As the last bit of summer slowly burns out on the Central Coast, I can almost feel the cool breeze ushering in the fall. This is my time of year. NFL pre-season has begun, and like any other red-blooded American bird I’m giddy with excitement. At least I was. Until my merry pre-season madness was marred by debate surrounding 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick’s decision to stand up for something he believes in by sitting down during the national anthem.
I tried to ignore this at first and dismiss it by thinking it’s just another example of the entertainment media feeding our celebrity worship. But it wouldn’t go away.
During the Joe White Memorial fundraiser, an auction event to raise funds for the Allan Hancock College athletics department, auctioneer extraordinaire Jim Glines took the stage. The first thing he said was that his family and friends had asked him not to say anything about the topic but that he just had to speak out against Kaepernick’s actions. He speech was met with loud cheers and applause.
I have to admit, my initial reaction was to condemn Kaepernick’s action as wrong. However, thinking on it more it seems that he was practicing the same freedoms as those who are lashing out at him for expressing himself. It’s sort of a catch-22 of constitutional rights.
I get just as teary-eyed as the next American when I hear a beautiful rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner,” and I’m not going to lie, those American life montages put out by the genius marketers behind the Ford and Budweiser commercials cause me to get a little tight in the throat as my chest fills with pride. At the same time though, if you look at it from an alien planet, isn’t it possible that compulsory recitings of the pledge or expectations of rising for the national anthem can be seen as weird or—dare I say it—almost communist-type behavior?
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar wrote in The Washington Post (Aug. 30) that one of the ironies of the way some people express their patriotism is to brag about our freedoms—like the freedom of speech—but then call people out as unpatriotic when someone uses that freedom to speak out against the government.
“What makes an act truly patriotic and not just lip-service is when it involves personal risk or sacrifice,” he said in the op-ed piece.
Obviously Kaepernick took a personal risk. He had to have known there would be backlash, so I think it was about more than him being a spoiled celebrity using his status to attract attention to the issue du jour.
Still, he is a celebrity and with that comes responsibility. Is it better to use a highly visible platform to commit what is rightly or wrongly considered a rebellious action against injustice, or to use that limelight to start a positive movement to encourage community, unity, and change?
When you’ve got thousands of people watching you and you take a stand, it needs to be a carefully crafted statement because you’ve also got the power to motivate those people. And you can motivate them to rebel in a negative way, or you can motivate them to make change in a positive way. At this moment this country needs to come together, not tear apart.
The Joe White Memorial fundraiser continued on with its worthwhile fundraising program, including an introduction of Olympic boxer and Santa Maria native Carlos Balderas (he once told the Sun he prefers his name to be spelled Karlos). Dressed in a USA jacket Balderas received an appropriate hero’s welcome complete with standing ovation. I think I shed a tiny tear of patriotic pride.
The Canary cries at the drop of a hat. Send comments to canary@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Sep 1-8, 2016.