Change the Name Boycott of Corporate Sponsors of the D.C. NFL Team — March Update

                                        Seattle Human Rights Commission

1963 – 2015   ·   52 years of championing human rights and fostering a just future

March 3, 2015

Hogen Adams, Lochen Silva, Yale Law School NALSA, and UW NALSA Join Change the Name Boycott of Corporate Sponsors of the D.C. N.F.L. Team

For information contact:

Ethel Branch

(206) 344-8100

ethel.billie@gmail.com

SEATTLE–Lochen Silva, PLLC (Seattle and Minneapolis), Hogen Adams PLLC (St. Paul), and The Public Advocate, NC (Seattle) have joined the chorus of law firms boycotting the key corporate sponsors of the DC NFL team. This takes the number of law firms boycotting team sponsors to eight. The other firms boycotting team sponsors include Kanji & Katzen PLLC, Kewenvoyouma Law, Skenandore Law, Galanda Broadman, and the Alaska office of Sonosky, Chambers, Sachse, Endreson & Perry, LLP.

The Yale Law School and University of Washington chapters of the Native American Law Students Association have also joined the boycott, as has the prominent Seattle-based nonprofit, OneAmerica, which was founded to combat hate and promote equality.

The corporate sponsors of the DC NFL team subject to the boycott include Bank of America, FedEx, Bud Light, Ameritel, Ticketmaster, and StubHub. Boycotters pledge to not purchase goods or services from these sponsors until the team changes its name.

The boycott comes at the behest of the Seattle Human Rights Commission, which charges that the team name is not just offensive, but is also a human rights violation, and so its use should cease. Immediately.

Multiple studies have found that mascots like the DC team’s have a direct effect on the self-esteem of Native American children and teenagers, whose suicide rate has increased 65 percent in the last decade. In just the last month, three Native youth have committed suicide on the Pine Ridge reservation in South Dakota. These suicides came on the heels of a hate-laden incident at a Rapid City Rush hockey game wherein spectators hurled “beer baths and racial slurs” on a large group of Native children from Pine Ridge.

DC NFL team owner Dan Snyder defends the team name by saying it honors Native Americans, but the term was historically used to justify violence against Native Americans. Its continued use normalizes the dehumanization of Native people and emboldens hate crimes such as the one witnessed in Rapid City. This has a crushing effect on the psyche of Native youth. The name must change. Now. The Seattle Human Rights Commission urges you to join this boycott, which almost 200 individuals have joined, via this link: https://www.change.org/p/dan-snyder-boycott-d-c-n-f-l-team-sponsors-until-the-name-is-changed. ###