Colin Kaepernick Comparing the NFL to Slavery Shows You We're Not a Serious Country Anymore
Why American Society is Going Haywire
Unlike the woke lefties demanding that Netflix remove Dave Chappelle’s special for offending them, it would never cross my mind to demand that Netflix pull Kaepernick’s new limited series, “Colin in Black and White.” Why not? Well, for one thing, Netflix would probably run a special dedicated to seeing what would happen if you punted a small child into a cage full of Honey Badgers if they thought it would make money, which, believe it or not, may be a positive trait in America’s censorship happy media.
Furthermore, even if I were inclined to go woke and call for censoring Kaepernick (which I’m not) and Netflix were inclined to listen (which they’re not), to do it responsibly would require me to watch his whole series first. That would mean spending way too much of my valuable time looking at his smug face and admittedly luxurious Afro as he spouts drivel like this:
When I was younger, I used to work in a group home, and I remember one of the kids who was struggling in school used to call studying and trying to get good grades “acting white.” It’s the same vibe as Kaepernick basically trying to say in that clip that any black American that white people like is another Urkel and thus, inauthentically black.
However, this column is about another clip that is even more ridiculous than that one. Here’s Colin Kaepernick comparing NFL players to actual, honest-to-goodness, pre-Civil War slaves. Note that this isn’t a throwaway remark. He obviously spent some time thinking about this and tries to make a case for it.
In the video, Kaepernick looks into the camera and sounds slightly annoyed, like Galileo being forced to explain to a room full of backward savages that the earth actually revolves around the sun, and says…
"What they don't want you to understand is what's being established is a power dynamic. Before they put you on the field, teams poke, prod, and examine you searching for any defect that might affect your performance. No boundary respected. No dignity left intact."
This is followed by a slave auction where the black players are sold off. Of course, there were no white “slaves” up on the screen which is kind of hard to square with the fact that roughly 25% of the NFL identifies as white compared to 57.5% that identifies as black. Of course, if Tom Brady were one of the slaves up on the block, it might undercut Kaepernick’s reasoning which is basically that… uh, wow, this is tough. I think he’s basically trying to say that the NFL is like slavery because the performance of the players is measured and their bosses will be in charge? Since that sounds like pretty much every other job, it doesn’t seem very well thought out. Especially since Colin Kaepernick has been at least trying to give people the impression that he still wants to be a “slave” for years now. In fact, here’s what he said less than 3 weeks ago:
"I am still up at 5 a.m. training five, six days a week making sure I'm prepared to take a team to a Super Bowl again. That's not something I will ever let go of, regardless of the actions of 32 teams and their partners to deny me employment. The same way I was persistent in high school is the same way I'm gonna be persistent here."
It's too bad the Chappelle Show isn’t still on the air because Dave had the guts to do the kind of skit about this that most of today’s skit comedy shows won’t (Although who knows? The Daily Show did a funny Jussie Smollet skit, so maybe).
Still, the skit practically writes itself, doesn’t it?
(A slave is pushed off a ship in chains. He looks horrified. 5 old, rich, snickering white men walk up to him).
Slave owner #1: You ready for a life of slavery, son? (He cracks his whip.)
Slave: Oh God, why have you forsaken me?
Slave Owner #2: Oh yeah, he’s a big one. I bet he can pick a lot of cotton!
Slave Owner #3: I gotta get this one. I’ll bid whatever it takes!
Auctioneer: How much are you willing to offer for this slave?
Slave Owner #2: All right, son. If you choose to work for my plantation, I’ll pay you a million dollars a year!
Slave: Wait, what?
Slave Owner #4: I’ll go 1.1 million and throw in a plantation house with a personal masseuse.
Slave: A masseuse? Wait, is this some kind of joke or…
Slave Owner #3: All right slave, you drive a hard bargain. I’ll go 1.2 million, a plantation house, a massage therapist, AND a personal chef. But that’s as high as I’ll go.
Slave owner #1: I will match that offer and give you a 10% bonus if you lead the team in cotton picked.
Slave: This is not really what I was expecting when the people from that other tribe massacred my friends, caught me in a net, and sold me to you, but that bonus sounds great, and I do have to admit that I have always wanted a personal chef…
Slave owner #1: Perfect! Welcome to the Savannah Cotton Pickers, son! (Hands him a jersey.)
Kaepernick’s comparison is so obviously bonkers that it probably wouldn’t be worth writing about this topic just to debunk it. That’s because it practically debunks itself if you have functioning brain cells. However, Kaepernick getting the opportunity to foist this nonsense on the public is worth writing about because it tells you so much about why American society is going haywire.
