One big piece of the proposed $290 million D.C. United stadium deal that hasn’t been much discussed is what would happen to RFK Stadium, the former home of the Washington Senators and Nationals that currently hosts soccer and not a whole lot else. But apparently D.C. officials have been thinking about it, because they tell the Washington Post that … okay, that they’re going to start thinking about it any day now?
[D.C. sports authority president Gregory] O’Dell said the authority will hire a firm in the coming months to evaluate options, with and without a stadium. It also will explore whether it makes sense to keep RFK standing and operating in the interim. “We’ll look at the as-is condition and what’s viable and financially feasible,” he said.
The city’s lease with the National Park Service, which owns the RFK site, limits it to “stadium purposes,” “recreational facilities, open space, or public outdoor recreation opportunities,” or “other similar public purposes”; this has plenty of people thinking “new stadium for Washington’s football team that shall go nameless,” including both Mayor Vincent Gray and mayoral candidate Jack Evans, who’ve both endorsed the site for football games. (“And not just for college games,” added Gray, in case anyone might have missed his point.) Of course, this would mean finding a way to pay for a football stadium on top of a soccer one, but let’s not think about that just yet, shall we?
I know it’s a non-sequitor, but I’ve heard a lot of slurs in my day, but I’ve never heard anyone refer to a Native as a Redskin. Whether a name change is made or not, a lot of this reeks of people who are anti-football, Snyder, etc. trying to grasp onto something that they don’t really care about.
Ben, you don’t hear people referring to Native Americans as “redskins” anymore because it’s such a PROFOUNDLY UGLY AND RACIST THING TO CALL SOMEONE. Since there are very few Native people left, and the ones who are around are dirt poor and geographically isolated by and large, not many people care. No sane team would ever name itself after a physical feature of an ethnic group it would stand to risk losing money by offending (and this is why Braves or Warriors, which carry a positive connotation, are not offensive, but Redskins is).
I’m a fan of the team, but the name is indefensibly awful. I’m surprised that Snyder never took advantage of the opportunity to sell a $billion worth of Pteradactyls – or whatever – jerseys. Particularly strange that “Redskins” are still with us while the inoffensive “Bullets” are long gone.
The team is still called the Redskins because for some reason it is still socially acceptable to make racist remarks concerning Native Americans. I mean seriously, they still do the “tomahawk chop” at Braves games and Cleveland still has the offensive caricature of Chief Wahoo as their logo. Let’s face it, had the team been called the Washington Darkies (or any other related offensive term) the team name would have been changed years ago. It is time for Washington to make the change and Cleveland/Atlanta should not be far behind.
DGA,
So you’re telling me back in the bad old 70’s or 80’s you heard people referring to Natives as Redskins?
And either way, Redskins/Redmen/etc. were never meant to be derogatory. The connotation was always that Natives had a lot of great warriors. And look, I’m fine with the name change anyway but it’s just plain dumb to act like Redskins was ever used as a derogatory term.
Ben, you might want to brush up on your history. The Washington Redskins (formerly the Boston Redskins) have been around since 1932. The term might not have been deemed intentionally racist back in the 1930’s, but many terms used to describe minorities back in the 1930’s are no longer socially acceptable today. It is time for the Washington Redskins (like many NCAA schools have already done) to change their name to something less offensive. Personally I like the Pigskins.
A number of years ago Stanford’s mascot went from the Indians to a, well, dancing tree (which maybe is appropriate for Palo Alto).