This is going to be a more serious topic that I’m talking about today compared to the other topics I’ve talked about in my previous blogs. Today’s topic is going to be covering one of the most polarizing events that has happened in recent years in sports. I’m going to be talking about Colin Kaepernick and his action to take a knee during the national anthem that enraged so many people yet brought an awareness for change that desperately needed to happen.
In 2016, Colin Kaepernick decided to kneel during the national anthem and it enraged a specific group of people. Kapernick was protesting police brutality, racial injustice, oppression, and the other types of injustices that was and has been happening to black people in America. Many people supported him like his teammates for example who would kneel with him and other players on different teams would do the same thing. I remember in high school my sophomore year when this happened and I was walking out with my football team to play a game Friday night and we all wanted to take a knee. Everyone, coaches included was all for it but we couldn’t do it because of how much it would blow back on our team and school. Mind you, we were the only school in our county that was truly diverse with mostly minority students from everywhere you could think of. In my school, white people were actually the minority because we barely had any. I had to stop and tell this story because I felt it was essential to the overall narrative of this blog. Now, back to what I was saying; what we did to compromise not being able to kneel was walking out locking arms with each other during the anthem in solidarity with Colin Kaepernick and what he was protesting. And I remember many high schools at the time did what we did or even kneeled risking their season in order to stand up for what was right.
As many people supported Kaepernick’s actions, there were many people who hated what he did and it was a specific group of people too. Many white(especially conservative) people hated on Kapernick for what he did. Networks like Fox News would bash him constantly for doing what he did. I feel like this event really started to show how deeply divided we still are as a country. I know this country still has it’s sins and it’s been divided but this event only solidified that we are very much still deeply divided. I remember watching videos of people cursing at Kapernick and burning his jerseys and everything they had of him because of how much hate they still have in their hearts. These people wanted to boycott the NFL and adding more fuel to the flame, former President Trump called for any NFL players that chose to kneel during the anthem be fired from their “jobs”. This event only further opened my eyes that these people still see players(especially black) not as humans but as entertainment. Basically the equivalent of “Shut up and Dribble”. And I definitely think this event brought out racist people that’ve been hiding in the closet for a while.
Social media is where we saw the good and the worst of this whole situation. Social media is how this whole situation was amplified because people were saying whatever they wanted to behind a screen without fear of anything happening to them. The accounts that wouldn’t even have a profile picture were the worst ones because they would have literally zero followers but be saying the most racist stuff!(And I used stuff because I didn’t want to curse in this blog) But, you also had athletes like LeBron James and organizations like the WNBA that stood behind Kapernick. You had networks like CNN that would actually be more in support of Kapernick while also letting people on the show who were completely against what he was doing get their point of view across. Overall, I feel like the media and social media only enhanced this act and it’s impact because we’re still talking about it as a reference point when we talk about other things like George Floyd today. What Colin Kaepernick did that day will forever go down in History because it helped reignite social justice efforts and helped push forward more social justice efforts today. Like my professor said in class I truly think Colin Kaepernick will be remembered on the Right Side of History in the many years to come.