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Washington Redskins respond to name change hoax from Wednesday

By Jacob Camenker

TAMPA, FL - NOVEMBER 25: The helmet of a Washington Redskins player rests on the field during warm ups against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at the Raymond James Stadium on November 25, 2007 in Tampa, Florida. The Bucs won 19-13. (Photo by Al Messerschmidt/Getty Images)
TAMPA, FL - NOVEMBER 25: The helmet of a Washington Redskins player rests on the field during warm ups against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at the Raymond James Stadium on November 25, 2007 in Tampa, Florida. The Bucs won 19-13. (Photo by Al Messerschmidt/Getty Images) /
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On Wednesday morning, a couple of sites were made claiming that the Washington Redskins would be changing their name to the Washington Redhawks. The sites were declared to be parody accounts.

Wednesday morning was a crazy time for the Washington Redskins. For a brief moment to some, it appeared that they had changed their name to the Washington Redhawks. A couple of sites were created with news stories claiming that the Redskins had changed their name, but it was quickly revealed that this was a hoax orchestrated by a group of activists calling for the team to change their name.

The two webpages that surfaced were actually very well made, which is why some fell for the news on December 13. One site was a well-made parody of the Washington Redskins official website. The story, entitled “Go Washington Redhawks!” was formatted similarly to the stories that appear on the team’s official website. The release contained a new logo for the team as well as some quotes from Jay Gruden.

The other fake site created was a parody of ESPN, and the webpage looked exactly like the ESPN home page does on both mobile and web browsers. The only telling detail that the news was illegitimate, aside from the disclaimer that stated the story was a parody, was the fact that people were unable to click on anything else on the page, as there were no external links away from the piece about Dan Snyder honoring Native Americans by changing the mascot.

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In the immediate aftermath of this event, the Washington Redskins released the following statement from their official Twitter account to ensure that people were aware that their name hadn’t changed.

This confirmation was hardly a surprise. Given that Snyder has been adamant that he wouldn’t change the name for any reason and the team has been fighting for their name in the Supreme Court, a surprise script flip always seemed unlikely. Besides, if they were going to change the name, there would have been rumors about it long before an official release was announced.

One of the organizers of the event, Rebecca Nagle said the following of why this online hoax was staged in a press release.

"We created this action to show the NFL and the Washington Football franchise how easy, popular and powerful changing the name could be. What we’re asking for changes only four letters. Just four letters! Certainly the harm that the mascot does to Native Americans outweighs the very, very minor changes the franchise would need to make."

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Needless to say, the dispute over the Redskins name will continue to be a hot topic as long as they keep their current name. But for now, the team will keep the name they’ve had since the franchise first came to Washington.

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