Yesterday’s NFL game between the Indianapolis Colts and the San Francisco 49ers was slated to be about more than just the game, as Peyton Manning was being honored by his former team for his remarkable accomplishments over his distinguished career.
Instead, it became a public relations stunt orchestrated by the White House to further diminish and marginalize the Black players that have been staging silent protests during the playing of the national anthem to shed light on societal inequities and police brutality.
Vice President Mike Pence left the game after the anthem, saying that he would not “dignify” the demonstration of the players that took a knee.
Vice President Pence on Twitter
I stand with @POTUS Trump, I stand with our soldiers, and I will always stand for our Flag and our National Anthem.
And anyone with half a brain could see that it was a planned, orchestrated and calculated event meant to support Donald Trump’s dastardly smear campaign, which aims to shift the narrative around the protest and the false notion that the players are ungrateful millionaires disrespecting the flag, America and the military.
Dallas owner Jerry Jones seemed to take his walking orders from Trump as well when he declared that any player who disrespects the national anthem will not be allowed to play for the Cowboys.
The audacity of Trump, Pence and Jones to frame this around some nationalist, patriotic fervor has gotten out of hand and is utterly disgusting in its execution. These clowns obviously have no desire to respect the constitutional rights of Black players and are transparent in their desire to offer up some form of retribution.
This mushrooming movement that Colin Kaepernick started was never about “disrespecting” the flag or America. In fact, anyone with an understanding of how protest actions are at the very core of who we are as a nation, and how we’ve benefited as a society because of them, should be offended at Trump turning up the volume on what is becoming more and more of a clown show.
Pence leaves NFL game over anthem kneeling
Vice President Mike Pence left the Indianapolis Colts game after some players took a knee during the National Anthem.
But it’s actually deeper than that. What Trump, Pence and Jones continue to prove is that the Black man’s voice in America’s will always be muted when it comes to challenging the power structure.
It wasn’t enough for them to take glee in the daily assaults of us knowing why Colin Kaepernick remains unemployed. They went to great lengths to make sure that those working on the plantation know their place, and what will happen to them if they step out of line and have the unmitigated gall to think for themselves.
It was simply a matter of time that we would arrive at this space, of the modern day athletes following in the footsteps of and paths blazed by Muhammad Ali, The Black 14 at the University of Wyoming, Jesse Owens, Jackie Robinson, Joe Louis, Curt Flood, Paul Robeson, Althea Gibson, Jim Brown, Tommy Smith, John Carlos, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf and so many others.
We have arrived at a space where human dignity, freedom and liberty and justice for all is no longer for sale. Trump and his band of billionaires would rather that you turn away from and ignore the injustice and message of the NFL players rather than facing and confronting it.
Donald J. Trump on Twitter
I asked @VP Pence to leave stadium if any players kneeled, disrespecting our country. I am proud of him and @SecondLady Karen.
It proves once again the self-centered and moral indecency of those with great wealth and power who want to wrap themselves up in this flag controversy to overcompensate for and obscure their own sense of guilt.
It’s the same ol’ double-reverse being played out from the antiquated playbook of making the Black man the Bogeyman. And the morons have fallen for it hook, line and sinker, with their chants of “Just stick to sports.”
An athlete with a conscience, no matter how much they’re paid, cannot simply ignore the societal ills and what is happening within the world that they entertain. Trump and his boys need to understand that the days of the docile Black athlete is over.
And no amount of denial and presidential truth-manipulation can assuage the festering breaking point of having to deal with Trump’s minions as they gleefully encourage racism and intolerance through what they say, and more importantly what they don’t say.
Donald Trump and Mike Pence will soon find themselves on the shelf of presidential irrelevancy and on the wrong side of history. What they’re too dense to realize is that sports, the NFL and America as a whole are now being threatened by their own irresponsibility and recklessness.
This was never about the flag or disrespecting the military. But that’s what the con men want you to believe. Because the last thing they want is to empower people of color with the message that they actually matter, and that an honest accounting and reconciliation needs to happen.
If Jerry Jones wants to punish his players for exercising their constitutional rights, here’s hoping that Dak Prescott, Ezekiel Elliott, Dez Bryant and every Black player on the Cowboys take a knee. Let’s see how he responds to that with more than just some bullying and threats.
Donald J. Trump on Twitter
The trip by @VP Pence was long planned. He is receiving great praise for leaving game after the players showed such disrespect for country!
Somehow, these jokers have fashioned taking a knee into a sanctimonious morality that borders on the religious. It’s a dangerous lie and an ugly game that they’re playing. They’re flaming the bonfire, encouraging hate instead of exalting what’s really supposed to make America great. This country was founded on protest, on fighting for what is right and just. That somehow gets ignored.
It’s a sad state of affairs that this is what passes for “leadership” nowadays.
And the funny thing, in this entire dynamic that isn’t funny at all in its deviousness, is that Pence said the protests are disrespectful and he won’t stand for it. But then he went out and protested the protest. Think about it.
Nobody bought the sham and the flim-flam of his staged departure. But we continue to see quite clearly how those in power really value people of color the longer this debate continues.
Meanwhile, there are some real issues that need to be dealt with. But they don’t want you thinking about that, though.
