The world's largest democracy and potato farmers

On the bottom of today’s New York Times op-ed page, there is a marvelous column by Jim Shore, general counsel of the Seminole Tribe of Florida, discussing the use of Native American mascots in college sports. And what Mr. Shore has to say may surprise quite a few.

The NCAA recently ruled that Native American mascots would be banned from post-season play starting this February, but has granted an exception to Florida State University (which uses the Seminole name). And, as Mr. Shore explains, this is largely because FSU has long gone out of its way to build a positive relationship with the local tribe.

While it may seem easy to understand FSU’s actions given that “Seminole” is not the sort of generic term used by Atlanta’s baseball team or Washington’s football squad, the reality is that these teams – as well any number of other professional, collegiate and high school sports departments – would do well to pay some modicum of homage to the people’s whose names they seem to borrow in a supremely capricious manner.

Growing up, I went to just about every Washington Redskins home game for a decade. Some seasons were winning campaigns. Most weren’t. But I always thought it interesting that Native American activists would only picket games when the team was doing well. In other words, if the squad was likely to get more face time on SportsCenter and other media outlets, the protestors figured they might be able to steal some of it.

Is “Redskins” a derogatory term? Given that the squad doesn’t have a potato on its helmets, it would seem so. But it has also been the team’s name for nearly three quarters of a century now. And while lyrics like “braves on the warpath” in a fight song might seem constant reminders, the truth is that fans are entirely oblivious to the nature of the term most of the time. In Washington, DC – one of the more powerful cities in the world by all accounts – the word “Redskin” is not a derogatory reference to Native Americans, it is a football team and nothing else.

It is noble of the NCAA to step up and try to make politically correct numerous schools across America. But the time for these fights is when the teams first adopt such questionable names, before they adopt such second meanings. Words have a funny way of evolving, with certain definitions being shed over time as others are adopted.

Besides, you never know if Cleveland’s baseball team is really just paying a bizarre tribute to Pakistan’s neighbor.