The ground shifted under Trump, and he is stuck in the past.
He is crossways with pro sports. Big, big mistake.
Fan tweet:
"Pretty sure you won't see @JJWatt Taking a knee."
JJ Watt response:
" A) don't speak for me
B) if you still think it's about disrespecting he flag or our military, you clearly haven't been listening."
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| Houston Texans Star JJ Watt |
Trump was cynical and dishonest, but clever, in slamming Colin Kaepernick three years ago.
Trump put gasoline on the culture war fire and Trump profits from that. There were photos of Kaepernick with big afro hair. Kaepernick was photographed with cops-as-pigs socks. He was easy to marginalize. Trump had the far bigger microphone, and used it to define Kaepernick's protest as insulting the flag, the US military, and the country. Fire the sons of bitches who protest, he said.
It was the ideal Trump setup, a conflict between regular all-American patriots and their national symbols vs. one of the usual suspects of dangerous outsider malcontents, a black man and his hate-America liberal friends.
Perfect for Trump.
Then the George Floyd video. White people saw. Wow.
Then the protests, and the discussions about the protests. Why can't the demonstrations be peaceful, people wondered? Why don't they do things like silent vigils to make their point? Why do people think they have to burn stuff to get our attention?
Oh. That was Kaepernick all along. The president insulted him and the NFL wouldn't hire him.
Change happened. Roger Goodell, the NFL Commissioner, said the NFL officially switched its position on players taking a knee. The NFL is culturally very White. NFL is played largely by black players, but for a white audience, and typically with white quarterbacks. Goodell said the NFL was sorry, they got this wrong. Last week Drew Brees echoed that. He, too, said he was wrong and he now stood with his black teammates. Trump tweeted criticism.
NASCAR is culturally not just White, but southern white. They, too, announced they realized they were part of the problem and began banning Confederate flags and insignia.
Then the US Soccer league announced a change in rules, ending their requirement that athletes stand at attention during the national anthem. This drew complaints from Republican Jim Jordan, and Trump echoed him, tweeting that he won't be watching soccer now that they implemented this rule. (Trump--the brand, symbol, archetype Trump--is not a soccer-watcher. Soccer is for Europeans. It is off brand for him.) In any case Trump objects to players taking a knee.
Trump watches football, good old all American football. He said he likes that hard contact and misses the old rules where players smacked heads. Only now, with soccer allowing player protests, Trump tweets "it looks like NFL is heading in that direction also, but not with me watching!"
If the NFL as an organization switched, but its white players did not, Trump would have succeeded in defining this as the institutions capitulating to political correctness, while the white players understood things Trump's way, splitting white and black. That is why announcements by white quarterbacks matter. White Cleveland Browns QB Baker Mayfield exchanged tweets with a fan:
Fan:
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| "If I lose fans for kneeling, that's OK." |
Mayfield:
"pull your head out. I absolutely am.
The meaning of taking a knee has switched, which means the political meaning of the fight over it switched, too. Trump now appears to be a defender of American blindness and denial, not a defender of American patriotism.
There is still a market for denial. Most of Trump's base will stick with him. Some NASCAR fans flew Confederate flags in defiance. However, this week shows accelerated erosion among Trump allies, coming on top of the revolt of the generals who were former top staff, and the apology of America's top military leader, General Milley, who said he should not have been near Trump at that Bible photo op. Now quarterbacks add their voice.
When white quarterbacks say to pull your head out, it signals the ground shifted. Trump is barreling ahead anyway.
2 comments:
I highly doubt that Trump watches NFL. I couldn't find a single picture of him ever attending a game before 2016. It might be fun to ask him for some stats.
Sarah Palin: "All of them."
NASCAR is responding to sponsor pressure, not some moral epiphany. The "rebel" flag has been under assault for some time now, soon now the only place it's going to be seen is at Lynyrd Skynyrd concerts.
It's still early but there seems to be groundswell happening. Like sports - other companies are lining up to support BLM and the right to protest systemic injustice. They wouldn't do it if it wasn't strategic. Starbucks - which has a rigid dress code let's employees wear their own protest gear, until Starbucks issues standard issue protest/support gear. "Standard protest gear?". T-Mobile, Disney, ABC and Papa John's has pulled all ad-buys from Tucker Carlson's show in spite of it's big audience. T-Mobile is having all-hands (voluntary) listening meetings. Every business unit and department had an open forum where people shared their experiences and stories. People of color and non-white immigrants shared - sometimes scary stories of harassment and threats. There were over 400 people on one call. It was unscripted and sometimes pretty raw, but it was real. The company is doubling down to use it's platform for change. With over 100 million customers and 80,000 employees, the leadership is right in thinking they can not take a stand on something to fundamental to so many people. Businesses are another bellwether to where they think public sentiment is.
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