These are trying times for multiple reasons, most notably COVID-19 and the renewal of the Black Lives Matter movement. With the latter coming back into prominence, there are a handful of sports teams that will come under the heat of the interpretation lamp, two of those being from the football realm: The Canadian Football League's Edmonton Eskimos and the National Football League's Washington Redskins. These teams have names that date back to their Beginnings, 1949 and 1932 respectively, times in which those names were not as controversial as they are today. With that in mind, what should each team do moving forward in the wake of the Black Lives Matter Movement?
The Edmonton Eskimos are a trickier case, so they will have their name examined first. With the 2018 Grey Cup having been held in Edmonton, the team set out to have a third-party study done to determine if the nickname Eskimos was offensive. The third-party study determined, by way of speaking with Inuit people (who the term "eskimo" could be derogatory to). The study found a consensus that the team should engage more with Inuit people, but there was no consensus as to whether or not the team should change their name. With that in mind, the most recent social activism may call for the team to change their name. To the Eskimos credit, they have done work in determining how the appropriate the moniker is, and the results were not conclusive, and because of that, the team decided to keep their name, to retain the tradition. I do not fault the Eskimos organization for their decision, but this new movement may cause them to reconsider. Would it be a bad idea to conduct another study with relevant people groups? No, it would not. I think this is a neutral move either way for the club, they will upset people either way, but they should be concerned most about the people it would affect most.
The Washington Redskins are another story, more clear cut, but more controversial. The Redskins have done nothing to see if their team name is offensive, and they do not need to. There has been a constant public outcry by those who find the name "redskins" to be derogatory, and their voices have been heard. The biggest stumbling block though is the Washington D.C. based team's owner: Dan Snyder. Snyder said publically when he bought the team back in 1999, that he would not be changing the team name, and that stance may not change sadly, unless ownership either has a change of heart, or ownership just changes period. That is a problem for both the NFL and the Washington franchise. This team needs to get out of the Nineteenth Century and Twentieth Century with their name. They have been told the name is offensive and they have outright denied those claims by flat out ignoring them. This name needs to change, I don't care what it is, but it needs to change.
Team names can be changed, but I get that fans can be hesitant to have their team change their name. There are traditions attached to their team's name, and fans want to hold on to their team's history. I see this as the one thing that many fans stumble with when they hear of their team possibly changing their name.
I am one of those people most of the time, but with problematic team names, they need to change. If they don't, sports, and football, in particular, will look terrible for their unwillingness to change.
La Cheeserie, Littles
Fight On, Sleepers
Black Lives Matters
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