The damage of a "Trail of Fears"

In previous posts I’ve made mention of my purported Cherokee ancestry, so I’ll not revisit those claims, but I want to focus on misguided use of term “Trail of Fears” with a recent announcement from my town as an example:

Trail of Fears Haunted Hay Ride: October 26, 2012

Let me caveat this by stating that I do not believe that the term is used with a malicious intent to cause pain to those who claim Cherokee ancestry, who might have predecessors may have endured the horrific event that is known as the “Trail of Tears”. I do find it ironic that a community who just had one of its biggest events of the year, the Annual Trail of Tears Commemorative Bike Ride, make its way though town about  a month ago.

That being said, I am offended when someone tries to get cutesy and calls their haunted-whatever event a “Trail of Fears”. That wordplay still resonates the evil that was perpetrated against a native population by a group of invaders whose land lust was insatiable. The part of north Alabama I live in was once part of the Cherokee Nation.

What is also disconcerting to me is the upward trend in the use of the term over the past couple years:

(Click here if chart does not load.)