Taking A Knee

I am not the biggest fan of how some (or even many) BLM "activists" act. Some of them are outright bigots, and are using their cause to their advantage as excuses to act childish and entitled and destructive.

However, that doesn't invalidate the point of the entire movement, just because some within it are worthless assholes. I have never liked Colin Kaepernick, and don't want him on the Baltimore Ravens. But that has nothing to do with him kneeling. Never has been.

Players around the NFL protested during the national anthem on Sunday, for major reason only: Showing Solidarity in the face of a childish, angry-tweeting embarrassment of a President, who outright called any pro athlete who protests, a "Son of a Bitch". Please tell me the last time a United States PRESIDENT said anything even remotely as divisive, and childish, and embarrassing to our nation, as that, to his own CITIZENS no less. Go ahead, I'll wait.

It was not even about race or politics anymore. It was an act of Solidarity, which is why a lot of NON-black players and coaches, etc., joined in protest. Yes, they're a bunch of overpaid millionaires (well, the stars at least). But that doesn't mean they aren't still people. And when the PRESIDENT of the United States calls some of them "Sons of Bitches", they stood TOGETHER in defiance of that, and in SUPPORT of each other. There's nothing embarrassing about that at all. If anything, fans SHOULD be proud of it.

If you are "embarrassed" or upset by pro athletes kneeling or displaying some other form of PEACEFUL protest, I think you really need to look in the mirror and check your priorities. You should be embarrassed that our GREAT nation, has a President who angry-tweets and cusses people out and shoots off at the mouth, WITHOUT any filter, to anyone he feels like, whether it be reporters, citizens, or even OTHER nations, basically trying to provoke war. THAT should embarrass you. Not the peaceful protest actions of athletes you otherwise cheer for and claim to love.

Kneeling or standing on the sideline locking arms or staying in the locker-room, etc., during the National Anthem, is not in any way "disgracing" the flag or the country. If anything, it is the highest form of HONORING the flag and the country. Because as we all know, according to our version of history, this nation was FOUNDED as an act of protest. If you don't recognize that, then you don't understand this country as well as you claimed to. There is nothing especially sacred about our flag, or the song we play as our National Anthem. The only thing that has ever been sacred about this nation, even with all of its ugly and violent history, has been "We The People".

If you don't support the proud American tradition of protest, well then I don't know what to tell you. Except that you really don't understand what it's supposed to mean to be an American. And you most certainly are not "defending" or "honoring" the flag by shitting on other's right to peacefully protest, which is all they're doing. And quite frankly, as a sports fan myself, I have to say, if you're THIS upset and THIS quick to turn on players and a team and a sport that you claim to love, then I really have to question how much you ever truly loved the sport or the team or the players in the first place.