By now most everyone has heard of the events surrounding Colin Kaepernick, quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers, and his refusal to stand during the national anthem played at football games. It began with him simply sitting on the bench and evolving him to take a knee during the anthem, almost as a gesture of respect. Nobody was surprised really at the outrage voiced by many Americans. Although, nobody actually questioned the reasons behind their outrage, because when it comes to our patriotism, their outrage is always taken as a given.
Shortly after, Kaepernick clarified his position:
I am not going to stand up to show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses black people and people of color. To me, this is bigger than football and it would be selfish on my part to look the other way. There are bodies in the street and people getting paid leave and getting away with murder.
Obviously this concept is not new, it derives from the greatly respectable idea of civil disobedience. Along with the negative reaction came the reinforcement from people supporting Kaepernick, including a slew of different athletes and other figures such as the #VeteransForKaepernick. For anyone interested, there’s a handy complete timeline of the Kaepernick protests outlining everyone who has protested in his example.

Many of the most common arguments against Kaepernick’s form of protest is that is disrespectful. We can take the example of New Orleans quarterback Drew Brees. In an interview Brees said that, while he agrees that Kaepernick has the right to protest, “there’s plenty of other ways that you can do that in a peaceful manner that doesn’t involve being disrespectful to the American flag.” Brees went on to say that the American flag “represents the very freedom that Colin Kaepernick gets the opportunity to exercise by speaking out his opinion in a peaceful manner about that issue.”
I could spend all day dissecting this very argument, but what core message really means is “Fall in line.” For anyone that doesn’t believe this just read more into what they are really saying. I could translate that entire statement above into this “You have the right to protest, but don’t change anything.” The argument commonly made about having the right to protest is enough evidence of how much freedom you have is bogus. We have the right as human beings to protest, but we have the privilege to protest as granted by the state, in this case represented by the American flag.
It is for this exact reason that I don’t accept President Obama’s support for Colin Kaepernick. Because while Obama did support the right to protest, he just recently added :
I want Mr. Kaepernick and others who are on a knee to listen to the pain that that may cause somebody who, for example, had a spouse or a child who was killed in combat and why it hurts them to see somebody not standing… I also want people to think about the pain he may be expressing about somebody who’s lost a loved one that they think was unfairly shot. One of thing I saw about American democracy is that it can be frustrating, but it’s the best system we’ve got.
Again, this can directly be translated into “You have the right to protest, but don’t change anything.”
With how quickly information moves these days many people reasonably suspected that this issue had already passed along, yet there are recent developments in the story worth discussing. First off being the fact that Kaepernick reportedly received death threats over the incident, and his remarks on the presidential candidates.
The death threats, just as Kaepernick acknowledged, proved his point. When your nationalistic pride is so intense that you cannot tolerate dissent you’ve lost your true sense of humanity. Many people will argue “He’s being insensitive to people who’ve lost loved ones in the armed forces.” But I would argue that those people don’t understand the point of all this. What good is defending a country if that country is intolerable? And if that’s not the reason to send death threats, is there any true reason besides blatant dogmatism?
As for his comments on the first presidential debate, I still don’t see why people get upset over these things. The statement was “Both are proven liars and it almost seems like they’re trying to debate who’s less racist.” And again, people don’t like dissent. It’s not that he’s simply disapproving of one candidate, it’s that he’s against both. To a degree the public can accept if people endorse the opposite candidate, but going with neither must seem truly anti-American to them. The first headline regarding this issue read “Colin Kaepernick in danger of losing support after comments on presidential candidates” and it truly is a shame.
The true point of all this being the power of civil disobedience. Such a simple demonstration of disobeying caused such a simultaneous uproar and yet many people follow in his example. With the current sharp rise of nationalism it’s useful to remember the basic methods of protest and analyze them so that they may be rendered most effective.