Donald Trump had some thoughts on the NFL’s protest ban

Donald Trump, who many point to as a catalyst for the NFL’s decision to ban player protest, has weighed in on the whole matter.

On Wednesday, the NFL voted to ban players from protesting during the national anthem under penalty of league law. Should a player or coach on either sideline show a form of protest while the anthem is being played, they will be fined.

You can imagine how well this went over.

Last season was packed full of finding out who your friends really are moments, regardless of which side you landed on. Folks either thought the players were within their rights to peacefully protest while others saw it as a disrespectful act towards a symbol of the country.

What was lost in everything was the point of why the protests were happening. The issue became more about how we as (prominently white) individuals felt about the act of protesting while the national anthem plays and less about the murder of young black Americans at the hands of police — Colin Kaepernick’s original reason for kneeling.

Things veered tremendously off course when Donald Trump used his pulpit as President of the United States to openly call for the firing of players who protested during the anthem.

On the heels of the culmination of his war against player protest, Trump went on Fox and Friends to both applaud the decision and also say it’s still not enough.

Look, I tried to approach this in as responsible a manner as possible as to avoid people on the internet shouting at both me and each other. That’s, unfortunately, an unreasonable task. Are we forgetting that just last year we all stared directly into the sun? Screaming into the echo chamber is just something that’s going to happen, but it doesn’t have to be the end game.

Perhaps we can use this as another opportunity to look inward at ourselves. These protests aren’t going anywhere and getting angry about it one way or another isn’t conducive to a unified nation. Instead, we should recognize that we’re all in this together and listen to one another instead of trying to shout over each other has always been the easiest way to bridge a solution to all of this.