Is there an endgame with these protests?

[sheajets]

There probably was a way to do this that involved slowly bringing the NFL fans to your side in support of your cause. It had to be measured, careful, and well organized. But the way this all transpired with a suddenly menacing, militant looking Kaepernick and then various players joining in with knees or fists in the air during the anthem, made it seem like an all out assault on the flag, country, and law enforcement. Fans got enraged, they dug in their heels, and they fought back. It's too late to start over now.

It "had to be" measured, careful, etc.? According to whom?

The most effective civil protest is almost always disruptive and disturbing. The whole idea is to shake people out of their torpor and get them to pay attention to issues that don't directly affect them and that they don't normally notice. Sometimes that means bothering, inconveniencing, and even -- horrors! -- offending them.

For this particular protest, an NFL sideline is the ideal venue. "Menacing" and "militant looking" in this case are 100 percent in the eye of the beholder. So is "all-out assault," which, in the case of the flag, I would have associated with burning it until you lowered the bar. Just for laughs: Do you find a white man with an open-carry weapon more or less "menacing" than a black man kneeling?

I'm eager to find out what you consider an acceptable form of protest. I'm guessing it's something meek enough to escape your, or anyone's, notice.

Protests in general don't work. And especially now. Look at what's transpired since the election. We've had children protesting in the streets but with no actual issue. It was a tantrum "protest" because they didn't like the outcome of an election. And then they had that weird thing in Washington with the pink hats and grotesque costumes. Forget what that was about. But anyway people are sort of protested out.

The players were in a unique position where they're millionaires, they have agents. If there was an issue bothering them then they could've formulated a strategy to draw more attention to it with their employers from the beginning so there was no surprises. You have to look at this scientifically...how do we get these folks on our side, how do we get them to understand how this makes us feel? etc. What should we avoid doing or saying since our salaries are tied to league revenue, and one thing we don't want to do is cause harm to our jobs or turn public opinion against us (they have). They could afford to put together something a little more sophisticated to draw attention to their issue without angering their employers or going to war with their fans.

Instead you had scorched earth. Kaepernick doesn't appear to be the brightest bulb. Michael Bennett has no credibility and said something dumb once more today. Delanie Walker added to the cavalcade of foolishness. If you don't have better faces of the movement, then you can't have a movement

fwiw I don't protest. There have been many things that have bothered me over the course of my life but wife, kids, mortgage, job etc. What time did I have?

[bachslunch]

What if a majority of the leagues fans don't believe in their cause, or their methods of bringing it to light, or even the fact that the sport has now become a political battleground.

I've never been a big fan of automatically kowtowing to what the majority may happen to think about anything. What appears to be a majority of French folks thought Jerry Lewis was hilarious, after all.

And sometimes, it's not clear there's an actual "majority" at all, just one that someone is trying to sell us to advance an agenda. Nixon's "silent majority" strikes me as a likely example.

If their salaries go down? Will they be ok with that?

Some things are more important than money.

For me, this is a benign example of protest, which I have no problem with. And at least to an extent, we here in America do have the right to protest, certainly if no one is being physically harmed or someone else's property isn't being damaged. Neither is the case here.

[Mark L. Ford]

I imagine that the end game eventually will be that the anthem will be performed before the players come out of the locker room, the way it was before 2009. There was never a reason that they had to be put on display to begin with.

[BD Sullivan]

I imagine that the end game eventually will be that the anthem will be performed before the players come out of the locker room, the way it was before 2009. There was never a reason that they had to be put on display to begin with.

Of course, between 2011-14, the NFL found a way to monetize patriotism:

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/def ... nor-troops

[Mark L. Ford]

Yeah... the basic starting pay for a military recruit is a little more than $19,000 a year-- in a combat zone, it's an extra $225 a month... so I'm not impressed at all with millions of dollars being spent for notice-my-patriotism gestures that are supposedly done "to honor the troops". Spend it on the troops.

[Reaser]

I imagine that the end game eventually will be that the anthem will be performed before the players come out of the locker room, the way it was before 2009. There was never a reason that they had to be put on display to begin with.

Players weren't always in the lockerroom before 2009, as anyone who's ever watched football knows. Just from watching football I've seen players lined up standing for the anthem from the 60's, 70's, 80's, 90's. Including Preseason, regular season, and obviously the post-season. Plus of course went to a lot of games in the 80's and 90's and players were out for the anthem then, too.

I get that the disingenuous agenda/memes going around claim players never were out for the anthem before 2009 and/or weren't out for the anthem ever in the history of the NFL until the NFL took money for it. That isn't the case, at all. Huge difference between it didn't (or implied, "never") happened and it being made uniform league-wide.

Not to mention the anthem before football games goes back decades and is part of various levels of football. I imagine most here that played high school football (maybe different for some of our more experienced members?) lined up and stood for the anthem before every game. I know my team did and literally every high school football game I've been too in my lifetime they had the anthem with the players lined up.

[BD Sullivan]

For years, if not decades, MNF games made a point to play the Anthem 10 minutes or so before ABC came on the air. You know, since it might take away from the chance to show 2 or 3 additional commercials.

[Citizen]

I won't speak for Mark, but I don't think he was claiming players never stood publicly for the anthem prior to 2009. Players and teams always had the option to do so, and back when kickoff would instantly follow the anthem, they stood because they were on the sideline anyway.

What changed in 2009 is that players started appearing in the sidelines for the anthem during prime-time games, which they hadn't generally done before since a commercial break and announcer chatter would take up time prior to kickoff. The "paid patriotism" angle, and the fact that networks are now more likely to televise the anthem, amped up the pressure -- unofficial, but still present -- on teams to be on the sideline for the anthem.

It's a de facto mandate, which makes it a nice, fat sacred cow ripe for spearing by protesting players.

[JWL]

I won't speak for Mark, but I don't think he was claiming players never stood publicly for the anthem prior to 2009. Players and teams always had the option to do so, and back when kickoff would instantly follow the anthem, they stood because they were on the sideline anyway.

I actually have a Fleer card circa 1980 that depicts the San Diego Chargers standing for the national anthem.

[Reaser]

I won't speak for Mark, but I don't think he was claiming players never stood publicly for the anthem prior to 2009.

Well, "the anthem will be performed before the players come out of the locker room, the way it was before 2009", implies they weren't on the field for the anthem anytime prior to 2009, obviously. Which typically has only been said on football related forums to push that agenda and/or said out of ignorance. Doesn't really matter, but somehow people believe this stuff.

It's actually all a great example of the pick-a-side issues plaguing society.

We have memes going around for weeks now, saying NFL players never came out or didn't come out for the anthem prior to 2009 / prior to the NFL being paid for it. Obviously not true, yet the uneducated believe it and then repeat it.

The other side counters with a meme of their own that says something like 871 convicted felons are currently playing in the NFL. Completely asinine and obviously not true. Yet the uneducated believe it and repeat it.