Is Free Speech on Borrowed Time?
[Originally posted on Wordpress: October 23, 2017]
I made a facebook post back on September 26, 2017, asking what I believed to be a rhetorical question. Obviously racism is still alive and well.
The crux of that post was supposed to be how the NFL and the owners can push a little here, push a little there, make some new rules, and try to shut everyone up and go about business as usual - but at some point the chickens are gonna come home to roost and somebody's gonna call an owner's bluff on the "if you kneel you don't play" thing.
I'd be real interested to see what happens if multiple stars kneel, or a majority of the team kneels, and owners start having to forfeit games to stick to their guns. If you know how the NFL generates most of its revenue, you know that'll affect their bottom line a hell of a lot more than some 'negative press' about some chitter-chatter and kneeling.
If the players roll over, this is inching closer and closer to a place where the NFL or sponsors can dictate social or political views to athletes and effectively neutralize professional sports as a platform for players to voice their opinions.
To this, some of you might say "hey, well they're out there to play football, not talk politics", but that ultimately equates to "if someone gets a bunch of media coverage because they're good at football, it's ok to take their first amendment rights away".
I don't want to see politics blend into my sports channels any more than y'all do, but when something like this happens, the leaders of our country have a fiduciary duty to take note of the problem and do their best to remedy the problem effectively and efficiently.
Unfortunately, some have tried to sweep these NFL players under the rug and divert attention from the intended topic (police officers shooting unarmed black men). These players love the flag and the troops as much as you and I; they're simply seeing an improvement that could be made to the country and calling attention to it - as is encouraged by the constitution.
Now that we're hearing "it's ok for the president to say whatever he wants on national tv, but athletes shouldn't be able to do the same", the United States has ventured into very dangerous territory. Instead of picking a side, take a step back and look at the big picture every once in a while. You might be surprised at what you see.
*I have copied and pasted the above text from my old Wordpress blog that is no longer accessible to the public. It was in response to the blackballing of Colin Kaepernick with regard to the dangerous precedent that I felt was being set. In light of recent events involving Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel, I feel the post has circled back into relevance.