TBURGESS

Not my earliest Bomber memory or my first game, but I became a life long Bomber fan when I was 9 or 10 in '66 or' 67. My team was invited to play at half time of a game because we'd been city champs the year before. 1 quarter, sideline to sideline instead of the full field. 6 teams competing at once. Nothing like making a play and hearing the crowd from the field and I made one. Sure it was probably only family and friends in the stands at half time, but still a big thrill for me. I'll never forget running on to the field or when we had to go back to our end zone seats at the end of the half. I was hooked then and I'm still hooked now.

The year off will certainly help BLM and Nichols. Possibly help Collaros too.

I'm so tired of these apples vs kumquats comparisons. Losing the season sucks, but it's the right decision that should have been made weeks ago.

I guess we need a 2021 thread now.

For what it's worth... Odell Willis - @KuntryKane205 CFL 2020 is has been cancelled!!!! Let’s get ready for 2021 #LetsTryAgainNextYear 6:06 PM · Aug 13, 2020

Solomon Elimimian @SolomonE56 Farhan not sure who your source is but with MANY issues unresolved The PA and league are NOT close to a deal. Did your source tell you the League failed to meet with PA last Friday? I won’t speak on what football ops are being directed to do but WE havnt seen it.

I don't think that kissing ass means what you think it does. Doing better isn't an argument for changing the name. Changing the name isn't doing better or getting rid of negative connotations. 🙄 It certainly is a tiny effort though. Congrats to you and your kind for getting your way. Changing the name will most certainly result in the end of racism.

Empire is problematic. Eagles works, but is kinda weak IMO. They were the Elk in '22.

Slavery was socially acceptable, legal and OK at the time. That's not the same as saying slavery is OK. Taking the word 'slavery' out of the lexicon wouldn't have changed anything. They had to take slavery out of the system (Note that I don't say WE, because we had nothing at all to do with it). Looking back, it's OK to say slave owners were people of their time, but it's not OK to suggest that they were wrong for following the social norms of their time. Certainly, looking back through a modern filter, they were wrong. Quite frankly rich people who didn't own slaves when it was legal were ahead of their time. For example: Washington, a founding father and their first president, owned slaves like most other rich men of his time. Does owning slaves at that time mean we should we ignore everything else that he did? Should we see him as a terrible person because he followed the social norms and legal rules of his time? Should his statues be removed? Social justice folks would say yes. I'd say he was a man of his time and the fact that he owned slaves should be added to every statue so people could make up their own minds. That's what I mean by trying not to put a modern filter on what happened. I don't mean ignore the past. I mean don't look at the past with today's morals include all the information about the past warts and all.

I'm not saying that, and I don't think it's implied either. It simply was what it was and it was OK when it happened. We shouldn't pretend it didn't happen or try to 'fix' it now. We should learn from it and do better now and in the future.

You're the one who took it to the personal level instead of debating the issues. I'm happy to go there too because it seems like it's all you've got. No, I'm not throwing you under the bus and no I'm not kissing ass and no, making a joke at your expense isn't sad or weak. My diatribe doesn't define systemic racism. Poor isn't a race. I don't imagine anything about you or even think of you until I reply then I move on again until the next time.

If that's the way you see yourself, it's OK with me. Sure, but that has nothing to do with Eskimo being racist or not when it was given to the club. I'm as informed as the next guy, especially if the next guy is Floyd. 😁 It's not that I don't know what happened, it's that I don't put a modern filter on what happened. It's not that I don't think some of the things that happened turned out horribly, because they did. I've repeatedly stated that the Indian Act is racist and that we should be treating everyone with the same level of respect no matter what their race, religion, sex, sexual preference, or any other way folks want to pidgin-hole other people who aren't exactly the same as they are. You're blaming all white people for the wrongs perpetrated by some white people in times when they weren't thought of as being wrong. In other words, you're basing your opinion mostly, if not purely, on race. Blame the 1%. They built the railroads, owned most of the land and all the slaves (until 1833 in Canada). Blame the Catholic church for the horrible things they put Native children through in an effort to convert them and assimilate them. Blame the government of the time who made the laws, but understand that they couldn't have made the laws if they didn't have enough votes, which shows you where the majority of folks stood on the subject at the time. There's already been a bunch of change and there needs to be a bunch more. A lot, but not all, race problems are really poor vs rich problems. Covid for example, doesn't know the race of anyone it infects, but more black and Hispanic people are getting it and dying from it in the US. That's because a lot of them live in poor neighborhoods, in crowded situations without access to the same level of healthcare that the middle and rich classes have. Michael Jordan's kids have a hugely better chance at success than any white person in the poor parts of any town. BLM folks justify burning things down by saying they don't have those things, they'll never have those things, and therefore they shouldn't respect those things (I'm paraphrasing from a John Oliver clip). Guess what? I'm an old white guy from a middle class neighborhood, who got an education and a good job and I'll never have those things either, because they're owned by the top 10% of wage earners. It's not just white folks. Natives, blacks or any other race for that matter enjoy the privileges this country has created too. For example: My Uncle was a west coast native who was taken away from his family at an early age and put in a school. He never talked about those times. He grew up to be a lawyer specializing in Aboriginal affairs then a judge. He didn't allow his race or his history to define him. One of the smartest and most successful people I've ever met. He lived the full Canadian dream, likely becoming a 10%'r, certainly being held in very high esteem by all who knew him and a nice guy too. Are we all equal? Nope, not now not ever. Is it harder to make it if you're poor or a visible minority? Absolutely. Are we failing to help the poor and the minority's. Yup. Will banning words help any of this? Nope.

