “hard facts”:
Those Who Want To Keep the UND "Fighting Sioux" NIckname & Logo: Those Who Want to Transition Away from the UND Nickname & Move On: -- The Standing Rock Tribal Council (Governmental body of elected members). -- 33% of the Spirit Lake Tribe Members
who voted on this issue April 2009 -- 5 North Dakota Legislative House Education
Committee Members -- 28 North Dakota Legislative House Members -- 44 UND University Senate
Members (UND faculty, staff, student & administration reps.) |