Bye Bye Belo

For those of you who aren't lawyers in Dallas (I think that's everyone except Pol Pot), let me first explain what the Belo House is.  It's a large classical revival mansion located in the middle of downtown Dallas.  It was built in 1888 by A. H. Belo, the founder of the Dallas Morning News.  Mr. Belo was also a veteran of the Confederate States Army, attaining the rank of Colonel (of course) during the Civil War.  Mr. Belo died in 1901 and the house was occupied by the Belo family until the 1920's.  It spent fifty years as a funeral home until it was bought by the Dallas Bar Foundation in 1976.

Since then it's been the headquarters of the Dallas Bar.  I've attended scores of events at "the Belo."  I knew vaguely that it was related to the Belo family who had started the Dallas Morning news, but that was about it.

Today I received what looked like a hastily thrown together email from the DBA saying that they're in the process of re-naming the building.  The email didn't mention any specific complaints that had been made regarding the name of the building, but simply said that the DBA was doing so to further its "steadfast commitment to diversity, equality, inclusion, and belonging."

I don't really care if they decide to rename it, but strikes me as being somewhat silly for a number of reasons.

1. Changing the name won't change the fact that the building was originally built for and  lived in by a racist old white guy.   If the DBA really cared, they'd find a new home that's untainted by the past.  Of course, if you scratched every building that was once occupied by a racist off the list, you'd have a lot fewer options in Dallas or anywhere else in the South.

2. Changing the name won't make a single person's life better.  

3. Lawyers like me have been referring to it as "the Belo" for a really long time and changing the name won't stop that.  I'm too old to pay attention to new names for shit.

4.  It doesn't sound like anyone was actually complaining about the name.  It sounds like the DBA started getting worried that somebody MIGHT make a big deal about it and try to cast the entire DBA as a bunch of racists.  

5. It's a historically and architecturally significant building.  I can't possibly see how trying to erase it's history (even the unsavory parts) will help anyone.  

Is anything like this going on where the other members of the Commentariat live and practice?