It's Championship, Not Nationals

[Swan217]

Originally Posted by Alan Anderson

It isn't politically incorrect. It's incorrect, period.

Unless you're talking about an event which occurred long ago, the name "nationals" is just plain wrong. It's as wrong as calling the winner of the Indianapolis 500 a jockey, or using the word "faxing" to refer to sending email. It's not merely that the label has changed; the actual thing is different.

The event is the same, the only thing that's changed is the venue. There were international teams when it was called Nationals in 1998, there are still international teams now that it's the Championship. The National Hockey League and the National Basketball Association are still National even though there are Canadian teams. Why are they still that way? Because a majority of teams that compete are still American. It IS a simple labeling issue; fax/email and horse/car racing are bad arguments.

Originally Posted by Joe Matt

There's variation, we can remove variation and make communication and life easier. If variation is not removed it can be passed down to newer people and processes.

Remove variation.

LOL, Joe Matt sounds like the Borg: "There's variation. It must be assimilated. Resistance is futile."

You can remove variation by getting rid of the international teams and going back to Nationals too. I'm not suggesting that - that's ridiculous. Variation is good for a system - it's good for innovation and inspiration. The problem with a homogeneous population is that it stagnates and becomes vulnerable. Look at bananas - farmers eliminated variation, and what used to be called bananas became extinct through disease. Now what is now called a banana is experiencing the same problem - they're a homogeneous population that's vulnerable to a new banana disease, and they too will soon become extinct.

Variation in FIRST is what makes the program so successful. In this specific case, a labeling issue, it can create confusion in the public, which is why it should be discouraged, but internally, there are undertones with the "National" label that communicate the history of the event and how its changed and, yes, improved through variation.