Politics

[SlowPokemon]

It's to protest police violence, not because they don't respect the flag. I think the scarier thing is that people want to allow the right to protest peacefully and exercise freedom of speech until it's something like this and then they're not allowed.

[mikey]

See that doesn't make sense.  You're protesting police brutality... By kneeling during the anthem.  There's like a huge disconnect between cause and effect there.

[SlowPokemon]

Haha what would you suggest? It's not about that having to do with kneeling, it's about the gesture and the thought behind it. And as NFL players, that's the way they can peacefully make a statement in the way people will notice.

From what I understand, the thought process was basically: I don't stand for the anthem during a game I'm playing = I don't like the state of the country right now and I want people to notice

[mikey]

I wish they'd stop doing it so that it wouldn't interfere with the game.  I'm blaming the casters too here.  Like when there's downtime, talk about normal stuff like stats, not the three players who sat on the bench during the anthem.  I don't even tune in to football games until after kickoff when I am watching, so I wouldn't even know about it if people weren't so up in arms about it.  It doesn't even mean much, I think it's shallow.  At this point it almost feels like a fad than anything too because everyone's doing something dumb to prove some imaginary point.  Nfl players have a lot of reach and most of them use that for a lot of great things but taking a knee during the anthem I'd say is more of a distraction than a protest

[Dude]

I don't understand why it bothers people...

It has nothing to do with you personally so let it go.

they have every right to do what they're doing so y'all need to stop complaining about it

[Tobbeh99]

I agree with Noc that I think it's a dumb way to make a statement, and it seems to have become some weird thing nowadays. I think the bigger problem is how people just seems to use all kinds of events to express some political statement (often a jab against Trump in some way), and it just makes the events look worse because people are tired of it.

[mikey]

Never said they didn't but it's annoying and isn't accomplishing anything

[Dude]

It's like talking to a fucking wall...

[mikey]

I don't think you understand
Kneeling during the anthem as a protest
Outcome
-People are ticked off
-nfl loses money
-People are paying attention to you
-You have a platform but don't push anything from it
-People get ticked off for other people being ticked off
-People get ticked off at the ticked off people who got ticked off from them being ticked off
-America just got a little bit worse, not better

It's like talking to a cardboard cutout

[Dude]

I don't think you understand
Kneeling during the anthem as a protest
Outcome
-People are ticked off

ok but why

There's literally no good reason to be pissy about it.

Just live your own life and don't worry about what others do.

[mikey]

-Person living their own life:
"I'm watchin football"
"These people won't shut up about the protests"
"Useless protests anyway".  That's when it becomes my problem

[Dude]

First world problems, eh?

Those people must be awfully petty to get pissy about that.

[blueflower999]

I've heard calls for all NFL players to kneel and some people even think the anthem shouldn't be played before sporting events anymore. Both of these ideas are pretty ridiculous, especially because the majority of NFL fans don't even support these protests.

[Dude]

Then I guess a majority of NFL fans are super petty for caring as much about this than they should.

[Pianist Da Sootopolis]

Nfl players have apparently started kneeling during the national anthem.  I watched the packers game (knew they would win, prayed they would lose), and apparently a few people knelt in that game during the anthem.  The fact that stuff like this is going on is about the scariest thing I've ever seen or heard of happening in america

are you shitting me?

Sorry Noc, I really want to politely disagree with you but just a few pages ago on this thread you downplayed the fact that there were literally Nazis in Charlottesville. People using their platform to protest injustice is scary to you?

There's not something more scary happening in the U.S. right now? The 2 hurricanes that just hit us? Our president poking the extremely unstable North Korean dictator with a stick via twitter? The fact that we're still in 7 military conflicts overseas? Is there really nothing more important than this fucking protest? He's been protesting since Obama was president. It's not a jab at Trump, it's the same message he's been trying to make clear since he started: police violence against minorities is an epidemic. Whether or not you agree with him is beside the point; he's doing the clearest expression of free speech imaginable, and you can't think of anything scarier in America? Please, get off your high horse.