Campus Indian promotion divides students

FORT COLLINS, Colo. (AP) – A suggestion that students wear feathers and face paint to a Colorado State University basketball game against the Wyoming Cowboys has ignited a campus debate about American Indian imagery.

Campus administrators planned Friday to meet with students over a Facebook page recently set up by basketball fan Ben Margolit. The CSU sophomore’s Facebook page included a photo of him at a party dressed up like an American Indian.

The Facebook page’s call for a “Cowboys vs. Indians” theme among fans at Saturday’s game sparked a campus controversy, with some American Indian students calling the promotion callous.

Margolit later apologized for the suggestion and took down the page.

CSU junior Tiffani Kelly, president of CSU’s American Indian Science and Engineering Society, said the meeting Tuesday would be a chance for students to talk about the suggestion.

“We just want to start some sort of dialogue with people who don’t understand why this is so offensive to us,” Kelly told The Denver Post.

Margolit told the newspaper he was “truly sorry” for the Indian garb suggestion and that he was simply trying to boost school spirit.

“I just wanted students to have a good time,” Margolit said.

He has since asked Colorado State fans to wear orange, a former team color no longer worn by the Colorado State Rams.

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Information from: The Denver Post, http://www.denverpost.com