Colin Kaepernick & Other National Anthem Protests

I'm going to say my piece on this. I've seen people saying that these players should shut up and appreciate the "American money" they get paid, that they are disrespecting our troops, our country, that they are spoiled and ungrateful, that they should protest in a more "positive way" or they should just get the hell out of the U.S.

I call bullshit.

They have done so peacefully, fully understanding the consequences of their actions and accepting that they'd receive backlash. And, in this great nation, they have done so without being hauled off to jail or beaten for it, unlike what you see happening in other countries to those who stand up for human rights.

You can love your country, you can respect those who have fought and died for it, and still demand better from those who make up this great nation, expect this country to be more than it is now. Civil disobedience is the very core of our values, starting with our Founding Fathers saying they weren't going to take this shit anymore of how we were being treated. It continues today with protests against a pipeline that is ill-conceived and representative of days soon past of our treating our planet as if we have no consequences for our actions.

There was a time when women protesting for the right to vote were treated even worse - jailed and force-fed after they went on hunger strikes when incarceration wasn't bringing enough attention to their cause. They were called names, told to go home where they belonged, derided and insulted. It took those brave souls standing up for what they believed was right, for not backing down in the face of opposition, for taking the abuse and criticism heaped upon them. Now, we can't imagine women not having the right to vote. This country was changed for the better.

Martin Luther King Jr led a peaceful revolution that led to the Civil Rights Act and major improvements for how blacks were treated in this country, and he lost his life for it. Sadly, we still have a ways to go to achieve equal treatment and equal opportunity.

Those who protest for a better way of life in the country they love don't have to cut and run somewhere else and they shouldn't be told to do so - that doesn't make us better, stronger, more worthy of respect, or better people.

Change is always fought. Progress feared for its unknowns. We still face race issues in this country and if this is how attention gets called to it, by those who can afford to stand up and say something, those who are listened to and looked up to for their talents, then more power to them! They aren't taking guns and going out murdering people to vent anger, they are trying to make a statement and effect change the way it should be - by convincing the majority that there's a better way. By shining a light on injustice and inequality.

That's how our democracy works. That's how change is effected peacefully instead of through bloodshed, how we continue to evolve and improve. How we remain the greatest country in the world.

If you'd like to see what Shannon Sharpe had to say:


www.hotnewhiphop.com/shannon-sharpe-pass...new-video.38524.html

Fred Hayak started a thread on this over in our Sports Forum , but I'm going to put the info I've been gathering here as I think this is more political than sports-related.

I've been having some lengthy conversations on my FB profile about this, but realize that some aren't on FB and others prefer to reply anonymously, so here's the place to do both. Colin Kaepernick kneeling has now taken a new life after Trump decided to weigh in this week and inject politics into sports, not that it wasn't already there (more on that later). The initial goal of the movement, to protest racial injustice, has now also become a protest against an attempt by the president to tell private business owners to restrict First Amendment rights of their employees.

Now, if you're going to judge someone by their actions, it is incumbent upon you to learn their motivations and their goals for doing so. Not to guess, not to ascribe to it your own motivations and assumptions, but theirs. I've got two articles below on that, then some videos of commentators with their positions that I think are worth considering.

Eric Reid: Why Colin Kaepernick and I Decided to Take a Knee
By ERIC REID
September 25, 2017

In early 2016, I began paying attention to reports about the incredible number of unarmed black people being killed by the police.

A few weeks later, during preseason, my teammate Colin Kaepernick chose to sit on the bench during the national anthem to protest police brutality. To be honest, I didn’t notice at the time, and neither did the news media. It wasn’t until after our third preseason game on Aug. 26, 2016, that his protest gained national attention, and the backlash against him began.

That’s when my faith moved me to take action. I looked to James 2:17, which states, “Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.” I knew I needed to stand up for what is right.

I approached Colin the Saturday before our next game to discuss how I could get involved with the cause but also how we could make a more powerful and positive impact on the social justice movement. We spoke at length about many of the issues that face our community, including systemic oppression against people of color, police brutality and the criminal justice system. We also discussed how we could use our platform, provided to us by being professional athletes in the N.F.L., to speak for those who are voiceless.

