Sorry to pop this thread up, but I found this article about a Washington State High School whose mascot's name is... the Redskins:
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle...be-left-alone/
The majority of people living in this town are Native Americans, and they don't think the name is offensive.
Not being American, it's hard for me to get an opinion on this matter, so I found this article interesting because it's written by someone who thinks the Redskins' name is offensive... but is forced to admit it is not to some of the only ones it should (or shouldn't) offend.
Here are some interesting parts:
-"Take Clarence Le Bret, who at 90 says he’s the oldest male tribal member in town. Controversy, what controversy, he says. “It’s the traditional name we always had.”"
-"Here, the kids have their “Wellpinit Redskins” T-shirts and sweatshirts they wear to games or Spirit Week. At games, they chant, “
Redskin Power!”
Says Kyra Antone, 17, who’s going into 12th grade and is wearing one of the T-shirts, “
It’s not a negative name for us. Whenever I think of Redskins, I think of
pride in our sports teams. There’s nothing wrong with being a 17-year-old Native American.”"
-"
That the term is derived from the blood from the scalp of a Native American is in dispute, as is often the case with what is and isn’t historically provable.
Ives Goddard, emeritus senior linguist at the Smithsonian Institution’s Department of Anthropology, in 2005 wrote a research paper on the term.
He says the assertion became popularized when American Indian rights activist Suzan Harjo said it on the “Oprah Winfrey Show” in 1992.
“
There wasn’t anything to support the connection,” says Goddard. “But that’s what everybody now thinks.”
In fact, he says,
it was Indians who first came up with the term when the whites showed up in this continent: “You guys are white, we are red.” It became derogatory in later usage, he says.""
-"Let the East Coast fester in the Redskins name controversy.
Says Ford, “
I use the name proudly. I wear it with respect.”"