I'm with Chutney here. The name is a racial slur. No professional sports teams should allow that. I'm sure many native Americans don't care about the name but it seems odd to me that so many non-Redskins fans are so against changing the name. We should probably be more ashamed of it than we are as a society. Even disregarding what native Americans think about it, what does it say about the rest of us? I'm not offended by the name and generally don't care but, calling it like I see it, the name really isn't appropriate. If it was the negroes, wetbacks, chinks, wops, micks, etc. it would have been changed long ago. Native Americans are so underrepresented that they could never gather up enough clout to overturn the opposition who want so badly to keep the name. I don't really think Indian-American conflict and history should have that much to do with it. It's a racial slur whether there is history behind it or not. Like Chutney says, I hate acting pretentious sticking up for Indians and being politically correct but it just seems stupid to keep justifying the name.
It's not the negroes, wetbacks, etc. kind of name. It's a tribute to the indians as fierce warriors. I'm not seeing where any disrespect of any kind is being done here. The Redskins have been NFL champions - isn't that a pretty high tribute or honor? If Indians' issues aren't being paid enough attention to, then I don't see the sense in wiping all reference to them helps. It only makes the indians less visible in our society. I grew up in the midwest where streets and towns and states were named after Indians or Indian words. I'm just not seeing that this is any different.
cause i read to your first party. and mr. crane being white is not germane at all but his post on race issues have always been paternalistic and preachy (e.g. black ppl should support the republicans). my point is that mr. crane has no clue about minority angst.
if it was an affectionate term, i would actually agree with u but its a pejorative. according to the article-most dictionaries describe it as an "offensive" term. u cant just rewrite the meaning of terms unilaterally for your own liking.
I'm with Chutney, also. The name is obviously a racial slur towards Native Americans and should be changed. I can't imagine how much money they'd lose when they change their name. Will they be changing their colors too?
Where have I said that black people should support republicans? I think they should have their own party. Your arguments are really full of strawmen. You accuse people of being racist or talk about their skin color as if it is germane to the argument, then argue about that instead. Or you misrepresent peoples' positions and argue against those.
Seriously? I don't think a Native American would give a rats ass if a team that was racially named after them won the Superbowl. They should be proud of this? It is completely different. One is a racial slur, and another is a tribute. You wouldn't name a street Negro Drive, it would be Martin Luther King Jr. Street... Or something.
what alternate universe do u live in? to reiterate- most dictionaries describe the term "redskins" as a pejorative as per the article.
u said blacks were responsible for the america's poor health care numbers because of their affinity for killing each other. u also said the democrats have done shit all for them and the republicans spearheaded all the important legislation for black ppl. i believe u said the republicans did all the legwork for the the landmark civil rights legislation, however, LBJ somehow managed to put his name on it. i dont think you're racist but i also think u dont have any credible diversity experience, its evident in your post. u speak about other cultures condescendingly
The dictionaries change the meaning of words over time, often for PC reasons. It never was a pejorative. I'm quite sure that indians used the term "white skin" for the settlers along the way. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9C06E0DF153EEE3ABC4952DFBF66838A639EDE Read the PDF, it's a newspaper article written in 1921. Then make the case that the name is a pejorative.
I said that the life expectancy for black men is absurdly low and that drags down the kinds of numbers you throw around as evidence our health care system is ineffective. I also said there are serious social issues we need to resolve that are the behind this low life expectancy, and none of that has to do with health care. To be more clear, black people (in my eyes) are awesome and impressive, but I can see that there is institutionalized racism that gets in their way of achieving even greater things throughout society. Those things show in the life expectancy and in how they get paid $.80 for every $1 a white person does for the same job, how in democratic party machine towns I've lived in the education moneys are diverted away from their schools, and so on. If I said anything about the civil rights legislation, it'd have been something like a higher % of republicans voted for the bill than democrats did, and that until 1960, the civil rights movement was squarely a republican party agenda (and was since the civil war). I don't speak about other cultures condescendingly. This is another example of you setting up a straw man and misrepresenting my position.
great!!! u use an article from 1921 when lynching and segregation defined race relations in america. the "n" word can be benign to some ppl but it still doesnt eclipse the historical nastiness of the term, same here. if native ppl are offended (which they are), then the organization and their billionaire owner should stop profiting from it.
Well, in that era of lynchings and segregation, this article speaks to how the Indians were viewed, and specifically the term Redskin. The owner owns the team. As his property, it's his right to name it what he wants. If people find the name offensive, they can not show up for the games or buy jerseys or whatever.
I'm still not getting that tribute argument. How does the word "redskin" honour Indian warriors? It has absolutely nothing to do with that aspect of Aboriginal history/culture, since it was a word used for all Aboriginals. If they actually want to associate themselves with Aboriginal warriors, why not call themselves the Warriors, or the Powhatan (the warrior tribe that inhabited that part of Maryland), or Wahunsunacock (the chief that led that tribe at the height of its power)? I'd really like to see them change their name to the third option, fwiw. The idea of a team in Maryland honouring Aboriginals is weird anyways, since all the tribes in that state were wiped out by slavery, segregation, forced assimilation, etc.
It's like you're throwing every counter-argument you can think of seeing if any of them will stick. It undermines your stance, IMO. There's actually a much better article about the anatomy of the term, Denny: link. You're right to point out that it hasn't always been an insult, because the first recorded use of the word was from Aboriginals. But this is the most important part: It's blatantly wrong to say that the word has never been used pejoratively. The word has existed for a long time and, while it may not have originated as an insult, it has certaintly spent a great span of time as one.
I've never seen our Indians called Aboriginals before. You may be confusing them with some other peoples. The Indians here have had a special status in our nation since day 1 (US founded). A nation within the nation. The Hawaiians have that status also. Like I said, read the PDF version of that 1921 article. The name "Redskin" is only bothersome if looked at through the lens of Political Correctness. Historically, the name refers to any old Indian of any old tribe. White people could no easier tell an indian from one tribe from another tribe any more than an indian could tell a new yorker from a pensylvanian. I've said this before, too. There's "racial" and "racist." There's nothing wrong with the former. It's like saying "there are black basketball players." It's a statement of fact. No different than saying "Indian food" or "Mexican food" or "Indian Casino" and so on. One's Race or heritage isn't something to be ashamed of. Identifying people due to their race with the concept that they are somehow inferior is when it is racist. There's plenty of it in sports, like the absurd notion that black men can't be QB because they don't have the intelligence or otherwise "what it takes." Same for catcher in baseball until too recently. If there were a long history of slavery and racism and all that against Indians, the name might be in the same category as the "N" word. I've not seen anything at all close to that here.
Yes, that's all very interesting. But what does it have to do with the post that you quoted? I have issues with the notion that the Washington Redskins are somehow honouring Aboriginal warriors by using a word that referred to the entire race. If that's really the justification you're sticking with, it doesn't defend the use of the word. Just the logo and theme (which nobody is objecting to). btw, Native/Aboriginal/First Nations is what most Indians try to refer to themselves as in Canada. We're talking about the same people.
The article from 1921, written by a guy who fought against the Indians, is a tribute. Your examples of hollywood clowns making racial jokes don't show racism, they show that there was great animosity (not to be denied) between the peoples. If racism were a thing to name a team after, then numerous teams from High School to the pros wouldn't just name themselves after indians. They would be brownskins and yellowskins, etc. That's your logic, I don't see it.
As an aside, things aren't always the way we picture them from our concepts of history. http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/blog/bi...-The-Ku-Klux-Klan-tops-the-Heb?urn=mlb,162784
