Should The NFL Penalize The Use Of The N-Word

The NFL is looking to eject the N-word from the football world.

The league is looking to put in place maybe the most controversial rule they have ever touched. It is said to be in place by the Fritz Pollard Alliance, a group that monitors diversity in the league. Beginning this season players will be penalized 15 yards for using the racial slur on the football field. If a player gets a second penalty for using the slur it will result in an ejection from the game.

With the NFL owners meeting only a few weeks away. John Wooten,the chairman of the Fritz Pollard Alliance believes that the NFL competition committee will indeed take on this penalty.

"I will be totally shocked if the competition committee does not uphold us on what we're trying to do," Wooten said. "We want this word to be policed from the parking lot to the equipment room to the locker room. Secretaries, PR people, whoever, we want it eliminated completely and want it policed everywhere."

This whole situation is a very slippery slope for the NFL to take on for many reasons. I understand wanting to clean up the locker rooms. The Richie Incognito and the bullying that went on in the Dolphins locker room you can say was a direct result of Incognito's use of multiple racial slurs. That will be a strong point for the  F.P.A  when presenting its case.

The other side of the argument is how can you police a word that has many different meanings and is infused in a certain culture that many of the NFL owners do not understand.

On top of that how can you condone the use of the word " Redskins"  when many Native -American groups have written to Rodger Goodell how it is a racial slur they want to erase from their culture.

Being a African-American young man, I believe the NFL has no precedence to penalize the word and or eject a player from a game for the use of the word.

As hard as it may be for the NFL, the best stance they can take on this proposal is no stance. This is one can of worms they do not want to open prematurely.

This is something that has to be figured out by the players union and the commissioner. You can't mess this rule up you get one chance to do this right. This isn't a new rule on hits to the head, there is a lot emotions that will be involved in this decision.  So before  Rodger Goodell pounds his gavel down he should step back and examine the choice he's about to make.

What do you think?