T.K. Williams, Thomas Lilly, Nick Powers, Minna Barrett, and Sidasia Johnson. Keya Rice for the Catalyst.
SUNY Old Westbury kicked off the first day of Black History Month with “Let’s talk about Colin Kaepernick.” Students and some interested staff members slowly came into Multipurpose Room B in the Student Union to listen to a panel of five lead a discussion about Colin Kaepernick kneeling during the Anthem. The panel featured alumnus T.K. Williams, student Sidasia Johnson, and three Old Westbury professors: Minna Barrett, Thomas Lilly, and Nick Powers.
The event opened with a slideshow by Dr. Minna Barrett of the First-Year Experience. The slideshow raised the question of why Kaepernick’s form of protest caused so much controversy. Many, including President Donald Trump, found Kaepernick’s actions appalling and a direct insult to US nationalism.
Colin Kaepernick is an American football quarterback who was drafted by the San Francisco 49ers in the 2011 NFL draft. In 2016, in the wake of the mass police shootings of African Americans by white police officers and the Black Lives Matter movement, Kaepernick began protesting by kneeling while the national anthem was being played at the start of games. Kaepernick became a national figure as his protest inspired athletes of not only the NFL, but also other sports leagues to join him in kneeling during the national anthem to show solidarity against racial injustice towards African Americans.
The first panelist was Old Westbury Alumnus T.K. Williams, a former college football athlete at Syracuse University and now a high school football coach. Williams recalls playing football at Syracuse University before he transferred to Old Westbury in the 2015. “We were kings during the football season, but after that we were dumb jocks.” Williams said the black population in Syracuse was only five percent of the student population. Those five percent were only significant when they were playing sports, i.e. football. They were just black kids amongst a sea of white people. Williams was concerned that his current players understood the significance, “Do you know why you’re taking the knee?”
Old Westbury English professor Nicholas Powers was deeply conflicted between not standing during the national anthem as a form of protest or standing as he’d always done. Powers, who is no stranger to protest, recalled a time when he was at a graduation held by the college and considered not standing for the national anthem. However, seeing the proud parents and family in the audience cheering on their newly graduated child made him reconsider. “The version of the American dream sung about in the national anthem was different than the one I wanted to protest.” For many first-generation graduates and their families and that in itself represents the American Dream, which was not what he was protesting against. For him, there has always been a conflict with the anthem as a symbol of hope for upward mobility but also as a representation of the racism, sexism, and bigotry that this country still has yet to overcome.
The third speaker was an Old Westbury student athlete, Sidasia Johnson, who plays on the volleyball team. The Kaepernick protest was brought to her attention by social media. Johnson became immediately conflicted as to what she should do. “I wanted to know if I would get support from my team.” Johnson would soon find out the answer to her question was no, she took the knee and was not supported by her team. Even with lack of support from her team and dirty looks and whispers from other teams, Johnson continues to protest because she knows it’s the right thing to do.
The final panelist was the chair of the Politics, Economics and Law department, Thomas Lilly. Lilly made it clear that he is not a football fan, but he would happily examine the situation from a legal perspective. Lilly quoted the First Amendment and said that kneeling during a game is not mentioned in the constitution and that congress can’t do anything directly about it. The First Amendment does not affect an employer’s ability to discipline or fire an employee for protesting. The First Amendment only limits the power of government to limit free speech, it does not prevent corporations from restricting speech. According to Lilly, even though NFL players are unionized, the union can do little to protect them if they are protesting and their employer chooses to suspend or fire them.
