“To Sin in Silence when We Should Protest makes Cowards Out
of Men” Ella Wheeler Wilcox
There are many different issues that plague this country and
there will always be problems that plague this country. How can we expect anything less when we are
trying to be a country that prides itself on its diversity and freedoms? If we do not try to fix these issues, however, then we
are only giving lip service to what this country really is versus what it could
be.
In this country, we have the right to protest something as a
way of trying to make real change. This
is a right for everyone, even for the people/groups that we may not believe
should have the right. Like anything,
though, protests only bring about change when they are taken seriously and when
people want to make the change.
A good example of this is people protesting our national
anthem. It all started with one
quarterback who chose to not stand during the national anthem. It wasn’t until he was actually noticed that
someone asked why he was doing it. He
honestly said that he was protesting the oppression of black people in this
country as well as police treatment towards black people. As soon as this was made public, the new
world of social media began.
Of course, as with the burning of the flag, anything related
to the ‘patriotism’ of this country is deemed wrong. The haters came out, calling names, saying
they were spoiled athletes or taking away their endorsements. In the end, we were happy when they were entertaining
us but when they use their celebrity to call out the issues of the country,
then they are bad people.
People joining the protest are doing so making the sacrifice
for something they believe in.
They know there will be consequences, they know there will be haters but
they believe in trying to get some action on the things they believe in. It is a lot better than people sitting behind
a computer ‘protesting’ on Facebook or Twitter or afraid to protest because it
will cost them something. If one is not
willing to sacrifice themselves for the protest then it is just empty.
Would this protest be viewed differently if white people and the
police joined in? There are a lot of
both that probably do believe the same thing but are they afraid to do anything
because it would cause a problem? I
actually told someone that I was going to join this protest and their response was no you
are not. No asking me why, just no I was
not. If we are trying to get racism
changed in this country, white people can’t always be the enemy and black
people can’t always be the victim because both are needed to make the change. We also can't be afraid to join in the protest just because we are white or with the police.
Is one of the reasons that this protest is so divided
because they do not do a good job of communicating the agenda beyond the protest? It is great to say the agenda at the
beginning but one still has to create actions on it so that it does
not get lost in the distractions. As
these protests continue, I do not see any of these athletes getting together
with police officials to see what can be done to make things better. I do not see police leader’s or black leader’s
trying to fix this issue yet both sides have no problem complaining about the
protest itself. There comes a time when
there has to be more done beyond putting up a fist in the name of solidarity.
What about empathizing with the people fighting against the
protest or not joining the protest? Has
anyone bothered to ask why some athletes have not joined the protest even
though they believe the same problem?
Why have we not seen one protestor say they do not feel they are disrespecting
the people that have died for the flag, if anything it is the greatest respect
to use the very freedom they died for to change things. Being against a protest or not joining is as
much of a right but it doesn’t mean those people can’t be brought together to
help change the issue.
Another part of protesting is the images of the protests
themselves. Over the years different pictures
from this country and the world have shown protests but how many inspired
changes versus inspired violence. If we
showed more images that would inspire or question change, would that help get
more people together? How can we not be
inspired from a single person standing in front of a tank in Tenemin square to
help change why that tank is there in the first place? How inspired are we when we see Muslims
burning a flag in Iran? Where we should be inspired with pictures of people not standing for the national anthem instead we seem to just show pictures of people looting for three days.
Protesting is something we should be proud of in this
country and we should show the world how this freedom helps to get things
changed. Unfortunately, the reality of
protesting is that we continue to let it divide us and create more hate. The more this happens, the less we will
protest to change anything. This is
exactly what the people we are protesting against want because then they can
continue to do the things that are wrong.
Albert Einstein said “What is right is not always popular
and what is popular is not always right”. There is a severe race problem in this country one that has divided us so bad that now the police are one side of it. We need to listen to these people who are doing something they know is not popular by using an event we hold sacred to protest because they feel what they are doing is right.
