More Like King, Jr. Less Like Kaepernick

When Colin Kaepernick began exercising his First Amendment right to peacefully protest, I was all the way here for it. Kaepernick was deliberately kneeling or sitting during the national anthem in order to highlight the wrongdoings against African Americans and minorities in the United States.

Much like Colin Kaepernick, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was a big believer in non-violent protests and organized several to draw attention to the Civil Rights Movement. Unlike Kaepernick though, King, Jr. understood the importance of the ballot. In 1957 during the Prayer Pilgrimage for Freedom in Washington, D.C., King, Jr. delivered his “Give Us the Ballot” speech.

Here’s a brief excerpt of what he said, EIGHT YEARS before the Voting Rights Act of 1965 became law:

But even more, all types of conniving methods are still being used to prevent Negroes from becoming registered voters. The denial of this sacred right is a tragic betrayal of the highest mandates of our democratic tradition. And so our most urgent request to the president of the United States and every member of Congress is to give us the right to vote.

Give us the ballot, and we will no longer have to worry the federal government about our basic rights.

Give us the ballot, and we will no longer plead to the federal government for passage of an anti-lynching law; we will by the power of our vote write the law on the statute books of the South and bring an end to the dastardly acts of the hooded perpetrators of violence.

Give us the ballot, and we will transform the salient misdeeds of bloodthirsty mobs into the calculated good deeds of orderly citizens.

Give us the ballot, and we will fill our legislative halls with men of goodwill and send to the sacred halls of Congress men who will not sign a “Southern Manifesto” because of their devotion to the manifesto of justice.

Give us the ballot, and we will place judges on the benches of the South who will do justly and love mercy, and we will place at the head of the southern states governors who will, who have felt not only the tang of the human, but the glow of the Divine.

Give us the ballot, and we will quietly and nonviolently, without rancor or bitterness, implement the Supreme Court’s decision of May seventeenth, 1954.

In this juncture of our nation’s history, there is an urgent need for dedicated and courageous leadership. If we are to solve the problems ahead and make racial justice a reality, this leadership must be fourfold.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. believed then, as I do now, the act of voting was not just important but sacred. Donna Brazile wrote, “[f]or Dr. King, the right to vote was sacrosanct and foundational. It is the very essence of our social contract. Free elections create legitimacy. They imply the consent of the governed. He knew that unfair elections laws did not just hurt minorities or the working poor, they rendered hollow the very essence of American government.”

I was a big Kaepernick fan until November 9th, 2016 when he declared he did not vote in the presidential election. Quite frankly, whom he cast his ballot for would have been inconsequential at this point. But the fact that he chose not to perform his civic duty, one men and women fought tirelessly for him to be able to practice was an insult to literally everything his protest stands for, not to mention those he is doing it on behalf of. What good is a protest if you take no action to stand behind it?

In his defense of not voting, Kaepernick said, “You know, I think it would be hypocritical of me to vote. I said from the beginning I was against oppression, I was against the system of oppression. I’m not going to show support for that system. And to me, the oppressor isn’t going to allow you to vote your way out of your oppression.”

Sorry, but this is a pile of hot and steamy poo poo. It’s compounded by revelations that Kaepernick has never voted, not for Obama, not for anybody. I invite Kaepernick (or anyone really) to explain to me how you fight oppression without a voice, without a vote? Without government representatives who will fight for you and people like you? How do systems of oppression become undone? Surely not on their own or we wouldn’t be in this position to begin with. Now that Donald Trump’s cabinet is stacked top-to-bottom with Republicans who oppose the basic rights and freedoms of African-Americans and other marginalized individuals, does he still think he couldn’t vote his way out of oppression? What does he think is going to happen to criminal justice when the day after Trump won, the only stocks which skyrocketed were private prisons?

Say what you will about Hillary Clinton but one of the policies I was most passionate about from her policy shop was (and remains) Criminal Justice Reform. Do me a favor, and actually take a minute to read (or scan) through it. Maya Harris and others understood that reforming the broken criminal justice system isn’t as simple as releasing a bunch of people who are already locked up (though, that is certainly part of the puzzle). It’s also about changing the laws and systems which keep these people locked up and treat them like second class citizens when they finally leave prison. Meanwhile, Trump is debating how to cancel environmental restrictions or undo the Paris Agreement and signing crap deals to keep a limited number jobs in the States.

When Kaepernick claims there was nothing to do by exercising his right to vote, I must remind you how very wrong he was. Oppressed people are able to rise up and speak out but not if you skip the critical step of voting to elect government officials to act on your behalf. No private citizen alone can undo mass incarceration, it takes a collection of government officials working in concert with a President who gives a damn about getting it done. It requires policy, education, sentencing changes, MONEY, time, relentless effort. If i’m being frank, it takes a lot more than just taking a knee.

Then again, I do suppose that as a NFL quarterback, your life guarantees you a certain amount of financial privilege. I know that Kaepernick could just as easily become a victim of police brutality or racism in America, it would be foolish to say otherwise. But, it’s just as likely that his life in the next four years will remain largely unchanged (save some friendly tax breaks courtesy of Donald Trump). I can’t guarantee that a majority of the people Kaepernick is protesting on behalf of will be extended the same luxury.

Feel free to protest, it’s your right to do so — but so is voting. And until you come up with a better excuse for why you didn’t exercise that right, I don’t care to hear about what you think your silent protest is accomplishing anymore. From my view, it’s now an empty gesture. You let the oppressed people you want to help down and in doing so have left them more vulnerable than ever.