Freeburg Community High has proclaimed the same nickname for 90 years. But State Rep. Maurice West wants to wash the school’s mouth out with soap. The Rockford Democrat believes House Bill 3527 — AKA the Prohibition of Discriminatory Disability Mascots Act — will benefit brains:

“It is an important piece of legislation…for sake of the mental health of our community.”

Maurice has teamed with Mascots Matter, which aims to 86 the moniker “Midgets” from five U.S. high schools. At a March press conference with the coalition, he slapped slurs:

“We need to ensure all schools…show empathy and compassion in addressing the problematic names of certain mascots. … [H]olding on to sport nicknames considered to be a slur is irresponsible.”

The bill bars public schools from employing any “mascot that is derogatory or representative of an individual or group based on disability, as defined by the federal Americans with Disabilities Act.” Evidently, this includes the lot of letters that lent ’60s surfing sweetheart Gidget her nifty name.

To be clear, the village of Freeburg isn’t in Maurice’s district; rather, it’s repped by Republican Kevin Schmidt. As quoted by The Center Square, Kevin treasures ties with the scandalous school symbol:

“My wife was a proud Freeburg Midget, my father-in-law a proud Freeburg Midget, brother-in-law a proud Freeburg Midget, all four of my uncles proud Freeburg Midgets; three of my aunts, proud Freeburg Midgets. And, of course, my own mother was a proud Freeburg Midget.”

That’s a pile of pride, and a mess of Midgets. 

Those diminutive dignitaries have undoubtedly influenced Kevin’s take on the term, which classically means “an abnormally small person having normal physical proportions.” It was used to describe the 100+ actors and actresses portraying munchkins in 1939’s “The Wizard of Oz” — a film that figured into the 1957 formation of advocacy association Midgets of America. Reportedly, the alliance later changed its name to Midgets and Dwarfs of America before settling on Little People of America.

As for Illinois’s embroilment, it hasn’t recently sprung up; see the New York Post, circa 2015:

Though town lore traces the mascot’s origin to a local reporter who was impressed by the school’s short basketball team beating larger opponents nearly a century ago, [Freeburg] faces public pressure to drop the nickname…

…

[Little People of America President Gary Arnold] and other group leaders delivered a 4,400-signature petition to the school this week asking to phase out the nickname within two years…

Plainly, that petition failed; but now the movement’s getting a growth spurt. 

It’s nothing if not timely; ours is an era of icon updates and injury by emoji:

Is “midget” a titanic transgression? To some, it’s as gross as it gets. In 2005, film critic Roger Ebert received a letter from actor Danny Woodburn. Born with dwarfism, Danny challenged Roger’s use of the word in a review of his movie “Death to Smoochie.” Amid their written exchange, Danny posed as follows:

[P]ersonally, I…feel, as many do, that…”midget” is akin to [the N-word].

Counterpoint:

Back to Danny, the actor offered a route to retribution:

[I]t would be great to claim “the word” as our own in much the same way as African Americans and Blacks have claimed [the N-word]. The truth is, if I say [the N-word], I am getting my head cracked open, but not too many [Litte People] or Dwarfs are doing any head-crackin’ after being addressed as a “midget”…

Presumably, head-crackin’ Midgets are alive and kickin’ in Illinois — in the form of Freeburg Community High’s football team. Does that bode well or poorly for the M-word? Regardless, maybe little people will soon do as Danny proposed.