Basic logic didn't defeat my argument. The current politically correct climate made logic irrelevant. Eskimos doesn't bother me or most of the affected folks who the Esks polled, but that point is lost on you. I am a non-racist white guy. I couldn't care less what anyone's ancestry is. I don't treat other races as children who need to be protected. I assume they are adults. I don't take responsibility for things that my race did in the past and I don't expect anyone of any other race to take responsibility for anything that their race did in the past. I try to see things as the were seen at the time they were done. I don't put a modern filter on them and call them bad. Eskimos, when the team was named, wasn't seen as derogatory or racist. That's the modern spin. I never said it was it was only the cost of rebranding. I had no idea what the cost was until a few days back, but the cost of rebranding is a big thing especially in today's CFL economy. You're completely downplaying the costs and expecting the Esks to pay the entire cost themselves. I see you as one of the group who is chanting in the streets: What do we want? CHANGE! When do we want it? NOW! Who should pay for it? SOMEONE ELSE!

Massive change or 'slight adjustment' both mean significant outlay of capital, which is really stupid when we don't even know if we get a CFL season this year and we don't know if no season will kill the CFL outright. I'd be very surprised if New Era or any other company for that matter would do anything 'pro bono'. Again, you want change without having to pay a dime yourself. Typical keyboard social justice warrior.

Easy to swap out, sure. Costs money to do so, sure. Sell off the old merch at a loss, costs money. Change all the marketing, costs money. Jersey refresh, costs money. All that plus more = A mill? Maybe. This isn't business as usual. It's a change that no one wants to pay for, especially during these pandemic times. You're kinda missing the point on purpose. It's not, 'this can't cost what they say it will', it's 'I'm not willing to pay a dime for a change that I want to see'. Put your money where your mouth is.

I doubt any team can afford to pay an extra million bucks this year. It's not the same as just changing jerseys, they have to change their entire branding, except maybe the double E. If it's best for the league then I guess all the teams should kick in for the name change. It's funny that folks who demand the change don't want to pay for it. They expect the team to pay the entire amount. Pretty easy to demand change when it doesn't cost YOU anything.

Edmonton is saying it will cost them a Million dollars to change the name. Should they be forced to do it in Pandemic times when they aren't making any money and when they will surely lose a bunch this year? How much money are the social justice keyboard warriors or the federal government willing to pay to the club to offset the cost?

Empire is also this guy...

Empire has strong connotations of colonialism and taking over by force. Canada was/is part of the British Empire. If the Eskimos are going to change their name they should use something more benign like Elk.

Greg Vavra is the one who surprises me. He was a great collage player, but his 5 year CFL career on 3 teams ended up with an overall 48.3% completion average for 3236 yards.

According to the poll (I'm guessing your the 'lets make a bad poll' guy in the cartoon), you're more upset about it than the very people who are actually affected. Maybe it's just not that big a deal to them. Maybe they are fully functioning adults who don't need to be 'protected' from 'bad words' like children. Maybe they understand that 'symbolic gestures' like changing the 'E' word or the 'I' word don't really mean anything. A symbolic gesture + $5 gets you a coffee at $tarbucks. Maybe they just polled the ignorant folks who don't agree with social keyboard warriors like yourself. I'm not 'ignoring historical facts'. The facts are that Indian is an inaccurate term that become the all encompassing English word for all the different tribes in North America centuries ago. It's connotation in Canada has changed in the last 30 years or so, but we haven't even changed the name of the Indian act yet. Most of history is on the side of using the words Indian and Eskimo. Indian and Eskimo are still used widely around the world. You know you're on shaky ground when you attack the person instead of the idea and you went there days ago. The cartoon is an example of cancel culture. Folks who disagree must be enraged. Any poll would obviously be bad because is wouldn't match the expected outcome. The second idea would obviously be wrong too. The 'why not just' guy gets thrown out the window because he has the answer that the cancel culture wants in the first place.

I'm not the angry office dude. I don't think we need to get the 'controversy' out of the news. I just thought the cartoon was funny. Maybe you should read things that you don't agree with so you wouldn't continually miss the points. FTR: The Eskimos poll results are in: Sounds like most of the affected peoples don't care as much as you think they do.

Blatant and intentional? Sure, but ignorance doesn't mean what you think it does. It doesn't mean 'disagrees with you' or 'disagrees with the White Guilt movement'. I understand the issues and I know what happened in the past. I simply see no value in changing words or changing how we see the past or removing things that don't match our modern sensibilities. I see putting a 2020 filter on the past as whitewashing (I don't know or care what the politically correct term is these days) what actually happened so we can 'pretend' that it never did. I do see value in addressing the actual issues. White Supremacists and White Guilt'ists are two sides of the same coin. The supremacists think they are superior because they're white. The Guilt'ists think they are superior because they feel guilty about what their race did in the past. Both sides think that people who don't agree with them are ignorant and are missing the point. If they'd just listen, they'd surely come to the same conclusions that each side has. I'm not on either side of that coin. Where you're born, who your parents are, where their ancestors came from, what your race is, what your religion is, your financial situation, your sex, who you love, and many other ways we choose define ourselves and other groups to are all totally random. Mankind needs to move past being proud of any of those things and needs to stop letting the differences keep us separated, but I suspect we never will never happen. <Puts on tin foil hat> The world has enough resources to feed, house, clothe, provide medical care, etc for everyone. The problem isn't resources. It's power and greed. 1% of people own the world. The next 9% run it. They have a huge vested interest in keeping the 90% squabbling. If we stopped, then 90% would do better and the top 10% would do worse.<Takes off tin foil hat> /endthread