The Cincinnati Reds are shortened from redstockings. No Indian at all there. But Red can be taken that way ,if you want to. Do they qualify .
In my youth I encountered many canadians since Windsor is so close and many Canadians work in Michigan. They were offended when the Canucks were named. They said it would be like Detroit calling the Lions the Detroit Niggers. That is what they told me.
What whooping?
The Braves do an annoying chant thing. The Indians just have a dude with a big drum.
Can someone fill me in on what Illinois is doing? I thought the NCAA was going to make them drop the Illini mascot and team name. I, for one, would miss the band routine where Chief Illiniwek magically appears on the field. I think that chief costume is a lot more cool than it is degrading.
Illinois is on the list of teams who are supposed to get rid of their mascot (of course, we Illini don’t use the term “mascot” for the Chief, but I guess the NCAA considers him one). The school cannot host any postseason NCAA events until they get rid of him. But so far, the school is holding out. Don’t know how long it will last. If he does go, I will be sad. I think he is one of the better representations of Native Americans in our culture. If local Native Americans want to work with the school to make him “more authentic,” that would be great, but I don’t see why we need to erase him out of existance.
I believe that our team name is not included in the “hostile and abusive” category established by the NCAA, so for now, the name Fighting Illini will remain.
Indians, sure. But why Warriors or Braves, both of which refer to military roles, not ethnicities?
They don’t play in Washington, either.
You could follow Gregg Easterbrook’s correct lead and start referring to them as the Potomac Drainage Basin Indigenous Persons. Hey, if enough people do that, that’s their nickname, right?
Anyone who remembers Muskie’s breakdown which killed his 1972 Presidential campaign, must also remember that ‘Canuck’ was still considered a slur then.
I do my best to avoid following Gregg Easterbrook on pretty much anything. Man’s an idiot.
This always comes up in the ‘Redskins’ threads, but there’s a pretty obvious reason why it doesn’t happen. Nobody’s gonna spend hundreds of millions of dollars on a MLsports franchise, and then deliberately name it after a group he dislikes - or intentionally negatively brand it in any other fashion. Nobody’s gonna buy something that expensive, then turn around and deliberately wipe out a good chunk of its value.
As Krokodil points out, in the Redskins’ case, changing the name to something else would likely have that effect.
So there you are: nobody’s going to name their NFL franchise the Wops or the Kikes, because it’d cost them barrels of money; and The Danny’s not going to rename the Redskins, for exactly the same reason.
A few years after that I was waiting tables on Longboat Key, Florida, a swanky resort area. There was quite a large ‘snowbird’ population. The running joke went something like this –
“What’s the difference between a canoe and a Canuck?”
“Once in a while, you can get a canoe to tip.”
Seems to be a bit of a slur to me.
Actually, about.com says Forbes ranks the Redskins as the #2 most valuable team, and says it is worth TWICE as much as the New York Yankees.
nitpick: Also, I believe Dan Snyder has at least one silent partner, so he doesn’t own it lock, stock, and barrel. But he is the controlling owner.
The washington robber barons would be nice.as an homage to Stanford who chickened out.
Illinois is a state named after an indian tribe. Is that on the blocks too. Is it offensive. I am asking for guidelines. If the school is named after an Indian tribe then the mascot has logic.Do all indian mascots offend. Is there a break point due to size. A state is good a school is not.
Indian whoops out . I think they used to make them to scare the enemies. I just do not think any ageement is possible.
Is there a question mark on your keyboard.
I used to be pretty rabid on this issue, but I’ve mellowed out in my old age. I wish they would change the name, but I don’t think the organization should be forced to do so. I realize that actual Native American persons have a lot more crucial issues on the table, and this is far down on the list of priorities. But that said, it’s an outdated term that has a history of contentious usage, so I’m in the camp of people who think that they should change it already and let this issue go away. Surely the team’s management is also sick of hearing about it.
I think that, in MANY cases, arguments against use of Native American names are little more than absurd political correctness.
For instance, my Dad’s alma mater was St, John’s University in Queens. The basketball team (once a national power) used to be called the Redmen. This ahd nothing to do with American Indians, mind you- there was no mascot in a headdress, there was no Tomahawk Chop at games. Rather, the team was called the Redmen because they wore red uniforms!
Even so, the forces of political correctness forced a change to Red Storm.
