What’s in a name?

Something is happening just beneath the fight over the name of a certain Washington, D.C., pro football team: America is working through the process of determin-ing what is-or is not-racially offensive.What is a slur, and who gets to decide? How many people must be offended to tip the scales? Why should some be forced to sacrifice their traditions out of respect for others?We are a long way from con-sensus on these questions, judg-ing by the response to a federal ruling that the "Redskins" team name is disparaging and its trade-marks should be canceled.The team is appealing the decision, and even if it loses its trademark, it can still use the name. But this latest develop-ment highlights the limitations of how America wrestles with certain racial statements, and our struggle to balance free speech and social good.Jim McCarthy, a lawyer who followed the Redskins trademark case, said he is not offended by the name, but "there's no denying the fact that a certain percentage of Native Americans are offend-ed. We don't know if it's a minori-ty, a majority, but it's a fact."Michael Lindsay, who was lead attorney for a group of Native Americans in a prior trademark case, said there are two ways to determine if something is offen-sive."The first is the legal path. The other is out in the real world. The legal test, it seems to me, actually does have something to teach the real world," said Lindsay, of the Dorsey and Whitney firm in Minneapolis.Here is what the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board, ruling Wednesday in a case first filed more than 20 years ago, tried to show the real world: • What matters is if "Redskins" is disparaging to Native Americans-whether other eth-nic groups are offended doesn't matter. • A "substantial" percentage of Native Americans must be offended-not a majority. The judges defined that threshold at 30 percent. 0 percent. • A disparaging term does not require intent: "Redskins" can still be disparaging even if the team says it is intended to show honor and respect.Based on testimony from lin-guistics and lexicography experts, and a review of how the term was used in dictionaries, books, newspapers, magazines and mov-ies, the board ruled 2-1 that the term was disparaging to Native Americans.The dissenting opinion was not a ringing endorsement of the term: "I am not suggesting that the term "redskins" was not dis-paraging ... Rather, my conclusion is that the evidence petitioners put forth fails to show that it was," the judge wrote.All of which left Paul Calobrisi, co-founder of www.savethewash-ingtonredskins.com, quite unsat-isfied. In his opinion, there's a simple way to determine whether something is a slur: The majority rules."I think an overwhelming major-ity of Native Americans should be against the name before we change it," said Calobrisi, who grew up in Virginia rooting for the team.He resisted the idea that a few people could decide something is offensive when he did not intend to offend them.But intent is irrelevant to Lindsay, the attorney: "When a substantial percentage tell you this is offensive, you should stop. It's really that simple.""Even if you meant no offense, if you keep using it, what does that say about you?"The Merriam-Webster Dictionary says the term is "very offensive and should be avoided." But again, given today's confron-tational discourse on the Internet and in politics, do we really care about giving offense? Or has that value gone the way of curtsies and tipping hats?"As a general culture, I think we care about offending certain people," said Karmit Bulman, executive director of the Conflict Resolution Center in Minneapolis. "We are still very much a pow-er-based society. We care if we offend those in power. We don't care if we offend those who we see as irrelevant and invisible.""You can look at this (Redskins case) as a trivial dispute, it's just a name," she said. "Or you can look at it as demonstrating how we still have huge clashes between people who we see as different than we are. And that our systems that we use to try to address those issues are really unsatisfactory."

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