The NFL has chosen a side — and it’s against peaceful protest, free speech, and Black Lives Matter.
At the league’s spring meeting in Atlanta on Wednesday, commissioner Roger Goodell announced the team owners had approved a new policy against kneeling during the National Anthem.
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The new policy statement released to the public finds it “unfortunate” that protests “created a false perception among many that thousands of NFL players were unpatriotic.” (No, Donald Trump did that by hammering the public with his rhetoric that protest is un-American — when in fact the opposite is true.)
The draconian terms it set sent a very clear message: DO NOT PROTEST ON CAMERA:
– all personnel must stand for the anthem or their team will be fined
– players can remain in the locker room if they don’t wish to stand
– personnel who are seen not standing will face “appropriate discipline”
You can read the entire policy and its response (below):
The NFL Players Association responded quickly, posting an official statement on Twitter calling the ruling out as an about-face from what they’d been told:
Others, including Jemele Hill, who infamously got pulled from the air on ESPN after pressure from Trump, had some thoughts on the new ruling: