American Indians want Redskins to Change Name

[The Shepherd 10]

A few years ago the animals rights people tried the get the GB Packers name changed. The Packers were name after the Acme Meat Packing Company and animal activists found it offensive.

I thought they named the Packers after Elton John and George Michael.

[Brad GLuckman 518]

I thought they named the Packers after Elton John and George Michael.

 

[Nichee 0]

shoulda wiped them all out when we had the chance.

 

I often type LOL, this post was the first one in a long time that I actually did laugh out loud.

[BringBackBernie 0]

Indians challenge use of 'Redskins' name

 

 

TULSA (AP) — American Indians have filed a new legal challenge to the Washington Redskins' trademark, contending the NFL team's name is racially offensive, speakers at the Native American Journalists Association national convention said Friday. A petition to cancel the trademark was filed Friday with a board of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in Washington.

 

"There is no compromise with racism," Suzan Shown Harjo, president of the Morning Star Institute, said at the conference. The institute is a Washington-based non-profit organization that advances Indian causes.

 

"Power concedes nothing," she said. "You have to go in and make change happen."

 

The patent office's Trademark Trial and Appeal Board backed a similar petition filed in 1992. That decision was overturned on appeal, but the door was left open for another attempt to invalidate the trademark, Harjo said.

 

"The Washington football club name has been determined by three trademark judges and the majority of native Americans to be offensive," she said.

 

Bob Raskopf, an attorney representing the NFL and the Washington Redskins, said Thursday he couldn't comment on the petition because he has not seen it yet.

 

The petition was filed by six American Indians ranging in age from 18 to 24. It states that the Redskins trademark should be canceled on grounds that it is a "pejorative, derogatory, denigrating, offensive, scandalous, contemptuous, disreputable, disparaging and racist designation for a Native American person."

 

"This public act of allegiance by Native American youth with the efforts of their elders to combat intolerance is truly heroic and reflects a courageous willingness on the part of these young people to protect Native peoples from slurs and vulgarities," Harjo said.

 

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/football/nf...s-indians_x.htm

Interesting article. These kinds of things I find infuriating in the college ranks. I may be alone here - but I always thought that the American Indian would be flattered by a sports team using their likeness or tribe as a way to convey strength, etc etc.

 

Your thoughts?

 

Chris Rock has a brilliant bit about this. "It would be like calling the New York Knicks the New York Ni_ _ ers. Get rid of the name. It is so racist.

[Justy2 0]

People are only offended when they allow the word to be offensive. If one allows the word to be offensive then its really one's own fault.

 

I live up in Mass. I remember when the was a move to change the name and logo of the UMASS Minutemen. The alumni put an end to that, Thank God.

 

They said that the gun in the logo was offensive. I think that it was simply too patriotic for their anti-American views.

 

I'm not a white supremecist, I don't hate Native Americans. Hell, my wife is Japanese. People who support the Redskins may be hapless fools, but they aren't racists or thinking derogatory shiznit about Native Americans, they're just football fans who want to get drunk, eat quesadillas and watch the game.

 

Its the PC crowd who are dredging up all the negative energy just to make themselves feel better about themselves and give their "movements" something to do.

 

So I hope this case is thrown out of court. They aren't breaking the law. The image depicted of the "Redskin" is freakin cool. How the hell can a native feel offended by it?

[BringBackBernie 0]

Honeslty I couldn't care less if they changed to the Washington Honkey's, Cracker's, Whiteskins, or any othee derogatory caucasian name. I would laugh, people need to learn not to take themselves so seriously.

 

But.....

at the same time I can somewhat see where they are coming from. When you really look at the name... red - skins, it's kind of wrong. I mean, with their history and everything, they were kind of screwed over. But I'm just so sick of all this PC crap, I can't care for more than a few secs

 

Kind of screwed over? Largest genocide in the history of the human race.

[Cuse9 128]

I'm not a white supremecist, I don't hate Native Americans. Hell, my wife is Japanese. People who support the Redskins may be hapless fools, but they aren't racists or thinking derogatory shiznit about Native Americans, they're just football fans who want to get drunk, eat quesadillas and watch the game.

 

Oh, so now all mexicans are drunks! When is all this racism gonna end!

[BringBackBernie 0]

People are only offended when they allow the word to be offensive. If one allows the word to be offensive then its really one's own fault.

 

I live up in Mass. I remember when the was a move to change the name and logo of the UMASS Minutemen. The alumni put an end to that, Thank God.

 

They said that the gun in the logo was offensive. I think that it was simply too patriotic for their anti-American views.

 

I'm not a white supremecist, I don't hate Native Americans. Hell, my wife is Japanese. People who support the Redskins may be hapless fools, but they aren't racists or thinking derogatory shiznit about Native Americans, they're just football fans who want to get drunk, eat quesadillas and watch the game.

 

Its the PC crowd who are dredging up all the negative energy just to make themselves feel better about themselves and give their "movements" something to do.

 

So I hope this case is thrown out of court. They aren't breaking the law. The image depicted of the "Redskin" is freakin cool. How the hell can a native feel offended by it?

 

To me, this has nothing to with the courts. First Amendment rights should always be protected, but come on, is it that big of a deal to change the name of a football team? Sports are not that important.

[Brad GLuckman 518]

Kind of screwed over? Largest genocide in the history of the human race.

 

...sheeesh, we gave em casinos

 

[BringBackBernie 0]

...sheeesh, we gave em casinos

 

 

You really don't read the news much, or you are being very sarcastic and funny.

[fvl306 0]

That said, Redskins has to be the most deragotory nickname out there of the various Indian sport team names. Fighting Illini is comparable to Fighting Irish, Seminoles, Sioux, etc. is a tribe, etc. and Indians, well, what's the big deal there (except the logo of Chief Wahoo was pretty brutal), and so on. However, Redskins is, at best, racial slur and, at worst, referring to the scalping/genocide that went on.

