In an interview with Fox News, Donald Trump went beyond simply expressing his disdain for football players who use the opening ceremonies of a game to make a nonviolent protest against the very violent treatment of African Americans at the hands of law enforcement—he suggested that they be kicked out of the country.
As Donald Trump reminded the nation several times yesterday, he recorded an interview with Fox News that was delayed to run during Fox & Friends Thursday morning—so that Trump could watch it from his bed and … do whatever he does when he sees himself on television. In teasing the interview on Wednesday, Fox’s John Roberts suggested that Trump likes the way that NFL owners have knelt down to his demands and added rules that players must restrict any unsightly peaceful protest to an area where no one at all can see it—like a “free speech zone” safely out of range of cameras and microphones so that no one actually has to hear the speech. Except, Trump wasn’t happy that the NFL even gave the players the options of protesting invisibly. He didn’t want a free speech zone. Anywhere.
When the remainder of the interview was released this morning, Donald Trump made it clear how much he did not want players to be able to speak out against violence—by delivering a chilling threat.
“You have to stand proudly for the national anthem, or you shouldn’t be playing, you shouldn’t be there. Maybe you shouldn’t be in the country.”
Trump did not make clear where he planned to deport players who didn’t display his mandated level of enthusiasm. Do they go to Mexico? Gitmo? Does each of them take a 23AndMe test so that they can be sent back to wherever their ancestors lived before they were kidnapped, dragged here in chains and shouted at about what a favor had been done for them? These details will surely be worked out in the future. But for the present, what’s clear is that even the most simple, silent and inoffensive protest about events that are heartbreaking, violent and all too frequent is too much to be tolerated.
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The playing of the national anthem before games is something that began with baseball during World War II, but the way it has been extended by the NFL and NASCAR to include military flyovers, parachuting rangers and parades of red-white-and-blue glitter long ago passed from genuine patriotism into ridiculous parody. What’s happening now is taking that parody and making it an ugly dictate. Something that’s only appropriate for an ugly dictator.
The new rules released by the NFL require that players stand for the playing of the “Star-Spangled Banner” or face a fine. The other option for players is that they do not come onto the field with their teammates.
Those rules may please Trump—or at least please him to the extent that they recognize and legitimize his ludicrous demands—but they do not address at all the protests that were begun by Colin Kaepernick and joined by other, primarily black, players on many teams. The point of those protests isn’t that the “Star-Spangled Banner” is an uninspiring, contrived, and nearly unsingable tune (through it is). The point is that this is a visible protest against the way that African Americans have suffered injustice at the hands of the supposed justice system.
A visible protest made invisible is not a compromise. It’s suppression.
But Trump isn’t happy with suppression of protest and fines for those who object. He wants more. He demands that people display their gratitude that he allows them to live in America. Or get out. Mandatory patriotism … isn’t patriotism. It’s not even parody. It’s just another form of violence.