After hours of careful consideration, and even a visit from Nate Boyer, a retired Green Beret and former N.F.L. player, we came to the conclusion that we should kneel, rather than sit, the next day during the anthem as a peaceful protest. We chose to kneel because it’s a respectful gesture. I remember thinking our posture was like a flag flown at half-mast to mark a tragedy.

It baffles me that our protest is still being misconstrued as disrespectful to the country, flag and military personnel. We chose it because it’s exactly the opposite.

Colin Kaepernick explains why he sat during national anthem
By Steve Wyche, NFL Media reporter
Published: Aug. 27, 2016

"I am not going to stand up to show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses black people and people of color," Kaepernick told NFL Media in an exclusive interview after the game. "To me, this is bigger than football and it would be selfish on my part to look the other way. There are bodies in the street and people getting paid leave and getting away with murder."

Kaepernick said that he is aware of what he is doing and that he knows it will not sit well with a lot of people, including the 49ers. He said that he did not inform the club or anyone affiliated with the team of his intentions to protest the national anthem.

"This is not something that I am going to run by anybody," he said. "I am not looking for approval. I have to stand up for people that are oppressed. ... If they take football away, my endorsements from me, I know that I stood up for what is right."

Shannon Sharpe has weighed in on this and he didn't pull any punches:
Short clip:
More:

act.tv video (2:24): Taking a Knee is a Sign of Respect

Video Facebook (3:16): Dale Hansen just delivered the best response to NFL athletes taking a knee.

Video (2:16): Bob Costas on Trump's Criticism of NFL Players

Video (1:39): Fox's Shep Smith: It's being framed as players attacking the anthem, troops, & the flag....that's not what they're doing and we're complicit

Video (1:51): Coach Popovich: "Where does the morality and the decency kick in?"

Respect: Colin Kaepernick – The Extended Cut
by Jim Wright, Stonekettle Station
Friday, September 2, 2016

Guess what, Folks? The Star Spangled Banner doesn’t belong to veterans. The national anthem is just that, the anthem of the nation.

The song, the flag, those are symbols of a nation, the whole nation, not just one little subset of it.

If you want respect, true respect, sincere respect, then you have to give it.

And that takes us to your question:

AS A VETERAN, what do you think about Colin Kaepernick's decision to sit during the National Anthem?

If you want respect, you have to do the things necessary to earn it each and every single day. There are no short cuts and no exceptions. This is true of men and true of nations.

If Colin Kaepernick doesn't feel his country respects him enough for him to respect it in return, you can not make him respect it.

If Americans want this man to respect America, then first they must respect him.

I didn’t say you had to agree with him.

I didn’t say you had to agree with his methods.

If America wants the world's respect, it must be worthy of respect.

America must be worthy of respect. Torture, rendition, indefinite detention, unarmed black men shot down in the street, poverty, inequality, voter suppression, racism, bigotry in every form, obstructionism, blind patriotism, none of those things are worthy of respect from anybody -- least of all an American.

The NFL Commissioner and several team owners released statements opposing Trump's words. Two owners stood or knelt on the field in solidarity with their players. They alone have the say in what happens to these players and it is not illegal to protest while on company time. As a government official, and President of the United States of America, you have NO right to threaten or call for a US citizen's right to freedom of speech. And in point of fact, Trump Was Just Slapped With A Criminal Ethics Complaint Over His Attacks On Black Athletes . Can you imagine the reaction if former President Obama had done the same to Tea Partiers for their demonstrations?

What started as a protest against racial injustice has morphed into a protest against government attempts to stifle our First Amendment rights. Both are equal, worthy, non-partisan causes, and we can't lose sight of either. The FBI and the DHS published a report on the growing threat of white supremacists in our country. Not Muslim terrorists, though our president has attempted more than once to implement an unconstitutional ban citing that as a reason to make our nation more safe, and he's praised Nazi groups as having "some very fine people" while not condemning white supremacists vigorously and clearly. The words our president uses, and his actions (pardoning Joe Arpaio, for example), matter. They embolden those who would otherwise restrain themselves for fear of backlash and reprisals.

