(09-25-2017, 11:43 PM)Bullseye Wrote: MalabarJag
   So your defense of the anti-American actions of some of the players (they stood for "God Save the Queen") is that their anti-Americanism wasn't as bad as the slave masters of the Confederacy?
   Talk about damning with faint praise.

No, my defense of the players is that nothing they have done to this point is even remotely anti American.

The First Amendment of the Constution reads thusly: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." (emphasis added).  The Founding Fathers felt the freedom of speech was important enough to make it the first right to codify in the Bill of Rights.  Citizens have the right to peaceably assemble and to air grievances.  Nothing the players have done in kneeling silently before a football game during the national anthem, or raising their fists during the same time exceeds the rights delineated above.  There has been no violence associated with those players pre game body positions.  The players have not destroyed any property in their silent protests.  The players have not burned any flags when conducting these protests.  It is doubtful any of the players who kneel or raise a fist prior to a football game have violated any tangentially related time, place or manner restrictions passed as local ordinances. If so, there have been no arrests based upon that.  Their actions have been wholly consistent with the constitution.  


My contrasting their actions with those of the Confederates is to highlight the staggering degree of hypocrisy on this subject from the right.  People who literally declared war on and conducted war against this country are revered as heroes by the right.  Meanwhile, those who silently protest in the effort to help form a more perfect union are reviled as traitors by the same right.

Again, it isn't about patriotism.

What the right has functionally expressed is that people of color have no right to voice dissent the right is bound to honor or respect.

What else explains the disparate treatment diametrically opposed to the degree and severity of dissent raised by the groups in question?