David French: All Praise Colin Kaepernik

No, hear him out first.

First, he notes that Colin Kaepernick's Wokeness now extends to his stockings:

[A]t this point I’ve come full-circle. I used to oppose Kaepernick’s actions (while agreeing that the NFL shouldn’t discipline him), now I’m cheering him on. You do you, Colin.

Here’s why: First, he’s completely exposing the utter hypocrisy of the corporate sports industry. I seem to recall ESPN firing Curt Schilling not long ago for taking some rather conventional positions regarding the problem of Islamic extremism (yes, a minority of extremists can create big problems) and for sharing an “offensive” meme taking on the idea that men should be allowed in women’s restrooms. And it feels like it was only three weeks ago that the NFL wasn’t permitting the Dallas Cowboys to wear helmet decals supporting Dallas police after one of the worst police massacres in American history. And now? Everyone is rushing to assure America that Kaepernick won’t be punished, and there are ESPN analysts falling all over themselves to praise him. I was on the radio with an ESPN writer just today who made the point that protest should make us feel uncomfortable. Did you hear that Christian pro athletes? Your views on social change are totally welcome now. No reprisals for you!

Second, he’s discrediting a dangerous cause. One of the challenges of dealing with Black Lives Matter is that the media has done a very good job concealing an extraordinarily radical and destructive movement behind a veneer of manufactured moderation and respectability. There is a lot that’s hateful, vicious, and incoherent about BLM, and now that Kaepernick is bringing his disrespect and insults to the national stage, it’s harder to ignore the radicalism.

Here's the money quote -- singing the refrain of a song I've been singing for years now:

I love free speech, and I hate the corporate culture that is increasingly stifling individual expression in favor of advancing approved boardroom messages.

I've said this so many times it sickens me to repeat it, but let's go for it one more time:

The Nazis did not take over corporations as a communist country would. Instead, they formed a socialist model called "fascist corporatism" in which corporations remained formally under the ownership of their, well, owners, but the state dictated to them how they would run their companies, for the benefit of the almighty State.

In America, speech codes and social bullying are not imposed on the citizen by the government, by and large. (Yes, there are direct government impositions, as with the Bake Me a Cake Bigot regime, but this isn't how it normally works.)

How this is all being done is by the government bullying institutions -- colleges, for example -- and corporations, and then those institutions apply the bullying forces upon the citizen.

Yes, the NFL is a big player in this. As is the NBA, boycotting a state for the crime of not having mixed-sex bathrooms for children.

And all the entertainment companies -- who don't provide you with entertainment at all, but rather supply you with a ready excuse which makes sense to you (somehow) to explain why you are wasting your precious moments on earth staring at a lighted box full of actors.

It's time for the people to show the power they have and begin bankrupting the Quisling Corporations by boycotting them until their ears bleed.

For the life of me, I do not understand why men, the NFL's biggest customers and the nation's most predictably righward voters, put up with this shit when they have the power within themselves to end it completely by simply abstaining for a year.

A little rebellion is good for the spirit and a little defiance increases blood-flow to long-atrophied parts of the body.

posted by Ace at 05:37 PM

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