Comments on: Indians Sue, Yet Again, to Ban “Redskins” Name

By: Frank

Frank — Wed, 16 Aug 2006 14:38:51 +0000

Why I saw a US made movie the other week extrolling the virtues of Japanese-American troops in WWII. I am sure the fact that the soldiers were shown referring to themselves as “Buddha-heads” means it was a term of endearment.

By: Walter E. Wallis

Walter E. Wallis — Tue, 15 Aug 2006 20:35:54 +0000

My combat outfit was the Second Infantry Division, the Indianheads.
I challenge anyone to suggest this was done to derogate the Indians any more than naming a team Redskins.
Perhaps they could rename the team The Pussies but keep the same picture.

By: Ted

Ted — Tue, 15 Aug 2006 19:00:05 +0000

Yes, this would be a silly tort lawsuit. But it's not a tort lawsuit, it's a lawsuit under 15 U.S.C. § 1052(a), from which most of the synonyms in the complaint come from. There's also no collateral estoppel issue; the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board originally ruled in favor of the revocation of the trademark, the District Court reversed the TTAB, and the D.C. Circuit reversed, so the case is still pending. As for the merits, I'm not entirely convinced of the proposition that the Indians don't have a case that "Redskins" might be sufficiently offensive as to not merit a trademark. As a more-than-hypothetical datapoint, consider, for example, the "Yid Army" of Tottenham Hotspur.

By: Rebecca

Rebecca — Tue, 15 Aug 2006 17:43:05 +0000

I did a quick google for the Redskins logo, and it's actually very respectful; it's the sort of image that could be on the face of a coin. As for the word itself being offensive, meh. I wasn't aware it had particularly strong pejorative connotations, but then, I'm not terribly up on my racial epithets. Putting the legal issue aside for the moment, let's look at the social issue: do people call other people "redskin" with the same connotation as using the n-word? If Wikipedia is to be believed, the name came from a desire to honor the Sioux mother of the team's head coach. I've only ever heard the term used as a slang description, never as an epithet.

By: Eh Nonymous

Eh Nonymous — Tue, 15 Aug 2006 16:55:37 +0000

Kip: if you don’t know the history of this particular trademark question, check out Language Log (no link, just google) and enter “redskins” in the search function. Lots and lots of posts by Bill Poser (Linguist) and Geoff Nunberg (Linguist) about the topic of the lawsuit.

Also: when someone tells you that lots of money ought to be taken out of some pocket and put into theirs, because of a great and historical harm, you should do two things.

#1 Inquire into the harm. It may be real, and maybe greater than you knew. and,

#2 Keep your hand on your wallet, they may be trying to swindle you.

This includes tort reformers of course. 🙂

Keep up the fine guest-hosting.