The anti-American anthem protests continue to plague the NFL.
And the rise of “wokeness” in sports has been a headache for the league.
But Donald Trump had two words for NFL players who kneeled for the anthem.
The NFL has tried to win back fans after a sharp decline in viewership following Colin Kaepernick’s anti-American anthem protests that caught fire around the league.
The protests subsided over the past few years, but the political posturing reignited after the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis.
The NFL began the season by playing both the unofficial black national anthem “Lift Every Voice and Sing” and “The Star-Spangled Banner.”
However, backlash from fans forced the NFL to nix a lot of the social justice messaging that was alienating fans.
But anthem-kneeling made a return on Thanksgiving of all days when both starting quarterbacks for the Houston Texans and Detroit Lions kneeled before the game.
The Texans’ Deshaun Watson and Lions’ Matthew Stafford caught the eye of Donald Trump who echoed the sentiment of the majority of Americans with two words:
No thanks! https://t.co/IYQSotnMG9
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 26, 2020
It’s a shame that multimillionaire athletes chose a day for giving thanks to protest the United States.
This leftist mentality has begun to take hold in America.
Fringe ideas that were once confined to college classrooms have broken out into the mainstream.
The NBA might’ve irreparably ruined their business with its full embrace of social justice during its conclusion to the season.
“Black Lives Matter” was plastered on the court and on the back of many players’ jerseys, even though the group is openly Marxist.
NBA commissioner Adam Silver suggested the league would move away from the over-the-top messaging in 2021, but the damage had already been done.
The NFL seemingly avoided that fate by not showing pregame protests, but the Thanksgiving day display proved to be a setback.
If players are going to double down on overt activism, they’re only going to drive away more fans.
People watch sports for a distraction, not a lecture.
And fans certainly don’t want to be lectured by millionaire athletes on political issues, especially when many of the athletes have shown that they don’t have deep knowledge on the subject matter.
If the NFL isn’t careful, they could lose a sizable chunk of their viewership for good.
Maybe the players will finally understand when they feel the crunch in their wallets.