Sure, but how is protesting injustice in America insulting America? It's about the most American thing you can possibly do.
So if kneeling during the national anthem is still too offensive can you describe a way you think black people should protest that would both get attention and be permissible?
From my experience people just want black people to protest in quiet ways that can be easily ignored, which defeats the purpose.
On the contrary, that strategy worked perfectly for Martin Luther King, and to great and long-lasting effect.
But to answer your first question, if you want to protest that would both get attention and be permissible, finding the right medium would be a good place to start. There are three major factors though that, in my opinion, hurt Kaepernick's efforts:
At the end of the day, I question the real impact Kaepernick had with these protests. And because it was seen as such a divisive act, I doubt he'll ever step out on the football field again.
- The NFL audience as a whole is slightly Republican leaning where these actions are a bit less tolerated. Had Kaepernick been a professional basketball player though, his protest would have probably been much more positively received. On the other hand, I can guarantee that had Kaepernick done this in college football, professional golf, or NASCAR, he would have been thrown out of the league almost immediately. Instead, Kaepernick never stopped to think that the majority of his audience would never, ever see his protest as none other than a desecrating display of the flag and the national anthem. And there we go to point #2:
- Kaepernick's move is peaceful alright, but put the focus of his protest on the wrong thing. Martin Luther King was successful in his protest not just because they were peaceful, but because it highlighted the immense struggle that black Americans were facing at the time. People watching the news didn't see protestors disrespecting the flag, breaking the law, or destroying property. They saw protestors being blasted by a fire hose, beaten, jailed, and torn asunder by racists crowds. It worked because it exposed the rotten core of racism during that era, and people changed. This, I think, is the #1 contributing reason why we see such a radical reduction of racism with the boomer generation of white America.
- Our very obvious commander-in-chief who can't put his cell phone down and stop tweeting. Trump's tweeting simply fueled points #1 and #2.
Malcolm X's evaluation is largely confirmed by modern scholarship. Nicholas Bryant, author of the most comprehensive study of President Kennedy's decision-making on civil rights policy, notes that during the predominantly nonviolent Birmingham campaign, Kennedy refused to make a commitment to forceful intervention or new legislation. He resisted the influence of the powerful, internationally publicized photograph of a police dog tearing into a black youth. The legislative situation was hopeless, he claimed, and he did not think the events in Birmingham would influence the voting intentions of a single lawmaker ... While Kennedy recognized the potent symbolic value of the [police dog] image, he was unwilling to counteract it with a symbolic gesture of his own."[39] Bryant concludes:
It was the black-on-white violence of May 11 - not the publication of the startling photograph a week earlier – that represented the real watershed in Kennedy's thinking, and the turning point in administration policy. Kennedy had grown used to segregationist attacks against civil rights protesters. But he – along with his brother and other administration officials – was far more troubled by black mobs running amok.
The whole kneel/stand thing never made sense unless you view it through the lens of self righteous faux outrage.
Nothing stemming from that dumpster fire is going to make sense either.
Preferrably hanging on a treeSo if kneeling during the national anthem is still too offensive can you describe a way you think black people should protest that would both get attention and be permissible?
From my experience people just want black people to protest in quiet ways that can be easily ignored, which defeats the purpose.
But I suppose if the insult is to God because kneeling should be reserved for him, that makes sense. Of course, In don't think I've ever heard that is the complaint, so we are back to square 1.
So they were disrespecting Jesus instead of the flag? Sad.Real kicker is the Philadelphia Eagles, which might have the most openly religious players of any team in the NFL, still got Trump's ire. He started a spat with them and claimed they were disrespecting the flag by kneeling during the anthem. Except it wasn't during the anthem, and they were praying.