Bending the knee

I have mixed views on the matter.

On one hand, I think it makes the players, the team, the league, and the nation look horrible when these people take a knee during the national anthem. If I were the owner of those teams, I would absolutely tell them that if they aren't willing to stand in unity with their fellow Americans, then they don't have a place on the American playing field. Politics should not be part of the game.

That being said...

It is their right to protest, freedom of speech, and freedom of expression to have, and per the consitution shall not be infringed. However, that just means that they cannot be prosecuted for the aforementioned act. However, if I were in charge, I would include a clause in their contracts that requires that they agree to keep political acts off of the field, and therefore this act of kneeling would be considered a breach of contract punishable by dismissal from the game and continued breach of contract would eliminate their contract. This would not be a violation of their rights as citizens, it would be a condition of employment.

For example...I cannot be arrested for wearing an armband with a swastika on it. That is protected by the first amendment. But can I lose my job over it? You bet your ass I can and definitely would (unless I was a professional WWII impersonator or something similar).

Taking all of that into consideration...I don't think that they should be permitted to stage protests like that while they are being paid to represent a national team.  Off the field...whatever.  Now, I do agree with President Trump when he says, "Get that son of a bitch off the field"...but if I were in his position, I wouldn't have even commented on it. When asked, I would have said, "I don't have the time nor the desire to grant these people an audience. I find their blatant disrespect despicable and that's all I have to say."

You know, I fucking hate national anthems. Would you like a segment from mine?



So, yeah. National Anthems are definately apolitical. And not militaristic in anyway. And I can't imagine why the the colonies would take exception to these delightful, innocent little ditties played every time the bombs drop. Jesus, didn't everyone agree that Hendrix rehabilitated the national anthem? Fuck me, even the darkies think that the song is swell!

Stop with this Blood and Soil shit. Just change your fucking theme tune to Trololo and be done with it.

I don't have the right to protest when I'm at work at my desk job. I didn't have the right to hand out political flyers or when I worked as an electrical engineer either. And when I worked as a bouncer, guess what, they didn't allow political protest, they actually wanted me to do my job. Why? Because I was on the company's dime - that's why. Yet for some reason we are being told that these multi-millionaires(clearly heavily oppressed, ya know) should be allowed to protest and voice their political opinions while at their job, because "MUH 1ST AMENDMENT, DAWG!" Both the team owners and the league are such pussies that they are backing these felons because it's a racial issue, and we all know black people are sacred cows in this country, so if you dare say one thing they disagree with you are tantamount to a racist calling for Afro-American genocide.

According to the Justice Department, cops are 2 and a half times more likely to kill a black person than a white person. Now, taken alone that statistic sounds bad. But when you understand the whole picture, it isn't. Because in good old New York, blacks are 35 times more likely to commit robberies, 38 times more likely to commit murders, and 51 times more likely to engage in shootings. So the data would seem to indicate NOT that cops are disproportionately targeting black people, but rather that they are purposefully avoiding engaging them, perhaps for political/optics reasons and to avoid negative press.  This is discussed in the video below at the 34:30 mark.

Once again, we are being led to believe that we should focus on on some non-issue(racist cops, racist system, etc.) when in reality the issue is, as usual, black culture in the U.S. being utterly devoid of value and morally bankrupt, due in large part to the fact that the majority of black children grow up in single-parent households.

You certainly have a point.  Because sports games inject the national anthem into their pre-game rituals, the players are granted the ability to display an appropriate or inappropriate response, depending on your point of view.  That's fair.

But here's my take on that.  These players have been wildly successful due in large part to America.  This country and its inherent opportunities have allowed them to become rich and famous, and now they kneel like petulant children when a song honoring the USA is played, all because of a manufactured lie about how racist everyone here is.  In my opinion, if they are so offended by the anthem and this "terrible U.S. of KKKA", they can fuck off back to the Sudan and try their hand at being a wide receiver or a tight end on the Khartoum football team.

I don't know if I agree with the "most viable platform" argument. These guys all have Facebook and Twitter fan pages, which are closely watched by the hungry media; they could spew their little tantrums there and have millions see it. Plus, as I proved in my first post in this thread, the protest itself is much ado about nothing. And as for professional sports athletes being "decent figures to look up to"...hahaha boy you really opened yourself up there, bro. These players are constantly getting in trouble for their bad behavior on and off the field. They are at best unsportsmanlike showboating assholes, and at worst dog-fighters, drug-users, rapists, and murderers. If these are the role models for young blacks in America, no wonder black culture is in the state it's in.

"Most of which happen to be black" oh please, who fucking cares! Trump didn't mention race when he said "son of a bitch", you did.

Most of the people who kill black people also "happen to be black", but that's a different story because the enemy there isn't Trump or a white cop. Right?

Give me a goddamn break.

I think trace interpreted that line as a punchline in itself, rather than a stepping stone to further explain your stance.