First of all, it’s worth noting that Colin Kaepernick probably considers the collective national eye roll this clip generated to be a FEATURE, not a BUG, because in the world of social media, as long as people are talking about you, good or bad, you are almost always winning:
If you don’t think this is true, consider why Colin Kaepernick is famous. He’s a 2nd-rate NFL quarterback who disrespected the American flag as a protest. Many people have never understood is that Kaepernick’s kneeling was never really about accomplishing anything. It was about finding a protest that drew massive amounts of attention while polarizing both sides. That’s usually how you become a star in politics today. There are exceptions that manage to nauseate everyone for one reason or another like Richard Spencer or Anthony Weiner, but oftentimes, one side loves you in large part because the other side despises you so much. See Matt Gaetz, Candace Owens, and Tucker Carlson on the Right and AOC, Michael Moore, and Ilhan Omar on the Left for good examples of this phenomenon. Kaepernick’s move was absolutely counter-productive if the idea was to achieve any kind of real and lasting permanent change, but it was perfectly executed if the idea was to get his name in the limelight.
With that being said, giving a highly polarizing person who has proven that they’re willing to do anything to get publicity a special to talk about something as explosive as race isn’t a responsible thing to do. However, responsibility went out the window in America a long time ago when it came to that subject. Accusations of racism for just about anything and everything are a day in, day out occurrence in America now. It seems like there are always people, Colin Kaepernick included, making wild, unsupported accusations of racism with zero concern over whether they’re fair or true. Those kinds of things should matter. They do to good people.
Results should also matter. Kaepernick can fairly say that he was a major player in the Black Lives Matter movement, but what has #BLM achieved exactly? 2 billion dollars plus in damage during the 2020 riots? Burned-out city blocks that may not be back for a decade? 25 people dead during the riots and who knows how many hundreds more have been murdered since because of BLM’s misguided attempts to “defund the police?” Ultimately, has listening to Colin Kaepernick brought people together, or has it driven them apart? Has it achieved good things or bad things for society? He certainly has a track record of success when it comes to getting publicity for himself, but are the things he’s advocating making life better or worse for other people?
Once you get beyond Kaepernick’s awful track record, consider that his beliefs are radical to the point of being ridiculous. For example, he has publicly advocated the idea of getting rid of the police and prisons:
By abolishing policing and prisons, not only can we eliminate white supremacist establishments, but we can create space for budgets to be reinvested directly into communities to address mental health needs, homelessness and houselessness, access to education, and job creation as well as community-based methods of accountability. This is a future that centers the needs of the people, a future that will make us safer, healthier, and truly free.
After all the money we spend on police and prisons is poured into social workers and homeless programs, what happens when the next Jeffrey Dahmer moves in down the street and a gang sets up a crack house two streets over? I guess you get a few dozen friends together and go kill them. After all, what are they going to do? Put you in prison? Har, har, har. Incidentally, after reading quite a few articles on the prison abolition movement (Kaepernick is not the only person with these loopy views) to try to figure out how they’re going to deal with criminals if there are no police or prisons, the answer seems to be that they haven’t figured that part out yet. With that being the case, maybe they can try it in Portland first to see how it works out and get back to us.
When you put it all together with regard to Kaepernick, what do we see? We see someone who is treated as important because he’s popular, not because he’s wise, has a successful track record, or has good ideas. That has never been a problem with musicians or actors, but it’s dangerous for society when we start applying that kind of thinking to important issues like politics, policy, and the law. There was a time in America when believing that being in the NFL was the equivalent of being a slave would be enough for most people to write someone off as a fruit loop who shouldn’t be taken seriously. That’s actually how it’s supposed to be. It’s also part of how you end up with a healthy culture, which we certainly don’t have in America anymore. A serious country full of serious people wouldn’t give a flat damn what a clown like Colin Kaepernick thought about issues that mattered and they’d think less of people that did. Is America still a serious country? Apparently not.
The people who listen to someone like Kaepernick and his ilk are ill-informed if they are informed at all. They have no values. They have nothing to do accept align with malcontents like themselves. Being a herd member is their highest aspiration, as long as the herd they belong to receives the most attention and they can win points by worshiping the leaders of the pack. I believe most Americans are not like what we see portrayed on social media or MSM. Most Americans don't worship at the alter of the woke institutions. They have families to raise and support, jobs to do and a higher power than themselves or other humans to believe in. In other words their time is taken up in worthy pursuits, not least of which is performing the tasks that allow these narcissists the luxury of hating on America . When they do see or hear about what the Kaepernick types are doing, they shake their heads in disbelief and wonder at the ingratitude of these specious self-serving ingrates . The last thing true Americans wish to do is belong to that herd.
White people don't get to tell black people what is acceptable to black people. Hmm. Does he really want to go there? Because the obvious follow on conclusion is that black people don't get to tell white people what is acceptable to white people, either. And if that's the case, than white people can freely oppress and exploit black people and black people's objections are irrelevant.
Indeed, his thinking appears to be that its not just irrelevant if white people like a black person, but that it's inherently bad. For a black person to be true to himself, he must make white people hate him. Yeah, that's a philosophy for unity and comity.