Report Alleges Colin Kaepernick Will Stand For the National Anthem if a Team Signs Him This Season
His girlfriend says otherwise.
Update: Radio personality and reported Kaepernick girlfriend Nessa Diab has called bullshit on Associated Press and CBS reports that the QB has made any statement regarding no longer kneeling to protest racial inequity during the anthem.
The reports that Colin will stand for the anthem are completely false! He has never discussed this with anyone. pic.twitter.com/tWusUBJMeF
— NESSA (@nessnitty) October 8, 2017
Additionally, the CBS reporter who was the source for the statement has backtracked. His tweets are collected here.
Kaepernick seemed to confirm the report was wrong with this tweet:
A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on.
Winston S. Churchill
— Colin Kaepernick (@Kaepernick7) October 8, 2017
Original Story: Vice President Mike Pence left a Colts-49ers game Sunday when players on the San Francisco team took a knee during the national anthem.
At the same time Colin Kaepernick—the QB who essentially created this form of protest—said in an unrelated statement that he’ll no longer do it if he’s signed with an NFL team this season, reports the Associated Press.
So even as VP Pence was tweeting that he would “not dignify any event that disrespects our soldiers, our Flag, or our National Anthem,” Kaepernick was essentially telling CBS Sports that he wants to continue in his chosen career and may compromise to do it.
Well, Kaepernick may not see it as a compromise, but some on social media certainly did.
https://twitter.com/stockportfan86/status/917085868631961600https://twitter.com/cynthiapalafox/status/917085844321665024
Haha! Sellout.. RT @AP_NFL: BREAKING: Quarterback Colin Kaepernick tells CBS he’ll stand during (cont) https://t.co/c8mGBRCXOz
— Lance E. Crowder (@DarthLanceyPoo) October 8, 2017
I respected Kaepernick’s protest and what he was trying to represent but now that he said he would stand for the anthem just to be on a team shows how big of a fucking vagina he is. Realized money was more important then his beliefs. Sellout
— kenny (@YoungKenneth23) October 8, 2017
The protest was always intended to bring attention to racial inequality, especially in the way law enforcement approaches young black men, but it has been interpreted in an intensely political way.
Kaepernick has long done charitable work for youths in troubled communities, so there could be an argument made that he can’t keep doing that without a source of income. And his reported statement to CBS came on the heels of the Tennessee Titans denying Kaepernick an opportunity for a workout due to his “lack of familiarity” with coach Mike Mularkey’s “system.”
It looks like Kaepernick’s willingness to resume his career may not best the force of the controversial tide of public protest he began last season—even if the seeming embrace of it by many in the NFL has ultimately “watered it down.”
He may just have to look for a new line of work.