Issues and Ethics Week 1

Teddy Gilman
Sep 7, 2018 · 2 min read

To my astonishment, and probably many others, no players were kneeling during the national anthem of last night’s NFL season opener. I can’t completely verify this, but what I can say is that I didn’t see any live footage of players kneeling nor sitting during the national anthem which was performed by Boyz 2 Men on NBC’s network.

Why didn’t Malcolm Jenkins race a fist in protest like he had in previous preseason games this year? It can’t be because of a policy, because the policy that NFL owners put forth in May requiring players on the field to stand was not obeyed by Michael Bennett or Jay Ajayi, who both sat on a bench during last night’s anthem. So my question is, why were there no kneelings shown on live T.V during the national anthem last night? Instead of asking “What was Nike thinking?”, why didn’t President Trump commemorate the fact that there were no players kneeling last night? What are players being told to stop them from carrying on with the protests that they were performing last season? I wouldn’t say that these articles have ethical dilemmas in them, but they both bring up the question of “why were there no players kneeling last night?”

Matt Tritto brought up the Nike ad, which I completely stand by because Kaepernick has basically sacrificed his own job security and well being for the social injustice cause. Malcolm Jenkins and Michael Bennett were both key contributors to the social injustice debate, and still are. Malcolm was wearing a t-shirt that had “Ca$h bail=poverty trap” written on it last night, and Michael was sitting down during the anthem. Were they told by higher up people in the Eagles organization to not kneel last night? That’s the question. This will continue to be an ethical dilemma, especially if players who were protesting last season are not allowed to anymore.

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