1992 happened to be a significant year for the gay-rights movement as well: a case challenging Hawaii’s refusal to allow gay couples to marry was pending before the state’s Supreme Court, while presidential candidate Bill Clinton campaigned on the position that gays should be able to serve openly in the military. The court case resulted in a 1993 decision leading Hawaii toward same-sex marriage; Clinton’s move on gay rights led Congress to pass the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy in 1993 as well. It was, in many ways, the beginning of the national debate about gay rights that is ongoing today. And the contrast between Americans’ progressing attitudes toward gay people and their attitudes toward this particular American Indian slur in these last two decades is…significant. According to Gallup, American sentiment regarding the legalization of gay marriage has gone from 68%-27% against to 53%-46% in favor in the last 17 years. Now 77% of Americans say they know a gay person; that number was only 42% in the year Clinton was elected.

No one in the NFL or Redskins organizations need wait until a majority of Americans oppose the use of “Redskins” to do the right/obvious thing and change it, of course. But some movement on that front might force their hand. It’s said that the best way to get someone to change their mind on gay rights is to have one of their friends or family members come out of the closet. But Native Americans are only 1% of the population, a portion that’s even lower in D.C., which makes sense, because “Our Most Popular Sports Team Is Called [Your Ethnic Group] Sucks” is not a good slogan for selling people on moving to your city. It’s going to take something besides person-to-person interaction to change the national mood (and the mood of D.C. fans) on the issue. You’d think that thing could just be taking a half-second to realize that it’s absurd to have a football team with a racial-slur nickname in 2013. But that’s what a reasonable person watching the Redskins might’ve thought in 1992 too, and two decades later, only the names on the backs of the jerseys have changed.