Race in Sports and The Politics Behind It
The American sports world has taken major steps towards eliminating inequality and the discrimination of athletes based on their race, but there is still work to be done in order to completely erase racial prejudice in sports.
Dating back to the beginning of the modern era of sports, athletes have faced discrimination because of their race. 72 years ago, Jackie Robinson famously broke the color barrier in the MLB when he played his first game for the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947. At the time, the most popular professional sports league in America’s first 78 years consisted of purely white athletes, before Robinson stepped foot on the field. If the MLB had the lifespan of an average human being, it would’ve died before a player of color suited up for a game.
Today, the two most popular sports leagues in the United States, the NBA and NFL, consist of 81% and 73% players of color in their respective leagues. That statistic itself shows the improvement of inclusion in the current sports leagues in America, which is largely due to the efforts of influential colored athletes to fight for equality.
Past athletes like Muhammad Ali and Bill Russell contributed major roles in the Civil Rights Movement for African-American rights, while current athletes such as Colin Kaepernick and LeBron James continue to make a stand against the ongoing discrimination of not only black but all athletes of color.
Before Ali and Russell spoke out in support of the Civil Rights Movement, there were limitations to how many colored players could be on the roster of NBA teams, and those players that were lucky enough to even make the team were significantly treated worse by team owners, fans, and in cases their own coaches. Despite being a star player, Bill Russell was only allowed to use colored bathrooms and go out to colored bars before the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed.
While Ali and Russell’s influence positively altered the way colored athletes were viewed and treated in society, colored athletes still endure forms of racism today. Just three years ago in 2016, then San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick famously kneeled during the American National Anthem before a preseason game. He later told NFL Media, “I am not going to stand up to show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses black people and people of color,” referring to his reasoning behind kneeling.
Kaepernick was slammed with harsh criticism for his actions and once he became a free agent, teams were unwilling to sign him to a contract despite leading the 49ers to a Super Bowl in 2012. Kaepernick and the NFL eventually reached an agreement where the NFL would pay Kaepernick less than $10 million to split with fellow protesting teammate Eric Reid, as a compensation for his unemployment from the league.
This was still not reasonable compensation. A man should not lose his job for publicly speaking his beliefs in a country that values freedom of speech. America has come along way since their days of slavery, but this is only the beginning of the war for equality.
