It started with one tweet:
At the vet and just ran into this in a cat magazine. WHYYYYYYYYYYYYY? pic.twitter.com/aDxV3XCAol
— Robohontas (@robohontas) February 7, 2018
Upon looking through Hamilton Collectible’s website, there are a number of lines that they have that appropriate Indigenous cultures. A dog “Feathers ‘N Fur” Yorkie Wild West Figurine Collection described as, “It may not be well known, but Yorkies were born with chief blood.” Yeah, no.
A cat Feathers and Fur collection with the delightful description of, “These feline chiefs are ready to “paws” and share the secrets of the spirit world with you! Wearing their majestic ceremonial headdresses with pride, each limited-edition cat figurine in this collection will lead you down the sacred path.” The ignorance is thick in this type of description.
And if you need a fairy in a headdress, they have those too. Meet the Jasmine Becket-Griffith Great Spirit Guardians Figurines. Could the description possibly get more cringe-worthy? The answer is YES. “…each fairy embarks on a sacred adventure with animal spirit totems, inspired by Native American culture.”
All of these collections were made from stereotypes of what non-Natives think Native cultures are ‘really like’. They are not representative of any of our diverse cultures and appropriate, badly, Northern Plains headdresses.
Who in the holy hell thought any of these were a good idea?! @HamiltonCollect #NativeTwitter pic.twitter.com/7FZ1ezA7uo
— Ali Watson (@aliwatson117) February 8, 2018
Noooooo, these are sooooooo bad and sooooooo culturally insensitive. Make it stop @HamiltonCollect. This is not cool.
— Robohontas (@robohontas) February 8, 2018
So they’re dressing up fairies and dogs in Native regalia as collector’s items? lol If you buy any of these, you’re ignorant.
— MissDawn2you (@MissDawn2you) February 8, 2018
Exactly. Do better, Hamilton Collectibles.