Official Announcement

“The time has come for us to transform this process and redirect the focus to the birds, where it belongs,” says CEO.

(November 1, 2023)—Today the American Ornithological Society (AOS) announced that in an effort to address past wrongs and engage far more people in the enjoyment, protection, and study of birds, it will change all English bird names currently named after people within its geographic jurisdiction. The AOS will also change the process by which English names are selected for bird species. The effort will begin in 2024 and will focus initially on 70–80 bird species that occur primarily within the U.S. and Canada.

Scientific names will not be changed, but the English (NA) names will be changed to better reflect the animals, not named after people.

Three owls would be subject to name changes.

  • Blakiston Fish Owl
  • Verreaux Eagle Owl
  • Wallace’s Scops Owl

This post already has potential to go wrong, but it can also begin some opportunities for education.

The movement of a collective of birders has been working on this for a few years, so there is lots of info about the project and its goals, and the history of the controversial figures is better documented than the owls currently named after them.

Would you guys want a writeup of all of this, or is this too political or negative for this group? I’ll respect your decision, but I’ll probably do an article to share somewhere. I just want to know if you all want this to be a SuperbOwl thing.

It’d be written from a neutral standpoint, just factual info.

  • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
    62·
    1 year ago

    I’m not going to up or down vote this, but I feel it is a little presumptuous. I can’t fully blame you for feeling this way, it certainly does happen the way you say at times, but some of these people do stand up for their principles at the price of their jobs.

    This isn’t the same group, but I feel it is in the same level, and they are dealing with the same situation.

    NPR Link

    Famous naturalist John James Audubon “did despicable things” and supported his work by buying and selling enslaved people — and that’s according to the organization that bears his name. But the National Audubon Society’s board of directors rejected the idea of changing its name this week, setting off resignations amid plans from local groups to rename themselves anyway.

    The debate over how to approach that legacy seems to have divided people at its highest levels: In an email to NPR, the society confirmed board members had resigned after the name decision.

    While the NAS did not name the members individually, a leadership page on the group’s website is currently missing the names of three board directors who were listed earlier this month: Sara Fuentes, Erin Giese and Stephen Tan, who served as a vice chair.