“Ladies and gentlemen, they and them and y’all, wives and wives, husbands and wives, husbands and husbands, significant others; I’m glad you, them, their, y’alls could be here this evening.”

Inwardly, he breathed a sigh of relief. No one had called him out for failing to address them properly. Or perhaps it was a rare display of excess politeness in consideration of the gravity of what was at stake tonight.

He resumed, still tense.

“As parents and teachers at our wonderful school, Columbus High, renamed, of course, from Christopher Columbus High—and now named for that great city in Ohio—I we, and they thank you, them  and however you identify, for meeting to  resolve yet another example of insensitivity on the part of the school board, which I have the privilege of representing.

“As a community that has not rallied against issues we are united on, such as election meddling or soliciting foreign governments to investigate our countrymen, countrywomen,  countrypersons, and countrytheirrthems, we have decided  instead  to create issues that divide us, and rightfully so, and now this group must tonight face the issue of renaming our high school football team.”

“It’s about time!” An angry member had risen and shouted her opinion.

The school board member continued. “Significant protests have arisen, many from those in this room, about the use of the name the Lions as our football team. While some have encouraged its retention-“

“Rot in hell! Rot in hell!”

“—we have determined to change the name.”

Applause.

“We are here tonight to accomplish that.”

A hand is raised. A strong voice speaks. “Excuse me, them, but-“

“I don’t go by ‘them’, you can call me   ’you’-“

“I prefer to be called ‘them,’ you.”

“Fine. Let me try to keep this straight.”

The woman again. “Using the word ‘straight’ in this context is derisive!”

“It’s an idiom.”

From the crowd: “You’re an idiom!”

“Let me get back tom the person whose hand was raised. Go, ahead, them.”

“We know we need to avoid references in the name to any endangered species.”

Another voice. “Right, and if an animal name is chosen, there can’t be any implication that there is use of bestial behavior on the part of the animal itself.”

A man at the back of the room. “How about just ‘Our High School Football Team’?”

A new voice. “I object to the pronoun ‘our.’”

The man replies, with some frustration, “Ok, then “High School Football Team’?”

Another voice. “Age discrimination!”

The man is bewildered. “Participants need to be in high school, age isn’t the factor.”

“It’s implied!”

“Then just ‘Football Team’.”

A woman with a thick accent raises, smiles, and says, “I like it.”

Yet another voice, irate. “Not enough diversity. What about rugby, soccer, La Crosse?”

The man is incredulous. “But it IS the football team.”

Someone else. “The use of the word ‘team’ implies a specific grouping, not enough inclusivity.”

The man. “Just ‘Football’.”

Silence. Then murmuring. Then a sound of general concurrence. Then a shaking of hands, by prior permission, and a few high fives which were done impulsively, but no one objected.

And then…

“Can I just say something? I don’t think we should allow football at all—it’s brutal and sexist.”

Who knows what happened next, who landed the first blow, who landed the last? It was carnage. All the attempts at civility had ended. All the unfiltered comments let fly.

The next day on Facebook, people at the meeting began posting they were victims and began the #MeFirst movement.

That same day, the school board received a major donation from Mel and Helen Lyons for school sports programs.

In their honor, the football team was named The Lyons.

For Elaine Kendall