 

So even if you think there's nothing wrong with, say, New York Jews, to make the comparison work, it would actually have to either be the New York Kikes or the New York Holocaust Casualties. How would that fly?

 

A lesson in PC. I was watching "To Kill a Mockingbird" the other day, and was struck by what was PC in the early 1960's. Here's the script of a conversation between Atticus and Scout, from the 1962 movie. I'm sure most of us watched this in high school.

 

"- Don't say "######," Scout. - I didn't say it.

Cecil Jacobs did. That's why I had to fight him.

Scout, I don't want you fightin'.

I had to, Atticus.

- He... - I don't care what the reasons are.

- I forbid you to fight. - Yes.

Anyway... I'm simply defending a Negro, Tom Robinson."

 

Negro was THE PC term. I'm sure nobody complains when they get money from the United Negro College Fund. But, aside from that, the term "negro" is now often considered offensive. The PC term has been "African American" for several years now, but that is also changing.

 

The point is, regardless of how neutral a term is for any group of people, someone wil take offense to it. As far as the term "Redskin" goes,

 

"Interestingly, most of the people who sizzle with outrage over Indian team names and mascots are not Indians. American Indians can be found vigorously arguing on both sides. Academics are split, too: Anthropologists call team names and mascots humiliating, while linguists say "redskin" describes "stalwart attributes." Even dictionaries disagree (the Oxford English says "redskin" is "generally benign," while Webster's says it is "usually offensive").

 

(from http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?p...;notFound=true)

[IN$TANT REPAY 8]

down with "the man!"

 

 

[jocstrap 8]

I Jocstrap grew up in Tulsa. You should see what these bums are doing in the small towns. NOTHING. Yes the trail of tears ended here and the Indians were forced upon these lands. Now in the present. How the hell can these guys complain when they are rewarded with casinos which bring in millions, if not billions, and special privaleges for building on their so called land? Choctaw, Chickasw, Cherokee, Creek, and Seminole are the 5 civilized tribes of Oklahoma. They even get special tax breaks on cigarette sales . Working the government over is all I can say. If only they had hte Reverend Jessie Jackson to jump into the limelight for them. JEEZ get your azzes in college (you do get a huge break with certain % of american Indian blood in you) and quit crying! That is all I have to say about this topic.

 

Go Redskins!

[Nichee 0]

I think the Tennessee Titans should be forced to change their name. In Greek mythology, the Titans are a race of godlike giants who were considered to be the personifications of the forces of nature. I would prefer to not have someone else’s religion jammed down my throat. Please change their name to the Elvis’s.

 

I think the New York Giants should be forced to change their name. There are lots of midgets (maybe I should call them small people?) in our country and I’m quite certain they don’t like being reminded that there are people in the world larger than them. They should be renamed “The New York Football Team Consisting of Mostly Ordinary People Though Some Differ Slightly in Height and Stature.”

 

I think the Cleveland Browns … oh, never mind, we won’t even go there.

 

I think the New Orleans Saints should change their name because members of the Church of Satan and Later-Day Demons would likely prefer not to acknowledge the Saints. They should be renamed “The New Orleans People Who Still Can’t Stop Saying, ‘Are You Serious They Passed on Bush.’”

 

BONUS NAME CHANGE:

It’s a little known fact that Benjamin Franklin – who became wealthy in Philadelphia as a newspaper editor, printer and merchant – believed the turkey, not the eagle, should be the official American national bird. To honor this great man, I believe a name change to the Philadelphia Turkeys would be appropriate.

[harken34 0]

Fock'm!

 

Where's my tomahawk chop icon..........

 

 

[Brad GLuckman 518]

You really don't read the news much, or you are being very sarcastic and funny.

 

 

Yes, I am being sarcastic.

[The Shepherd 10]

Chris Rock has a brilliant bit about this. "It would be like calling the New York Knicks the New York Ni_ _ ers. Get rid of the name. It is so racist.

Chris Rock is a turd. Like Chad Johnson - punk with a big mouth - only he's filthy and can't play football.

[Justy2 0]

To me, this has nothing to with the courts. First Amendment rights should always be protected, but come on, is it that big of a deal to change the name of a football team? Sports are not that important.

 

Yes, it is a deal.

 

A] If the Redskins did it they would be admitting a de facto fault. After the name change come the requests for mounds of cash by the "offended". (Ya know, now that I think of it I do have some Native American blood in me, naybe I can cash in on this too.) Since the Redskins are not at any fault and are not doing anything wrong they should not be compelled to change their name. Also who is next, the Pirates? Buccaneers? Vikings? Patriots? Padres? Blue Devils? Devil Rays? Come on.

 

B] The Redskin organization would have redesign everything with their logo on it. They should only do so if its economically feasible for them.

 

C] Any further team logo by any sports team would first need an OK by liberal activists. If any liberal group (or any other group for that matter) found a name offensive they would to think of something else. The Washington Marshmallows, nope rejected by a health advocacy group who feel that marshmallows are bad for society. The Washington WalMart Greeters, nope rejected because of WalMart'ss anti-union philosophy and low wages. The Washington Benchwarmers, nope rejected by children's advocacy group who feel that stereotyping non-athletic children leads to low self-esteem (even if no actual children are involved with the logo.) The Washington Bearded Clams, nope rejected by an environmentalist group who claim that clams don't have beards. See it would be a real pain in the butt to think of a new name.

 

D] Their name is protected free speech by the First Amendment. Any name change should come within the organization.

[Terrorazer 0]

Do you think that there are pissed off leprakauns.....how in the hell do you spell leprekaun!!

 

 

I believe it's leprechaun.