redskin

this reference to American Indians is always unacceptable; dictionaries variously label it taboo, offensive, insulting, or disparaging. "Redskin, whose earliest known written instance is 1699, was one of the first slur-names given by white settlers to the Native Americans they encountered" (Irving Lewis Allen, Unkind Words). Although anecdotally it appears that some American Indians do not particularly object to the term, for the rest of us, it is off limits: "The R-word is the moral equivalent of the N-word. It packs the same level of bigotry and insensitivity for Native Americans as any other racial slur" (Marc H. Morial, President and CEO of the National Urban League, NAACP, August 24, 2018).