The Front Burner: Discussing sports and politics.
More than a year ago, National Football League player Colin Kaepernick decided to kneel during the anthem as an act of protest against what he and many others consider unjust treatment of African-Americans by police. In September, when Eric Reid became the first fellow player to follow Kaepernick on his knee, President Trump interjected on Twitter that many sports fans don’t want social or political issues intruding into sporting events. More emphatically, he used coarse language in a rally to disparage professional athletes drawn to activism and team owners who employ them.
A very raw emotional issue was joined. It sparked a tinderbox.
Are athletes who refuse to stand during the national anthem unpatriotic? Do they disrespect and dishonor their country? Or do the players who kneel to protest racial inequality display true patriotic courage by challenging the United States to be all that it dreams to be?
To answer these questions, and for a broader discussion, we turn to two articulate voices with strong viewpoints about mixing social issues and professional sports:
Richard E. Lapchick, the chair of the University of Central Florida’s DeVos Sport Business Management graduate program in the College of Business Administration. He also directs UCF's Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport and is the president of the National Consortium for Academics. Cal Thomas, a conservative, who began to write columns in 1984. During the 1960s and early 1970s, he worked as a reporter at NBC News.