Change My Name

I’m fixing to change my name.

I’m not speaking for myself in this case, but rather for the Washington Redskins of the National Football League (NFL), who just might have to do the aforementioned—change their name. That is if the real redskins, oh, I beg your pardon, the Native Americans have it their way.

It seems the Oneida Tribe finds the team name to be offensive and have begun running radio ads and launched a web site to promote changing the name of the Washington football team.

Their effort is supported by many sports writers and journalists who claim that “redskin” is the last racial slur that can be used without a person getting fired.

How about “redneck?” Is that offensive to palefaces?

From the other side there are those who think those behind the name change effort are simply left-wing politically correct thugs who hate Mom, apple pie and the NFL.

There are also those who think “redskin” comes from the red war paint the Indians wore while they were scalping palefaces, and not from the color of their skin.

I’m not taking sides, but from the pictures and paintings I have seen of real Indians, they were mostly a light copper color. And the history and fiction I’ve read over the years caused me to conjure up words like cunning, brave and honorable as the description of a reds—, oops, sorry, I mean a Native American.

It seems a similar effort was mounted against the Atlanta Braves a few years back, but that antagonist simply disappeared. Did they just give up, or were they paid off? Is this current effort against the Washington Redskins really about being offended, or is it about looking for a pay off to just go away.

Who’s next? Will they come back after the Braves, or will it be the Cleveland Indians or the Kansas City Chiefs?

Before we proceed farther, let’s consider the options of the Redskins—that’s the Washington Redskins, and not the Redskins themselves. Uh oh, there I go again. I mean the Native Americans.

I wonder how many millions of dollars it will cost the Washington team to change its name. The logo of the big Redskin—doggone it, I mean the Native American on the side of their helmets would have to go, as well as their advertising schemes, sign boards and a myriad of other long standing logo items.

So if you have any of the team’s banners, jerseys, etc., you might want to hold on to it because it could become valuable.

So the question is, should the team do that, or would it cost less to give their antagonists a monetary settlement so they could dismiss all their lawyers and go back to their casinos?

That would probably be the best route for the football franchise to take. After all, that’s what happens in the vast majority of law suits, because it is less expensive to just pay off the plaintiff than it is to pay all the expenses of actually going to court.

There’s one other option left. How about if the team immediately changed their name, thereby cutting the Native Americans off at the pass?

How about if they changed their name to the Washington Palefaces, or Washington Blackfaces? Naw, that would just invite more lawsuits.

How about if we call them the Washington Republicans? Whoa! Now that would cause some lawsuits!

Nope, I don’t think any of the above would work, so my advice to the team is to just give them the wampum they are after and let’s be fixing to play some football!