Dear White NFL Players,
The time has come for you to no longer simply lock arms with your teammates during the NFL national anthem protests. The situation now warrants, better yet requires, that you take a knee.
Yesterday was a day of reckoning for Donald Trump, NFL ownership, coaches and racist fans that refuse to look beyond the silly cloak of the false “disrespecting the flag” nonsense.
The juvenile-in-chief’s latest diatribe at a campaign style rally in Alabama lit a spark around the league where teams unified in open displays of solidarity.
Trump: “Get that son of a bitch off the field.” during his NFL rant ” ColinKaepernick “
Trump Trashes NFL Anthem Protests: Owners Should Say ‘Get That Son of a Bitch Off the Field’ If U Have CopyRights Please Send E-mail Here : [email protected] Trump Trashes NFL Anthem Protests: Owners Should Say ‘Get That …
Obviously, each individual did so for various reasons. Some are supporting Colin Kaepernick, who’s more than qualified to have an NFL job but obviously does not at this point because he chose to utilize his first amendment rights and make a statement about police brutality and societal inequities in America during the playing of the national anthem.
Some players were continuing that fight, demanding an accounting and reconciliation of the racism that is inherent in our society, wanting the United States to live up to its lofty promises.
WATCH- Athletes Clap Back At Trump
Athletes vs Trump
Others were simply standing up for the NFL shield, which Trump attacked with a rabid lack of intelligence that obviously resonated with his like-minded supporters.
In Sunday’s first game, at Wembley Stadium in London for the international community to see, close to 30 players from the Jaguars and the Ravens took a knee on the sideline as The Star-Spangled Banner began to swell. None of them were white.
Behind the NFL national anthem protests
From London to Los Angeles, NFL players responded to President Trump saying players should be fired for protesting during the national anthem. More than 200 players kneeled or sat during anthem Sunday. The previous week before Mr. Trump’s comments, only six players protested.
The players, coaches, and even owners who remained standing did so with arms interlocked on every NFL sideline throughout the day, as some form of the scene was repeated prior to every game yesterday.
For those of you that avoided the fray previously, congratulations on finally getting on the right side of wrong.
We know that, historically, most people don’t get involved in conflict, or stand up to hypocrisy and oppression until it directly affects them. And when Trump called Kap and others a “son of a bitch” for exercising free speech, calling on owners to summarily fire them and urging fans to boycott until everyone stands, you guys finally rallied behind this burgeoning movement like the Cash Money Brothers shouting, “Am I my brother’s keeper? Yes I am!!!“
But now the question begs to be asked, are you your own keeper?
Because if you value yourself as more than just a commodity and tool of flesh and blood, here for someone else’s sick and twisted amusement, than the time is now to make that known.
Lost in the sauce of Trump’s sophomoric, racially-tinged rant about players deserving to be fired for “disrespecting America” was something that most people missed.
Bob Costas on NFL protests (full interview)
NBC Sports broadcaster Bob Costas speaks to CNN’s John Berman and Alisyn Camerota after President Donald Trump criticized the NFL and players who took a knee during the national anthem.
Before we touch on that, I’m sure that in your team meetings, your peers have informed you that Kaepernick was embodying the true essence of patriotism by protesting injustice. After all, protesting against the inequality that they were subjected to by the British is what the colonists did, which led to the establishment of this country in the first place.
Kaepernick’s decision to kneel is much more patriotic and in line with the ideals of what America should truly stand for than any of Trump’s verbal diarrhea of divisiveness. If the man was truly about patriotism, he would never uttered these words about John McCain, “Hes not a war hero. He was a war hero because he was captured. I like people who werent captured.
So to equate Kap, Michael Bennett, Malcolm Jenkins and others with being anti-american and anti-military for “protesting the flag” is like saying that John Lewis and 600 others were protesting the infrastructure of the Edmund Pettis Bridge on that March 7th Bloody Sunday in 1965.
It’s not only erroneous, it’s a blatant and convoluted lie to stir up the uneducated and ignorant masses for a sinister purpose.
But let’s take the explosive element of race out of this equation and make it about you. Because in that campaign rally on Friday in Alabama, Trump let you know exactly how much he values you. And your life.
President Trump says referees are ruining the NFL | SportsCenter | ESPN
During his recent rally, President Donald Trump told the crowd that players being penalized for hitting too hard is ruining the game of football.
He actually said that referees are ruining the game for penalizing players that hit too hard.
So, let’s get this straight. With his latest efforts to disparage and dismantle Obamacare on the brink of failure, Americans reeling from two massive natural disasters, and his desire to treat a nuclear standoff with North Korea like a Milton Bradley game of Battleship with the juvenile and antagonizing chants of “Rocket Man”, Trump finds it appropriate, in the face of all the heart-wrenching data on CTE, to belittle the NFL’s rules on protecting players from the insidious effects of its violent collisions?
Donald J. Trump on Twitter
Just heard Foreign Minister of North Korea speak at U.N. If he echoes thoughts of Little Rocket Man, they won’t be around much longer!
Today if you hit too hard15 yards! Throw him out of the game! They had that last week,” he said. “I watched for a couple of minutes. Two guys, just really, beautiful tackle. Boom, 15 yards! The referee gets on televisionhis wife is sitting at home, shes so proud of him. Theyre ruining the game! Theyre ruining the game. Thats what they want to do. They want to hit! They want to hit. It is hurting the game.
And this isn’t the first time he’s waded into these asinine, brainless waters reserved for the greatest of imbeciles. During his campaign, he said the NFL had become too soft and called concussions a little ding on the head.
Amid increasing concern over CTE (chronic traumatic encephalopathy), a degenerative brain disease linked to repeated blows to the head, a recent study of the brains of 111 deceased NFL players found all but one to have it.
Every former college football and NFL player is concerned about whether they’re the next ticking time bomb. And if you’re being honest, that includes you too.
The NFL’s concussion crisis, explained
The concussion crisis in football is getting harder and harder to ignore. The sport is trying to change the rules to protect players, but danger could be too deep in its DNA. Further reading: PBS’ great coverage of this issue: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/league-of-denial/ Boston University’s CTE Center: http://www.bu.edu/cte/about/what-is-cte/ League of Denial Q&A (sbnation) http://www.sbnation.com/nfl/2013/10/9/4817818/league-of-denial-nfl-concussion-crisis-authors-interview-pbs-frontline “Does Football have a future?”
And what Trump has basically said is that he cares about you, your long-term health, and the fact that you might be one day likely to kill yourself and others due to the effects of this violent game being played at its highest and most violent levels as much as he cares about women’s private parts.
He places no value on your life. To him, you’re just a piece of meat. He’s basically saying with a shrug of the shoulders, “If you die, you die.”
That’s why it’s imperative that you join your colleagues in silent protest. If you can’t do it in support of Colin Kaepernick, social justice and fair treatment for all under the law, your peers being called a “son of a bitch” for doing something American in utilizing free speech, how bout you do it for you.
Because Donald Trump was loud and clear about how he feels about you. And your life.
Perhaps now you can relate as an NFL player, on some level, with others in the locker room and their feelings. It’s not cool to be considered a disposable, soulless commodity who should be happy and content with cashing a fat check, is it?
Maybe you could take a knee also, if only to let everyone know that you’re a human being too.
