“The Anti-Redskin” is an interesting Atlantic Magazine article on Ray Halbritter, the self-described “Indian the white man doesn’t want to see.” For students of American cronyism there are some interesting elements:
Halbritter was the sort of adversary the Redskins had never seen before: a leader of an American Indian tribe, with media chops, A-list political ties (he sat beside Obama at a White House event in 2013 and hosted a golf fund-raiser for John Boehner this August), and a bankroll big enough to keep the NFL’s third-most-valuable franchise under a blistering spotlight.
The Turning Stone Resort Casino, a ribbon of white stone and dark glass located half an hour east of Syracuse, is one of the top-grossing American Indian casinos, raking in well over $200 million a year in revenue from its slot machines, golf courses, and hotel rooms.
… The U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs, in turn, revoked his status as the tribe’s federally recognized representative. Halbritter drew on his ties with New York politicians; the bureau reversed its decision within 24 hours.
Six months before the showdown, Halbritter had inked a sweetheart deal with then–Governor Mario Cuomo to open Turning Stone. It was the first legal casino in New York State, and it didn’t have to share a cent of gaming revenue with any government. The deal’s generous terms, along with the tribe’s lawsuits—which sought to reclaim land from 20,000 property owners, many of them local homeowners—poisoned relations between the cash-swamped casino and the struggling rural communities around it.
What puzzles me about the article is how Dan Snyder and the Redskins are managing to resist the trend toward comparative victimhood that has swept America. Are people so busy worrying about gender discrimination and Ellen Pao that they don’t have time anymore to care about the hurt feelings of Indians?
Readers: What’s your best guess as to whether and/or for how long the football team in D.C. can continue to be “the Redskins”?
I have never heard the term “redskin” used in a derogatory way. What is the derogatory meaning?
I have heard people claim that “Indian” is unacceptable, but most American Indians seem happy with the term.
Snyder, who’s no shrinking violet, says the name will never be changed. I agree.
No one cares about Indians, Phil. They aren’t black, Hispanic nor Asian.
You should know this one, Phil. A lawsuit should continue until both parties are out of money to pay the lawyers. As long as Snyder and Halbritter have money to burn, the name must stay so that the fight can go on.
One can only guess how long it will take to get that team renamed. The movement for women’s suffrage took something like 60 years. In 1960 some black college students sat down at a segregated lunch counter and were refused service. The resulting protests invigorated the civil rights movement to a degree that no one could have anticipated at the time.
George: some ethnic slur words are derogatory in specific ways. Many others, such as the one that you’re curious about, are not derogatory in any specific way. They’re simply derogatory.
Possibly just not interesting enough to the wider public…
I recall an opposite situation where a former Mozambican citizen, now American, born in Africa to Portuguese parents (and therefore white), was forbidden to self describe by his university (and bullied by colleagues) as an African-American (despite being both), because he was white.
Redskin has no longer the “force” behind it. What it means has become dissociated from what it represents, and it just doesn’t represent insult for enough people to care.
I sense a real conflict in your post.
One hand the indian fellow is proper libertarian fighting the good
fight. Not paying taxes, etc.
But then he is acting all uppity and using white’s mans rules against them.
So you have to cage it under “Can’t we all get along”
Can’t an Indian sell fire water to pale face and steal his
money using gambling.
State Government do it every day.
hehehehehehheeeee.