Black NFL Players Get All the Pain Yet Hold All the Power
The NFL has been mired in controversy since then-San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick began his protest of police brutality against black and brown men and women last summer. This weekend will be no different as Week 4 of the season kicks off. Eyes across the country have been glued to the sidelines to see who stands during the national anthem.
Throughout last weekend's games as the National Anthem was sung, over 200 players kneeled or sat, three teams stayed in the locker room altogether, and the Dallas Cowboys - along with team owner Jerry Jones - locked arms and dropped to their knees in unison.
Kaepernick explained in 2016, and multiple times since, why he was sitting down during the Anthem in an exclusive with NFL Media.
“I am not going to stand up to show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses black people and people of color," he said.
Kaepernick’s transition from sitting down during the Anthem to kneeling took -- which he did after meeting with a former U.S. Marine -- took his stance to the next level. While he, and other players insisted that the protests were of racial injustice, the actions set off a chain reaction.
It pissed off white people, resonated with black people, and stirred the pot between players, owners, coaches, and the fans. Players on the 49ers and other NFL teams joined Kaepernick in his protests, following his lead invarious ways – raising a fist, sitting down, or kneeling. This silent protest was the beginning of a movement that would help change the narrative on how black men, and black communities in general, are being treated in America today.
Silent protests have long been forms of nonviolent resistance. The NAACP’s Silent March in 1917 was the first publicized event of its kind that spoke to the injustice of black people. Different from sit-ins and boycotts, it’s the type of protest demonstration that immediately puts the response on the oppressor. Although hundreds have died in protests for the civil rights of people of color, this silent protest ended peacefully and set the stage for Kaepernick’s choice to use silence as a form of resistance instead of engaging, which pushed detractors and white supremacists over the edge.
Enter Donald Trump.
Last Friday night, Trump appeared at a rally in Alabama to encourage supporters to vote for Republican Senator Luther Strange -- who lost his bid for the Senate on Tuesday. He used this speech as an opportunity to rant about the NFL, disparaging the league's new safety rules -- during a 2016 campaign rally, he dismissed concussions as being "a little bump on the head" -- and slamming owners for allowing the kneeling to continue.
“Wouldn’t you love to see one of these NFL owners, when somebody disrespects our flag, to say, “Get that son of a bitch off the field right now. Out. He’s fired. He’s fired! They’re friends of mine you know.”
In the words of Kanye West “Real friends, I guess I get what I deserve, don’t I?”
All hell broke loose at the very moment that Trump implored NFL team owners -- seven of which, including Jones, donated $1 million to his inauguration earlier this year -- his friends, to terminate their workforce for exercising their constitutional right to freedom of speech.
It can’t be confirmed or denied exactly why teams took a stand last weekend, but the power of Kaepernick and his colleagues’ actions since the first kneeling has led to extraordinary conversation and changes in some local police use-of-force policies. At this point the work can’t stop at words, especially since it took words from the President, not actions, to move the NFL to respond.
Let’s face it, 70% of NFL players are black. Many of these same players are putting themselves at risk for Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy or CTE. The disease, which currently can only be detected posthumously, has been researched heavily by Dr. Bennett Omalu along with doctors at Boston University. Future NFL players are dying at the hands of police.
Black men, the most important piece of the NFL’s workforce is depleting not just due to fears of CTE, but also due to police brutality. Also, history has told the tale of the NFL without black manpower. It’s not good.
We can ask the NFL to step up and take care of our men, but if you look at the numbers, the players hold the power in this fight and fans can only standby as mire supporters as they make their moves.
So where do we go from here?
Earlier this year, thousands football fans continued to protest and even threatened to boycott the NFL. To date, Kaepernick has still not been signed by another NFL team, which is due in no small part to his protest. Some football analysts, at times laughably, insist that the real reason he remains a free agent is because Kaepernick simply just doesn’t have the skills to pay the bills anymore.
No matter how you slice Kaepernick’s unemployment, money talks. He has donated more than $1 million to support causes affecting the black community and he continues to take a stand for our rights. Fans upholding their protest of the NFL season for one reason or another may garner the change that we wouldn’t expect in this 21st century; however, I think we all can admit change is necessary and it’s going to have to come from players first.