Sunday, August 27, 2017

PROTEST IS THE AMERICAN WAY.


Last week we loss the comedian, civil rights activist, and nutritionist, Dick Gregory.  He was in his eighties and lived a meaningful life that touched millions.  I remember as a child sneaking and reading my father's paperback copy of Gregory's provocative work "Nigger, an Autobiography.  It was a straightforward reflective masterpiece that epitomized America. Until the end Gregory maintained the fire in his belly that governed over everything he shared with the masses. He didn't turn into one of those elderly men that lost their ability to challenge the establishment.

I say all this as I watch Jim Brown turn his back on Colin Kaepernick.  Brown a man that stood with Ali and other great athletes during the civil rights movement belittling Kaepernick for taking a stand on his beliefs;  a non-confrontational, personal stand that Colin took when he chose to sit or kneel during the national anthem.  He committed no crime.  Yet Brown who has a terrible history when it come to domestic abuse accuses Kaepernick of desecrating the flag as if it is like throwing a woman off a balcony.  Google Eva Bohn-Chin.  I never had Brown on a pedestal so his meetings with Mr. Apprentice and his choice to not see the value of non-violent activism doesn't change my view of him.

I am old enough to remember the stories of him repeatedly assaulting the women in his life.  While we shouldn't be defined solely by our past, we cannot expect it to be erased.  I have no idea if he apologized for his actions but I do know that he chose to judge another man solely based on his own outlook.  In his world there is no room for diverse thinking or expression. Brown was afforded a second, third, and fourth chance and is still beloved by the football community; but he can't respect another man for standing for what he believes in.  Ironically, Brown along with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Bill Russell, in 1967, stood publicly with Muhammad Ali when he chose not to fight in the Vietnam War. Some saw that as treason, but during the height of his career he chose to take that stand any way. What happened to that guy?  Where the hell did he go?

Longevity has its place, as Dr. King stated.  I want and need to live a long life, but what I never want to do is become that old lady who thinks progress is unnecessary.  I don't want to be that person who cannot see and value different points of view.  So I choose to boycott the NFL.  My Sundays will no longer be consumed by football pools, games, and thrash talking.  I choose to celebrate Kaepernick's decision last season by being more productive.  I choose to give the side-eye to the Jim Brown's of the world that have decided hypocrisy is a way of  life and protesting is now somehow un-American.

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