Taking a stand
Steven Parker is the son of a Marine father and an Army mother. The Oklahoma senior defensive back said he wouldn’t take a knee during the national anthem like many in the NFL have done. But Parker stands with the beliefs that first launched the movement, that inequality persists throughout the U.S.
NORMAN — Steven Parker has to stand.
As the son of a Marine father and an Army mother and the grandson of a man who also served, the Oklahoma senior safety said earlier this week, he wouldn’t take a knee during the national anthem like many in the NFL have done.
But he also stands with the beliefs that first launched the movement, that inequality persists throughout the United States.
“I definitely agree with Colin Kaepernick,” Parker said. “In my opinion, I don’t feel like the United States — not even in my opinion, it’s just the truth, it’s facts — we’re not treated as equal people, African-Americans, black people.
“I don’t like what Trump said, but it’s basically one of those things where I have to stand.”
At a university where student-athletes have taken a stand on social issues in recent years, this week was hardly the only time Parker and other members of OU athletic teams have engaged in tough conversations about controversial issues.
A year ago, Parker stood in the old team cafeteria-turned-meeting room and talked with a group of reporters about an unarmed black man killed by a Tulsa police officer just a couple days earlier.
“It's something that is very hurtful for me, being from there and this situation is happening so close,” he said then. “I'm at a loss for words on what to say. I've seen the video thousands of times. It has me angry to the point that it's like, what do we do as a society? This is something that has been a problem for a long time, and it keeps on happening.”
This time around, Parker expressed his opinions after President Donald Trump’s remarks and explicit name-calling about NFL players kneeling during the anthem spurred hundreds to demonstrate before or during the national anthem in displays of unity. Many of them took a knee before the game, while others linked arms.
When Parker talked to the media Wednesday night, there hadn’t been a college-football game since the NFL protests.
There were some small-scale demonstrations in college football last year after Kaepernick began the movement, but with many teams — including Oklahoma — still in the locker room or the tunnel during the national anthem, the same type of demonstration hasn’t spilled over to the NFL’s collegiate counterpart.
But even if it isn’t happening on his own field, OU coach Lincoln Riley knows it’s important to have conversations about what's happening in the world, no matter how difficult or divisive the issue.
“We can’t put our head in the sand and pretend like everybody’s not seeing it,” Riley said of the NFL protests. “People are going to have different opinions. That’s part of it. Just more that, we respect everybody’s opinion and we’re open with it, and if guys want to come talk about it, it affects different people in different ways, we’re here to support our guys no matter what.”
And indeed, the Sooners are open about discussing controversial issues, perhaps more so than many college campuses because of what happened two years ago.
In the aftermath of the 2015 incident where a video leaked online of Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity members shouting a racist chant, it was then-linebacker Eric Striker’s powerful response that drove conversation around campus and around the nation. With his leadership, he helped heal a university torn apart by racial divides.
Even now, cornerback Jordan Thomas wears a long-sleeved black shirt and black leggings under his practice clothes to take a continued stand against racism.
Since the 2015 incident, more student-athletes around OU have used their platforms to bring attention to causes they care about.
Redshirt senior Ogbonnia Okoronkwo, for example, channels his desire to affect change by working with an oncampus group that fights to correct injustices on college campuses by writing academic papers.
“There has to be more to you than just being an athlete,” Okoronkwo said earlier this year. “People, a lot of young kids, look up to us and I feel like it’s our duty to not only give them entertainment but to also enrich their minds.”
While the beliefs of each student-athlete are unique, a common thread brings many of them together: using their platform to make their voices heard, to take a stand.
“With our stature and stuff like that, it’s great to present our ideas and our beliefs,” Parker said, “because people, they’ll look at that and see they can do the same exact things.”