Writing on The Undefeated blog site today, ESPN's Stephen A. Smith says that in light of current events the question has switched from who will stand up with Colin Kaepernick to "who could possibly stand against" the ex-quarterback. And who plays the villain to his hero? President Trump, of course.
Setting up his ode to "St. Colin" with the tragic events of Charlottesville, Smith asks: "And guess who’s looking more right — more righteous — than anyone could’ve ever imagined: Mr. Kaepernick himself."
Why? Because Kaepernick’s lawful protest now stands in the context of David Duke telling the press, “We are determined to take our country back.” In the context of President Donald Trump’s not only refusing to directly condemn white nationalism but also creating a moral equivalency between them and the ones who came out to fight to keep America free for everyone. A stance Trump walked back only after extreme pressure and a tweet insulting the black CEO of Merck. Enough with the cries of “This is not our America.” This is our America. Maybe the connection between Kaepernick expressing his rights as an American to draw attention to his belief that black lives matter and the events in Charlottesville isn’t a straight line, but it’s not that crooked either. Who can now doubt that the racism that Kaepernick was protesting is real — and far more dangerous and deadly and visceral than previously believed?
In overlooking the anti-cop hate perpetuated by Kaepernick and his fellow Black Lives Matter hate-mongers, Smith makes a huge miscalculation by assuming Kaepernick is suddenly more deserving of NFL entitlement:
Not as a backup in the middle of the season when the quarterbacks start going down. Now. If the NFL thought giving him a job would prove a distraction or somehow damage its brand, it was wrong. Now it’s facing down the opposite problem. First, it was just Kaepernick’s voice needing to be silenced. Now it’s Beast Mode, Michael Bennett, Malcolm Jenkins, Richard Sherman, and the list will only grow. All of them using their megaphone to talk about the 'blackballing' of the former 49ers quarterback.
Yesterday I wrote that Kaepernick may get dwarfed by a larger problem with malcontent NFL players this season. Smith seems to be promising as much. He advocates NFL owners to join their loud-mouth ball players as social justice warriors who will "provoke change" because they have the cash and the platform to do so. "NFL owners not only have their players to contend with but, potentially, millions of football fans to answer to — many of whom never had a problem with Kaepernick exercising his constitutional right in the first place."
The owners don't agree with Smith, who admits "the owners best feel they can fatten their pockets by limiting the damage and letting Kaepernick drift into unemployment because he offended to many fans who just wanted him TO shut UP and play."
Smith wrongly predicts that Charlottesville will change all that. He writes "it was far easier for owners to give Kaepernick the proverbial finger and tell him to take his activism elsewhere last Friday than it is for them to tell him so now." No owner wants to be seen as dismissive and detached from what's going on in the country, Smith writes. None want to seem indifferent to "the current plight of minorities of all races, colors and creeds":
Charlottesville HAS made Kaepernick’s question — “At what point do we take a stand as a people and say this isn’t right?” — visible. Much like the wildly diverse protesters who came out to fight white nationalists, there are masses of widely diverse NFL fans who once dismissed Kaepernick as a distraction but can now see the bigger picture.
It's only been a matter of hours since the events of Charlottesville. How has Smith divined this so-called great awakening, this "bigger picture"? It seems like an over-estimation on his part. Kaepernick was reviled as a cop-hater and as the "quarterback" of the Black Lives Matter racists before and after Charlottesville. Smith continued:
Last summer, Kaepernick said, “I want to bring attention to the racial oppression that exists in this country.”
If he was faulted before, he certainly can’t be blamed now.
Not by billionaire businessmen perpetually hesitant to say or do what is right.
Not with the specter of Charlottesville still infesting our collective consciousness.
Not when another Charlottesville is always on the horizon.
Smith is blind to the racism of Black Lives Matter and its disgusting racist chants of "pigs in a blanket, fry 'em like bacon." Those billionaire businessmen NFL owners see this as a huge no-no that they would be endorsing by signing Kaepernick. As far Kaepernick and Black Lives Matter are concerned, Charlottesville changes nothing for multitudes of Americans.
