Another thought-provoking article, Mr. Kean.

Kap kneeled before the flag to protest police brutality. Conservatives condemned him for disrespecting it and called him unpatriotic. White rioters brandished the flag like a weapon to brutalize police and try to overturn a democratic election. Conservatives praised them for fighting “election fraud” and called them patriots.

When people raged over Kaepernick kneeling during the anthem, I didn’t get it. When had kneeling ever been a sign of disrespect? I thought they just didn’t understand. So, I wrote a FB post to explain his meeting with military veteran Nate Boyer, etc..

Naively, I thought when people learned he was trying to shine a light on police brutality and racial inequality and not disrespecting the flag, they would accept it, even be supportive of his cause.

I couldn’t have been more wrong. People didn’t want to understand Kap. They didn’t want to be reminded of systemic racism. They didn’t want to confront their own racist views. So, they looked for an excuse to silence him. They used the excuse of “disrespecting the flag” to direct hatred toward him and disguise their own racism.