The city of Chicago has a Major League Soccer team which goes by the name of Chicago Fire. When I first heard of the team, I initially thought it was named after their fire department because I didn’t think the alternative was possible. Alas, I was wrong, the name of the team is actually derived from the Great Chicago Fire. In that disaster, 300 people were killed and over 100,000 residents lost their homes. As turn of the century disasters go, this one was a pretty substantial one.
I suppose the team name memorializes that event and recognizes the disaster’s place in city history. Sure that’s fine but let’s use that same argument and imagine, if you will, if some professional sports team in New York decided to name themselves the “New York 9/11s”. There would be a lot of uproar for sure. I’m guessing that time makes things less sensitive. The Great Chicago Fire happened well over a hundred years ago now. Anyone who was directly affected by the fire has now been long gone. There is no one left to be offended by the soccer team’s name. This is why things like this slide, which recreates another tragedy, got to the point where someone actually decided to make it.
It would not surprise me that perhaps 100 years from now (if civilization hasn’t ended yet), there will be a team called the “New York 9/11s” and no one would really raise an eyebrow at that.