Q&A: Waubgeshig Rice on far-reaching impact of Washington team name change - Sportsnet.ca

SPORTSNET: When you see sports headlines and an Indigenous team name flashes across the screen, what goes through your head?Well, I find the blatant examples offensive. It disturbs me to see some slurs so freely thrown around like that and I often won’t click on the story or follow up on it because I don’t want to see those particular words repeated over and over in front of my eyes. So, I have tended to avoid coverage of some of those teams over the course of my sports fandom.

I think back to when I used to play fantasy football all the time and whenever the draft came up every year, I would specifically avoid drafting a Washington player, no matter how good they were. Because I didn’t want to have that sort of connection to my fantasy football team. And it’s obviously a very trivial thing and ultimately pretty meaningless. But even then, I didn’t want that regular reminder.

That’s the biggest question I think we’re facing right now. It is a hot topic of conversation. And fortunately, we have seen some meaningful change in recent months as a result of this more widespread awareness of issues of racism. But it remains to be seen. Hopefully we’ll still be talking about these things in three, six, 12 months’ time. But I take solace in the fact that there has been concrete change. The Washington team will no longer be known as that slur.

Oh, absolutely. Because I don’t see myself dropping out of sports fandom altogether — I will continue to watch sports. I really enjoy just sitting at home and watching the game. And my older son, who’s three and a half, is already well familiar with hockey. He knows I watch the Maple Leafs on a regular basis. So he’s aware of what these sports are and how I feel about them.

ByDavidSingh waub Genuine question. Are the actual native people offended by this or is mainly people being offended for them?

ByDavidSingh waub P*ssies

ByDavidSingh waub Snowflakes

ByDavidSingh waub Sad day for sports.

ByDavidSingh waub I hope they are able to find an good nickname for the club. Also glad they finally are giving up this nickname

ByDavidSingh waub Edmonton Oil riggers ! Sounds great

ByDavidSingh What about the Black Hawks, is Chicago and Washington different?

ByDavidSingh If it's Sportsnet, there's some leftist agenda coming.

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