A couple more points, then I'll shut up and listen. I do not see what these players are doing as disrespectful to our country, our flag, our anthem, or our troops and veterans. Our flag and anthem represent our country, our troops swear an oath to the Constitution of the United States and its ideals, not to a piece of cloth or a song. Dissent and peaceful protest is as American as the flag itself and our Founding Fathers encouraged it. These protests were begun to fight unequal treatment and unfair injustice to fellow citizens of our great nation - that is patriotic. They love their country and they want it to become better, not sabotage it.

Their manner of protest was peaceful, it disrupted no one getting to work or businesses trying to make a living, it didn't delay anyone's entertainment (and the people I've seen saying this as a disagreement have me stunned - that's white privilege at its finest folks that you are more upset that your "entertainment" by these players is more important than unequal and unjust treatment of our fellow citizens), cost anyone who paid to watch the game any money, they did it on their own work time facing the consequences of their actions. You do not have to agree with their goals or with their methods of action, but you damn well shouldn't agree with a president who says they should shut up and sit down. Listen to them. See if their cause is credible and just, and if so, help raise awareness and make things change for the better. It won't take legislation, it will take a change in our own attitudes and in our institutions (law enforcement, judicial, education, etc) to guard against abuses.

"Last, If you love this country, try to understand what's happening to it.

By isolating yourself around people like yourself, you are refusing to even explore why so many others are angry.

Our world is changing. There really is no going back.

We want you to be part of it.

So put down the 140 word limit and start having real conversations with people who are different from you."
~Chris Seelbach




"First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection."
~Martin Luther King Jr, Letter From a Birmingham Jail, 1963

"And I must say tonight that a riot is the language of the unheard. And what is it America has failed to hear?...It has failed to hear that the promises of freedom and justice have not been met. And it has failed to hear that large segments of white society are more concerned about tranquility and the status quo than about justice and humanity."
~Martin Luther King Jr

"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."
~John F. Kennedy

“Patriotism means to stand by the country. It does not mean to stand by the President or any other public official save exactly to the degree in which he himself stands by the country. It is patriotic to support him in so far as he efficiently serves the country. It is unpatriotic not to oppose him to the exact extent that by inefficiency or otherwise he fails in his duty to stand by the country.”
~President Theodore Roosevelt, 1918.

"The hope of a secure and livable world lies with disciplined nonconformists who are dedicated to justice, peace and brotherhood."
~Martin Luther King, Jr.

"Injustice, poverty, slavery, ignorance - these may be cured by reform or revolution. But men do not live only by fighting evils. They live by positive goals, individual and collective, a vast variety of them, seldom predictable, at times incompatible."
~Isaiah Berlin

"The most sacred of the duties of a government [is] to do equal and impartial justice to all citizens."
~Thomas Jefferson, Note in Destutt de Tracy, 1816

“The real damage is done by those millions who want to 'survive.' The honest men who just want to be left in peace. Those who don’t want their little lives disturbed by anything bigger than themselves. Those with no sides and no causes. Those who won’t take measure of their own strength, for fear of antagonizing their own weakness. Those who don’t like to make waves—or enemies. Those for whom freedom, honour, truth, and principles are only literature. Those who live small, mate small, die small. It’s the reductionist approach to life: if you keep it small, you’ll keep it under control. If you don’t make any noise, the bogeyman won’t find you. But it’s all an illusion, because they die too, those people who roll up their spirits into tiny little balls so as to be safe. Safe?! From what? Life is always on the edge of death; narrow streets lead to the same place as wide avenues, and a little candle burns itself out just like a flaming torch does. I choose my own way to burn.”
― Sophie Scholl, co-founder, The White Rose Society

"Patriotism is love of country. But you can't love your country without loving your countrymen and countrywomen. We don't always have to agree, but we must empower each other, we must find the common ground, we must build bridges across our differences to pursue the common good."
~Cory Booker

"The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions, that I wish it to be always kept alive. It will often be exercised when wrong, but better so than not to be exercised at all. I like a little rebellion now and then. It is like a storm in the atmosphere."
~Thomas Jefferson, letter to Abigail Adams, February 22, 1787