Playwickian policy is puerile, at best. But, if students don’t want to print the word R—— that should be the end of the story, not the end of the paper. We cherish students’ journalistic freedom.
I understand how some Native Americans find the name R—— offensive. It is associated with the murder and slaughter of many Native Americans whose dead “red skins” were bountied in early America. Both Native Americans and non-Native Americans have to live with that gruesome fact. History cannot be changed by ignoring facts, only the present and future suffer from deliberate ignorance.
We must face up to our own history and recognize that a society of human beings once lived where we now live, and that our forbearers chased them away and brutally murdered them. Only by teaching this can we claim to hold truth dear, and profit students by helping them realize how contrary to our current ideals was that historic travesty.
That is the lesson we must impart, the original meaning of the name R——; the fact that it stood for a ruthless practice, a near genocide, perpetrated against a brave people, creating a stain on our national origin. That is a history lesson which will instill awareness and empathy, and produce better citizens.
The name R—— was chosen to honor to Native Americans because it exemplifies bravery – the exact attribute a chooser of names would want to reflect and instill in athletic competitors. Racial or ethnic animus played no part in selecting or retaining our emblem; that narrative makes no sense. It is a glorification, not of murder and barbarity, but of the bravery of Native Americans to whom we owe an unpayable obligation of blood, and also a debt for the very land beneath our feet: Truthful recognition and unceasing remembrance is a good faith payment against that debt. Go R——!

— Warren D. Tochterman, Esq.
Bensalem, PA