I really am torn on this. I am all for freedom of speech and not having to participate in displays of patriotism but wondering how much pressure these students felt from the coach and if their lack of cooperation would result in loss of playing time. The one player who did not participate is already being recruited by Rutgers.
http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/Camden-Football-Team-Coaches-Kneel-During-National-Anthem-District-Supports-Expression-393009511.html
Are you suggesting that Rutgers is recruiting the player because he didn’t kneel?
Not at all. I don’t think he needs to worry about playing time because as a recruited athlete and his position on the high school team is likely secure.
I have no issue with this. I’m sure youth growing up in Camden are well versed in systemic racism. I’m inclined to take the coach at his word until there is evidence otherwise:
“Two students chose not to kneel, Brown said, adding each student had the right to “exercise what they thought was right.””
When I was in high school in the late 60s I decided I wasn’t going to say the Pledge of Allegiance. I’m sure I had some good reason, although I wasn’t a very political person or a flower child. I got in trouble and my mother had to come to the school. She supported my right to refrain.
I think the press needs to stop reporting all of this high school stuff. Kids are going end up being pressured one way or the other depending on the circumstance and that’s not right.
I don’t think most teens are fragile flowers. It doesn’t hurt them to hear about issues and formulate opinions about them whether or not their opinions agree with others’ views, their parents’ views, or whether or not they wind up changing their minds later on or forgetting exactly why they did it years later, like @MomofWildChild. It’s all good. It gets them thinking about issues more important than the latest antics of some B-list celebrity and what photo to post on instagram. It’s active engagement in a political and social issue. Not sure how that can be a bad thing.
Good for them, whether I personally would use that as a means to protest I don’t know. I am getting more than a little bit irritated of those claiming anyone not standing for the anthem is not patriotic, un american, or worse, disrespectful of the military and those who serve in it. The national anthem, while it obviously was written about a battle in the war of 1812, is not owned by the military, it is supposed to represent our strength and resilience as a nation, it is not supposed to be this club to be used to get people to step into line. Our country was founded around a right to protest, it is a big part of that anthem as well because of that,that we have strength because of that right to protest. Besides the fact that I think the national anthem has been trivialized by being played at anything from a used car lot opening to sports events to the point where I kind of wonder what it really stands for, I also think that someone protesting an injustice they see by kneeling at its playing is doing so in the very spirit that is supposed to represent. Whether I would use that as a means of protest or not I don’t know, but I respect their right to do it.
I also have seen posts from service on military pages people who are not white, who have said Kapernick is trying to bring up a very real issue, that they could face serving in difficult war zones, risk their life for this country, and come home and face getting killed by a cop or someone else for basically being seen as a threat simply because they are black, and they said if it takes people kneeling during the National Anthem to make them aware, they are all in favor of it.
A HS coach overseeing minors has no business imposing his political views on his charges in a school setting. This is no different than a teacher handing out pro-life brochures in the classroom.
The coach should be disciplined by the school.
On a trip to Thailand, I watched a movie in a movie theater.
After the trailers played, the national anthem was broadcast, and I was surprised that the audience had to stand up (I stood, too ). It seemed really strange then. But the more I think about it, why is the national anthem played at the start of sporting events???
Are you also against coaches standing for the anthem, then? Because that’s a political view as well.
Good question! And why are children as young as kindergarten encouraged to “pledge allegiance”? Patriotism is weird sometimes. (also weird that quoting you stripped your bold tag.)
Having just visited a Communism Museum in Prague, and spent a lot of time in museums documenting both Fascism and Communism, I really object to “forced allegiance.” That’s why we are Americans. Because we have the freedom to stand up or sit down, to place our hands over our hearts or not do so, and to salute a flag or burn it.
Now that I think about it even more… When I played competitive sports in HS & college, the national anthem was never played for our team-- nor did we ever get cheerleaders. The national anthem and cheerleaders were reserved for the big pageantry sports, like football, basketball, baseball.
This national anthem protest issue at sporting events is a problem of the event organizers own making, by conflating athetics with patriotism.
Hear, hear, @Pizzagirl
I liked that museum, @Pizzagirl. Small but I found it really interesting and I’ve thought back on it a few times in the past year given the current political climate.
I’ve also been think lately of a few Mark Twain quotes:
We teach them to take their patriotism at second-hand; to shout with the largest crowd without examining into the right or wrong of the matter – exactly as boys under monarchies are taught and have always been taught. We teach them to regard as traitors, and hold in aversion and contempt, such as do not shout with the crowd, and so here in our democracy we are cheering a thing which of all things is most foreign to it and out of place – the delivery of our political conscience into somebody else’s keeping. This is patriotism on the Russian plan.
- Mark Twain, a Biography
[Patriotism] …is a word which always commemorates a robbery. There isn’t a foot of land in the world which doesn’t represent the ousting and re-ousting of a longline of successive “owners” who each in turn, as “patriots” with proud swelling hearts defended it against the next gang of “robbers” who came to steal it and did – and became swelling-hearted patriots in their turn.
- Mark Twain’s Notebook
…the true patriotism, the only rational patriotism, is loyalty to the Nation ALL the time, loyalty to the Government when it deserves it.
- “The Czar’s Soliloquy”
Well, Twain was a known shirker of his patriotic duty–he wrote a novel condemning slavery, the rightful law of the land, even!
/sarcasm
I respect these people’s Constitutional right to protest. But what I don’t respect is their willy nilly protest with no CLEAR objective. Just like the totally aimless Occupy Wall Steet squatters.
I get it that the kneelers are unhappy. But Colin Kaepernick, the initial instigator of this, says he’s going to sit during the anthem until "[the American flag] represents what it’s supposed to represent”.
Okay, then what exactly has to happen for Kaepernick and others to know the goal has been reached? Even football players who aren’t rocket scientists have a goal post to pass to know they’ve scored.
Examples of clear objectives:
- Nelson Mandela freed from prison
- equal marriage rights for gays
- shareholder approval of CEO salaries
- 10% teacher pay raise
I think it’s reasonable to prefer protests to have clear objectives. I don’t share your requirement that they do, though, and I’m not sure your (perfectly valid) reasoned position has much to do with all the people demonizing Kaepernick and burning his jersey, either.
Kaepernick explicitly stated that he’s was going to continue his protest until some condition was met, but he doesn’t define the conditions.