"Redskins" has always been an epithet.
It doesn't get less epithetical because it's been a team name for almost 90 years.
I don't understand why anyone who is not a Washington fan would be angry about the name-change.
Would people be angry if the Carolina Panthers changed their name? Were people angry when the New York Titans became the New York Jets?
There's a Tulsa suburban school district called "Union," because it originated as an amalgamation of 2 or 3 small rural districts. The team name is "Redskins." The issue of changing the name has come up before and has been rejected. The district is reconsidering the issue, and I suspect the name will be changed. That's a good thing, I think. The name shouldn't have been adopted in the first place.
The same football program also rips off the U of Miami. They wear the "U" on their helmets. Miami sued them at one point for trademark (copyright?) infringement and won, but they still use it. Maybe they are paying a license fee. Their official colors are red and white. But their uniforms are maroon, silver, and black. They win the biggest-schools state football championship about every 3 years or so. They have an enrollment of 3,500 or so, which seems obscene to me. Of course, so do the other high schools that win state championships in the biggest-schools category.
Northeastern (Oklahoma) State University in Tahlequah (capital of the Cherokee Nation) is by some claims the oldest college west of the Mississippi. It was started by the Cherokees after they were brutally moved from the Southeast on the Trail of Tears. The team name used to be "Redmen." You'd think the colors might have been red and white, but they weren't, and aren't. They have been green and white for at least 50 years. They changed from "Redmen" to "Redhawks" 10-15 years ago. I think a lot of alums got upset by that. Oddly (to me) the colors are still green and white.
There are a lot of Native Americans in Oklahoma. Everybody whose ancestors were here around back around 1900 (that would include me) seems to claim about 1/16 or 1/32 Native American ancestry. By a SCOTUS decision the other day, about half the state seems to have become (or reverted to being) tribal land.