Beleaguered NFL Discussing "Redskins" Problems // Nobody Has Asked FCC to Ban Word

WASHINGTON - Oct. 5, 2014 - PRLog -- Indeed, team owner Dan Snyder was reportedly pressured into making several presentations to the NFL teams'€™ owners on that very sensitive issue.

Murphy's solution might be the same one he used as athletic director for Colgate when he changed the school's nickname from "Red Raiders" to "Raiders" because of his sensitivity to the concerns of Native Americans.   After all, as Murphy pointed out, Green Bay is "right in the middle of the Oneida Nation"€ - a factor which makes him and his NFL team especially sensitive to pressure on this issue.

The Oneida Nation has been leading the fight against the continued use of the name, and against Dan Snyder himself, because it says he "continues to proudly promote bigotry by using a dictionary-defined racial slur as his team's name."

As Murphy notes, the NFL and Commissioner Roger Goodell are under tremendous pressure because of spousal and child abuse by players, a bill which would strip it of its tax exemption, alleged coverups of evidence related to spousal abuse, law suits because of both concussions during games and the use of drugs to permit players to play although severely injured, and other problems.

For this reason, a team with a racist name - even one which is in the process of having its trademarks stripped away, and facing strong FCC pressure to not have the name used on the air, especially during prime time - may not at the top of the list of the concerns of NFL owners.

However, the best time to attack a powerful opponent is when he is already weakened from other attacks, and when his energy and attention have to be directed to fending off other arguably more important threats, notes public interest law professor John Banzhaf.

Banzhaf has filed a formal legal petition with the FCC, seeking to prevent the renewal of the broadcast license of one of Snyder's radio stations because of its continued and unnecessary use of a team name which has been found in several legal proceedings to be a highly derogatory racial slur.

None of the NFL's other problems can be cured quickly and easily, notes Banzhaf, so the NFL might be willing to address the one which can be corrected literally overnight.

Changing the team's name would end the pressure from the President, half the U.S. Senate, every major American Indian organization and a growing number of other civil rights groups, being the butt of jokes on shows like "South Park" and the "Daily Show," concerns about broadcasters (and other media outlets) either voluntarily or under pressure from the FCC refusing to broadcast the name, worries about having its federal trademarks revoked, causing the NFL to lose its tax exemption over the name, etc

It certainly makes sense for the NFL owners to be discussing this issue because it is both quite serious and also very easily corrected, unlike the league's many other problems, suggests Banzhaf.

Indeed, a close friend of Murphy's, broadcaster Keith Olbermann, recently explained to his viewers how and why Banzhaf's legal petition to the FCC is likely to be very effective and successful, regardless of the legal theories upon which it is based.

Banzhaf notes, by the way, that he has never asked the FCC for a total ban on the word "Redskins" or on any other racially derogatory slur.

He explains that, although the FCC currently has no rule or regulation relating to racial slurs, nor has it ever disciplined a station for using the word "N*ggers" on the air, broadcasters have long simply recognized that the unnecessary use of racial slurs like  "N*ggers" is almost certainly contrary to the "public interest" standard they must meet in order to have their FCC licenses renewed.

Banzhaf suggests that radio or television stations might on rare occasions use racial slurs such as the word "N*gger" - for example, in discussing Mark Twain's writings, the history of the South prior to the Civil Rights Act, whether the word should be used today by rappers, etc. - but that using it dozens of times an hour when it is totally unnecessary to do so would violate broadcasting law.

That's probably why the musical group "Niggaz Wit Attitude" was almost never referred to by its full name on the air, but rather usually introduced simply as "NWA."

And this was true, notes Banzhaf, even though the African Americans who composed the group deliberately chose the name to represent themselves.  There are no Indians on Washington'€™s NFL team, and - unlike with NWA - virtually every organization representing that ethnic group has strongly condemned the choice of name as derogatory and racist, in courts and elsewhere.

There may be occasions when words which are racially derogatory to African Americans, American Indians, Hispanics, Asians, and other groups may, consistent with the public interest, be broadcast on the air.  But those are rare, and would occur only when it was necessary to use the actual racist words.

But repeated use of the R-word - which Indians say is as racially derogatory to them as the N-word is to Blacks - and when it is unnecessary to do so, can hardly be shown in an FCC license renewal proceeding to be serving the public interest, suggests Banzhaf, since broadcasters could just as easily say "€œDallas beat Washington"€ or "€œDC stomped NY"€ - all without using a racial slur word, and as some broadcasters and other media outlets are already doing.

In short, the petition which the Chairman says the FCC is prepared to consider "€œon the merits"€ asks the agency to simply not renew the broadcast license of one station which - unlike most stations in the U.S. - uses the word repeatedly and unnecessarily during most of its broadcast day.

Since the R-word - like the N-word and other racist slurs - is so clearly a fighting word, and the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that "€œfighting words"€ are not protected by the Constitution, the FCC can certainly take the repeated use of racist slurs into account without running afoul of the Constitution.

Moreover, notes Banzhaf, federal law prohibits the broadcasting of profanity during prime time to protect children, and dictionaries define "€œprofanity"€ to include racial and ethnic slurs.

So, at the very least, the FCC can and should rule that stations which repeatedly and unnecessarily use the R-word during prime time should not expect their licenses to be automatically renewed without a hearing, says Banzhaf, noting that any delay in the renewal of a license - much less holding a full evidentiary hearing - can damage a station'€™s credit rating, its ability to be sold or transferred, etc. and hang like a Sword of Damocles over its head for many months if not years.