/In re: Rick Reilly’s Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Defense of the Washington Redskins

This pretty much sums it up.

Rick Reilly, a columnist for ESPN, recently posted an op-ed defending the name and mascot of the Washington Redskins. Read it, ye mighty, and despair. Kissing Suzy Kolber’s response is funnier and more biting, but David Zirin’s offers more salient counter-examples. Read both for a full picture of just how misguided Reilly’s column really is.

It’s not even that there should or shouldn’t be a controversy about the name. It’s that Reilly’s column doesn’t show a hint of nuance, context, or understanding of how race and culture actually work. His position is odious, but it’s also badly and inconsistently argued.

A few things that I haven’t seen mentioned (yet) in the collective Internet’s swift excoriation:

/Thoughts on weddings

Confession time: I absolutely love weddings. And not just for the open bar.

(Sidenote: I once attended an alcohol-free reception and vowed never again–there is just no way to comfortably navigate that kind of social minefield without a buzz.)

 There are no less than six wedding blogs that I read daily, obsessively bookmarking my favorite posts.  I’m not entirely sure where this compulsion came from–I have never been engaged, and it doesn’t look like I will be anytime soon (AHEM AHEM).  Despite this fact, I am giddy for all things marriage, most especially weddings that feature bunting, cute couples, papel picado, and DIY details.  Unfortunately, none of my favorite weddings share a cohesive theme or design, so I have a feeling my Big Day is going to be some bizarre Franken-wedding full of mismatched details.  Also, I’m serving Mexican food, so I really hope that Los Tres Amigos on Lebanon Road caters.

Though my devout following of the internet wedding community has shown me lots of wonderful ideas for my own (non-existant) nuptials, there are a few things that I wish would just disappear from the collective wedding-planning-conscious.