Racist TeePee Games website

Someone alerted me to this company website. I trust its problems are blatantly obvious to everyone.

TeePee Games--about us

TeePee Games is a game player's discovery platform for smartphone, social and Flash games. The service allows casual game players access to the games best suited to their profile, cutting through the noise of app stores and top-ten lists. TeePee Games combines a huge array of social features provided by established services Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and contains them in one place online. The company was founded in 2010 and is funded by private equity.

TeePee Games is headquartered in London, United Kingdom

Management Team

We think the casual game industry has been run by cowboys for too long, now it's the turn of the indians! Read more

Investors

Someone has to pay for the peace pipes. Read more

Press

Gather round the campfire braves, the Chief has a story to tell. Read more

Careers

Want to join our Chief and become a tribesmen? Read moreTeePee Games--management team

TeePee Games combines over 50 years of management experience in the gaming market from console to online and mobile games the management's industry achievements are second to none.

Click on the profiles below for more infoEach of the eight people in the photo has his or her own stereotypical picture and "Indian name":Nick Alexander
Wise Man

Tony Pearce
Chief TeePee

Simon Jones
Chief Dream Catcher

Charles Macleod
Warrior

Darren Newman
Chief Scout

Lauren Omond
Head Squaw

Marc Woodhouse
Cave Painter

James Duncan
ScoutA couple of these job titles are particularly bad. In addition to using a slur, "head squaw" says nothing about Lauren Omond's job--she's a project manager. This is a good example of why "squaw" is a worthless word. It compartmentalizes Omond--she's only a "squaw," not a wise person, warrior, or scout--without adding any information. "Woman" provides just as much information and isn't a slur.

But the grand prize for stupidity has to go to "Cave Painter." There may be a few cases of Indians painting in caves, but it wasn't a regular practice. The TeePeaBrains obviously are thinking of the Cro-Magnon people colloquially known as cavemen. Incredibly, they've confused a modern American minority with an extinct subspecies of primitive cave-dwellers. Thanks for telling us that Indians = cave painters = prehistoric brutes, idiots.

Also worth noting is the background design on the home page. A campfire on the left, a cow or buffalo skull on the right. Sparse vegetation between them, suggesting a barren desert. Mesas and poles (cacti?) in the distance.

This type of scene vies with chiefs and teepees as the most stereotypical Native imagery. It implies Indians live in the remote wilderness somewhere. Presumably they're dressed in ragged buckskins, grubbing for roots and berries, like some sort of human coyotes.

Never mind that 70% of Indians live off the reservation in cities, or that they all uses cars, phones, and computers. To Teepee Games, Indians are an inferior subspecies of human, primitive and savage. Hence the "racist" tag in the title.

Reactions

People on Facebook were predictably outraged. Some of their comments:Racist game developers choose a thoroughly racist marketing strategy. WTF were they thinking?

OMG

We could do crackergames.com where they sit around a Hooters figuring out how to rape, steal and colonize.

WOW....I don't even have words to describe how wrong on so many levels that site is....

Wooooow...just goes to show how ignorant some people still are.

Pathetic!!Fortunately, the geniuses at Teepee Games want our feedback. Here's how to do it:

FeedbackThanks for playing on TeePee Games! The web site is still in Beta which means we are still tweaking and moving things around.

YOUR FEEDBACK WOULD BE VERY APPRECIATED!

We can't wait to hear from you!
Just reply to this email to beta@teepeegames.comThis is why Hollywood doesn't make modern Native movies starring Native actors. Because almost everyone thinks Indians are primitive people of the past who wear headdresses and live in teepees.

Most people who see this website will think: "Yes, Indians were primitive people of the past who wore headdresses and lived in teepees. Since the site confirms my thinking about them, it must be right."

If you're still not clear on this company's problems, read any of several dozen postings on hipster headdresses and related subjects. For instance:

"Indian Market Special" headdress
Tribalism is trendy
Khloe Kardashian thinks she's Native
Callaloo stereotypes "Native Americas"
Natives attack "Indians" showband

Below:  People in the British Isles seem to love their racist perception of Indians. Here's the same type of stereotyping by a similar group of people.