My two cents:
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There’s nothing wrong with Utes, Illini, Seminoles or Braves.
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There’s nothing wrong with the name “Cleveland Indians,” but that stupid Chief Wahoo logo has got to go, yesterday.
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I don’t know exactly where the line should be drawn, but no matter where the line is, “Redskin” crosses it. The name stinks, and needs to be replaced.
Wht does it really matter that much???
“Redskins” might not be a racially offensive term any more, but the team’s founder, the late George Preston Marshall, was in his day the leading racist in the NFL.
Lifelong Washington fan here.
I actually wrote one of my first papers in grad school on this issue - provoked by a Eagles friend (it hurt to type that!). I initially felt that the name was harmless and honorific. After learning more about the issues, I can understand how some Native American people feel about the name and I think it should change. However…
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The Redskins organization does a good job of trotting out Native Americans who are ostensibly happy with the name. They used to trot out a “princess” of some sort (who it was later determined, had shaky credentials) before games and so forth. There was also a business owned by Native Americans in North Carolina that made foam fingers for the Redskins that were often enlisted as supporters.
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Susan Harjo and the folks at AIM seem to be more or less fighting this fight solo. They had some success in using copyright law (the Lanham Act, to be precise) in an effort to strip the Washington Redskins of the rights to the name because of its racial origin, which would mean anyone could make Redskins paraphenalia, stripping the football team of royalty income - but this was a short-lived victory, I believe. All of the legal challenges have come from this group but there doesn’t seem to be much else going on. The height of the fight seemed to be around 1991 when Washington played Buffalo in Minneapolis - there was a sizable presence of protesters at the Metrodome, and the media picked up the story. But the majority of activist effort focused on college mascots, and there was a receptive audience there. Professional sports was another issue altogether. Private ownership and rabid fanbases (typically less sympathetic to protests about tokenization and objectification than college students and faculty) were considerable barriers to overcome.
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Daniel Snyder is a lifelong Redskins fan and has made it clear he has no intention of changing the name.
I imagine some Native people feel the way I do when I see a Black lawn jockey - hell, there is one down the street from me - it’s pretty clear that the person who put it there probably assigns some sentimental value on it and is not intending to demean me with it, but it does nevertheless… and it must be that much worse when you see 80,000 people decked out in pseudo-Indian garb totally bastardizing your culture. But there are about a million other issues, regrettably, that require one’s attention. I have some pretty radical Native American friends who certainly don’t like the name but aren’t going to dedicate the time and effort to eradicate it. I have a really good buddy who’s Native American and a huge football fan… his take is that the name is offensive in the abstract, but it’s something else when it comes to the team. (He won’t root for the team but he isn’t waiting for the name to change, either.)
There’s also a sizable population of Native Americans who are indifferent or even in favor of the name and symbolic connection to Native Americans. I think you could ask a thousand Native Americans and get a thousand different answers. But the bottom line in my mind is that that doesn’t matter - tokenizing people as sports mascots is a problem and really a vestige of a time when people in positions of control looked at minority people as objects rather than human beings.
I’ve heard ridiculous things from fans, like “if the Redskins change their name I’ll no longer be a fan!” Whatever, dude. There are 32 teams in the NFL. Most 'Skins fans are die-hard and wouldn’t flip to the Ravens or whomever. They’d be pissed, curse, but then buy the new Randal-El jersey with the new scheme or whatever.
I only purchase gear without the name “Redskins” and the indian head logo - which means basically I have jerseys and burgundy and gold stuff.
BrainGlutton brings up a good point. The 'Skins were the last team to integrate, and Marshall was notorious for his racist behavior… somehow this is the team that captured my dad’s imagination as a Black kid growing up in North Carolina… and hence I am a second-generation 'Skins fan. If it were up to me I would have probably chosen another team!
A new name? Well… let’s see
A few years ago, my father pitched to the Redskins’ top brass a new mascot, one that would let them keep the same name and colors, but no longer offend any Native Americans. That mascot was a red fox, and had a helmet logo all designed and everything. The top brass didn’t go for it.
I think they should have gone for it, myself. All it would have taken was a small amount of money to change the helmets, chump change for an NFL team. Just a few hundred thousand dollars, and they would have had more support from Native Americans, with minimal grumbling from the fans.