Senator threatens NFL's tax-exempt status over the Redskins name

[dps]

"Hindu" is a slur?

[crazy canuck]

"Hindu" is a slur?

You know what a Sikh is right?

[Malthus]

In the 70s and 80s I grew up in a community where my Sikh friends were often subjected to racial slurs.  The most common were "Paki" and "Hindu" (which showed the complete ignorance of those uttering the slurs but I digress). The Sikhs knew the comments were meant to be racial slurs.  The people making the slurs knew they were making racial slurs and the white kids who didn't make the racial slurs knew exactly what was going on.

The notion that because a racial or bigoted comment is common place is in some sense exculpatory is not very convincing to me.

That the owners of the team didn't care that it was a racial slur or not (even after it being brought to their attention) makes a lot more sense to me.

Heh Sikhs have no luck with ignorant bigots - if they aren't being attacked as "Hindu", they are being attacked as "Muslim"!

[Malthus]

"Hindu" is a slur?

You know what a Sikh is right?

He's sikhing the meaning right now.

[/ducks, runs]

[crazy canuck]

In the 70s and 80s I grew up in a community where my Sikh friends were often subjected to racial slurs.  The most common were "Paki" and "Hindu" (which showed the complete ignorance of those uttering the slurs but I digress). The Sikhs knew the comments were meant to be racial slurs.  The people making the slurs knew they were making racial slurs and the white kids who didn't make the racial slurs knew exactly what was going on.

The notion that because a racial or bigoted comment is common place is in some sense exculpatory is not very convincing to me.

That the owners of the team didn't care that it was a racial slur or not (even after it being brought to their attention) makes a lot more sense to me.

Heh Sikhs have no luck with ignorant bigots - if they aren't being attacked as "Hindu", they are being attacked as "Muslim"!

Too true.

[The Brain]

In the 70s and 80s I grew up in a community where my Sikh friends were often subjected to racial slurs.  The most common were "Paki" and "Hindu" (which showed the complete ignorance of those uttering the slurs but I digress). The Sikhs knew the comments were meant to be racial slurs.  The people making the slurs knew they were making racial slurs and the white kids who didn't make the racial slurs knew exactly what was going on.

The notion that because a racial or bigoted comment is common place is in some sense exculpatory is not very convincing to me.

That the owners of the team didn't care that it was a racial slur or not (even after it being brought to their attention) makes a lot more sense to me.

Heh Sikhs have no luck with ignorant bigots - if they aren't being attacked as "Hindu", they are being attacked as "Muslim"!

Poor guys.

[Valmy]

The notion that because a racial or bigoted comment is common place is in some sense exculpatory is not very convincing to me.

Well I grew up here and I think so. How else would so many good and polite and wonderful people have had such bigoted and racist views? Many elderly people I knew had changed their views considerably in light of new ways of looking at things. Same with people who did anti-gay stuff in the past. Many things people did in the past seem horrible or appalling today that were considered normal or even virtuous then. We recognize them as objectively wrong, and we should, but I think it is a mistake to project backwards nefariousness or evil necessarily. The past is a foreign country and all that.

But the point is not how insulting or racist the owners of the Redskins were in the 1930s. It could have been, and it probably was, a completely innocent thing with nobody thinking there was anything strange about it.

I mean you get stuff like this even today:

http://washington.cbslocal.com/2013/10/08/how-many-native-americans-think-redskins-is-a-slur/

Tommy Yazzie, superintendent of the Red Mesa school district on the Navajo Nation reservation, grew up when Navajo children were forced into boarding schools to disconnect them from their culture. Some were punished for speaking their native language. Today, he sees environmental issues as the biggest threat to his people.
The high school football team in his district is the Red Mesa Redskins.

I don't think there are too many Sikhs calling their local school teams the 'Pakis' or the 'Hindus'. But then you get the whole internalized racism thing and blah blah. It's complicated.

What is not complicated is that we shouldn't have a team called the Washington Redskins in 2015.

[Valmy]

Heh Sikhs have no luck with ignorant bigots - if they aren't being attacked as "Hindu", they are being attacked as "Muslim"!

Eh it is not like places that are informed about Sikhs treat them much better sadly.

[Malthus]

Heh Sikhs have no luck with ignorant bigots - if they aren't being attacked as "Hindu", they are being attacked as "Muslim"!

Eh it is not like places that are informed about Sikhs treat them much better sadly.

Well, at least they will be persecuted for who they are, rather than for who they are not. 

CINNA. Truly, my name is Cinna.
FIRST CITIZEN. Tear him to pieces, he's a conspirator.
CINNA. I am Cinna the poet, I am Cinna the poet!
FOURTH CITIZEN. Tear him for his bad verses, tear him for his bad verses.
CINNA. I am not Cinna the conspirator.
FOURTH CITIZEN. It is no matter, his name's Cinna. Pluck but his name out of his heart, and turn him going.

—Julius Caesar Act III, Scene 3

[crazy canuck]

Heh Sikhs have no luck with ignorant bigots - if they aren't being attacked as "Hindu", they are being attacked as "Muslim"!

Eh it is not like places that are informed about Sikhs treat them much better sadly.

While we have a pretty poor record here I think things are much better now.

[Valmy]

You have to play on the name thing. I worked with a guy when I was delivering pizzas who claimed he got out of being beaten up for being Iranian during the Hostage Crisis by telling his persecutors he was actually Persian. They apologized and moved on.

[crazy canuck]

What is not complicated is that we shouldn't have a team called the Washington Redskins in 2015.

On that we have a clear agreement.

[dps]

"Hindu" is a slur?

You know what a Sikh is right?

Yeah, but I don't see how mistaking one for a Hindu is a slur anymore than, say, thinking I'm a Baptist when I'm actually a Methodist.

[crazy canuck]

"Hindu" is a slur?

You know what a Sikh is right?

Yeah, but I don't see how mistaking one for a Hindu is a slur anymore than, say, thinking I'm a Baptist when I'm actually a Methodist.

Both Baptists and Methodists are Christians so I am not sure you understand the difference between being a Sikh and a Hindu.  A Sikh being called a Hindu is more like a Christian being called a Jew or a Muslim being called either a Jew or a Christian.

That technicality aside, you are missing the intent of the slur.  It was meant as an insult.  To single them out as being the other.

[garbon]

The notion that because a racial or bigoted comment is common place is in some sense exculpatory is not very convincing to me.

Well I grew up here and I think so. How else would so many good and polite and wonderful people have had such bigoted and racist views? Many elderly people I knew had changed their views considerably in light of new ways of looking at things. Same with people who did anti-gay stuff in the past. Many things people did in the past seem horrible or appalling today that were considered normal or even virtuous then. We recognize them as objectively wrong, and we should, but I think it is a mistake to project backwards nefariousness or evil necessarily. The past is a foreign country and all that.

I think it is a mistake, as I see you doing, to just go oh well it was a different time. I don't see why we would assume that people who did bigoted things simply did it because they were unaware that they were actually being bigoted. Seems to be a convenient whitewashing of prejudice and enmity.