Professional athletics, patriotism and the people's right to protest

I’m a big fan of sports, the national anthem and free speech.

Like most fans, I enjoy watching talented people who have trained hard to hone their natural athletic gifts to compete against others on the field in their chosen sport.

Sung at these events, the national anthem uses the American flag as a symbol of the endurance and perseverance of America and its so-called “American values” — those values being different things to different people — against its enemies on the field of battle.

But both the flag and the anthem have long been symbols of protest both nationally and abroad. African-American athletes Tommie Smith and John Carlos, gold and bronze medal winners at the 1968 Olympic Games, raised their black-gloved hands from the podium when the national anthem was played, a moment that Smith later said was not a black power salute but a human rights salute protesting racism and law enforcement aggression against African-Americans at the time.

Famed basketball player Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, then a rising young college athlete, chose not to participate in those Olympics as a protest for the same reason — riots gripped the U.S. He felt, he said in a recent stinging op-ed in The Guardian, that doing so would give a “thumbs-up” to politicians refusing to address the overt racism of the time.

Flash forward to 2016 and San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick, who took a knee during the national anthem in protest of what many felt — feel — was the inordinate amount of police brutality being perpetrated against African-Americans.

That same year Seattle Reign soccer star Megan Rapinoe took a knee during the anthem in solidarity with Kaepernick. Rapinoe, who is openly gay, has since continued to protest in various ways, including at this year’s World Cup. National Football League teams have since shunned Kaepernick, and he remains team-less.

Then just last month two 2020 Tokyo Olympics-bound U.S. athletes followed in Smith and Carlos’ shoes when they protested on the podium at the Pan-American Games in Lima, Peru. Hammer thrower Gwen Berry bowed her head and raised a fist, while foil team member Race Imboden took a knee during the anthem while he and his teammates stood on the podium to accept their gold medal.

Asked about the protest, and Imboden Tweeted he was tired of the “multiple shortcomings” of the U.S. He cited racism, gun control and immigrant mistreatment, “and a president who spreads hate.”

Berry is African-American. Imboden is European-American. Both face as-yet unspecified disciplinary action from the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee.

In his op-ed, Abdul-Jabbar noted that, “what those love-it-or-leave-it ‘patriots’ furious about athletes who protest don’t understand: We aren’t insulting the country or what its professed values, we’re focusing attention on those who don’t live up to the promises of what the country stands for.”

What do the national anthem words, “O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave,” represent? Personally, I stand for the anthem when it’s played, choosing not to use it as a method of protest. But that’s my right as an American. As such, I also reserve the right to use it as a form of protest in the future.

Professional athletes like Smith, Carlos, Kaepernick, Abdul-Jabbar, Imboden, Berry and many others, are all in positions of some visibility and notoriety. It is their right to choose to use the national anthem to bring attention to what they consider injustices in American society.

It’s their right because this is the “land of the free,” a land of free speech bought and paid for by the brave. What they didn’t pay for was oppression, yet that is exactly what attempting to stifle peaceful, yet highly visible protest is — oppression, the opposite of American values.

And oppression is a value of a tyrant.

Retired U.S. Marine Corps general and former Secretary of Defense James Mattis, was recently back in the news after publishing his book “Call Sign Chaos: Learning to Lead,” published a recent essay in the Wall Street Journal. In it he expressed his concern about America’s growing “internal divisiveness” that is dividing the country into “hostile tribes” at war against each other.

We should applaud our athletes who use their positions to bring attention to the issues that are breaking America apart. It’s brave (like Kaepernick, they often pay a price for their protests) patriotic and very American.

Mattis put it well when he said, “On each of our coins is inscribed America’s de facto motto, ‘E Pluribus Unum’ — from many, one. For our experiment in democracy to survive, we must live that motto.”

Lee Hughes can be reached at [email protected].