http://washington.cbslocal.com/2013/03/07/fight-on-battle-over-redskins-name-heads-to-court/
So this battle has been waging for decades now. For the sake of people who may live outside of the US, we have an American Football team named "The Redskins," and there is a debate on whether or not that name can be trademarked by the team because of certain laws in the US which prevent ownership of essentially disparaging names.
I am not really all that concerned with that. I do not think you should be able to trademark the term Redskin anymore then you could do the same for the word Cowboy.
What I do find interesting is that we have a major sports franchise, with the name Redskins and we are mostly cool with it in the US. We justify it because they have an awesome helmet which seems respectful to native Americans, and it would just suck to see a franchise that most of us have known of, loved or hated our entire lives have to change their name in order to be politically correct.
But it is undeniably a messed up team name, that no matter what the intent of paying respects to our heritage may encompass, it is still a name that would probably offend most Native Americans. You simply just have to imagine calling a team the Blackskins, or Yellowskins in order to immediately feel a bit icky about the whole thing.
So outside of the trademark argument, what say you GAF? Should the pissed off Native Americans, and many other Americans who are offended by such things win the day? Or is tradition and acknowledgement of our past with a sidebar enough?
So this battle has been waging for decades now. For the sake of people who may live outside of the US, we have an American Football team named "The Redskins," and there is a debate on whether or not that name can be trademarked by the team because of certain laws in the US which prevent ownership of essentially disparaging names.
I am not really all that concerned with that. I do not think you should be able to trademark the term Redskin anymore then you could do the same for the word Cowboy.
What I do find interesting is that we have a major sports franchise, with the name Redskins and we are mostly cool with it in the US. We justify it because they have an awesome helmet which seems respectful to native Americans, and it would just suck to see a franchise that most of us have known of, loved or hated our entire lives have to change their name in order to be politically correct.
But it is undeniably a messed up team name, that no matter what the intent of paying respects to our heritage may encompass, it is still a name that would probably offend most Native Americans. You simply just have to imagine calling a team the Blackskins, or Yellowskins in order to immediately feel a bit icky about the whole thing.
So outside of the trademark argument, what say you GAF? Should the pissed off Native Americans, and many other Americans who are offended by such things win the day? Or is tradition and acknowledgement of our past with a sidebar enough?