"...Somebody needs to slap a pair of fatigues on this little nitwit and drop him off in a firefight in the Afghan War. My guess is he lives in a gated community where he has the darkest skin of anyone. Millionaire sport figures, even ones who don't perform all that well, are not an inspiration for social justice. Colin should work on his performance in the game rather than try and make social statements." Vanzetti
"Kaepernick has every right to act like a sulking egotistical brat. Fans have every right to think less of him, and of the team's management." balt21212
"A lot of people died in my family so this millionaire dimwit ball-chucker can shoot his uninformed mouth off when he wants and disrespect our country. If I owned the SF team I would sack you by text message, Colin." Roy
"I'm about as liberal as they come, but I'd fire his a** if I owned the 49ers. I can't think of many companies that would allow their employees to use their workplace, uniform, resources and reputation as props for personal and controversial protests." recordhigh
"What has this slime done for this country except get paid way too much for throwing a football. It is just a game. This guy is just another Jesse Jackson/Al Sharpton poverty pimp in the making." liberty
Nice, eh? And there's nothing unusual about the comments I chose either, in fact, the vast majority of the submissions were stridently anti-Kaepernick.
But does Kaepernick really deserve this outpouring of hated and vitriol? Isn't he just asking whether the values espoused in the National Anthem actually apply to African Americans or not? That's a fair question, isn't it?
Think of it this way: Maybe this IS the "land of the free and the home of the brave" if you're white, but if you're black, not so much.
Do you really get a square deal in America if you're black? Is it really a level playing field? Is equal opportunity a fact or fiction? Aren't you much more likely to be harassed, threatened, brutalized and incarcerated if you're black than if you're white?
These are no-brainer questions. Everyone knows the answers to these questions if they're honest with themselves, that is. Life is just tougher if you are black in America, there's no two-ways about it.
So why don't we try something entirely different for once. Why don't we give Kaepernick the benefit of the doubt and assume that he's not an attention-seeking "America hater." Let's assume that he's just trying to do the right thing by pointing out our shortcomings as a nation just like Mohammed Ali did when he refused to be inducted into the military in April, 1967.
Remember that? At the time Ali was raked over the coals too, but he toughed it out because he was a man of principal. People conveniently forget about the hostility and scorn that was heaped on Ali because it doesn't jibe with the modern-day remake of Ali as a national treasure. But, trust me, the man was more widely despised than Kaepernick.
And Ali didn't hate America any more than Kaepernick does. He just decided that it was more important to do the right thing and take his lumps than stay silent and cave in to public pressure.
It looks to me like Kaepernick is following the same moral blueprint. He just wants America to deliver on its promise of freedom and equality for all.
Is that too much to ask?
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