EDITORIAL: Patriots take a knee, Trump takes an L

In President Donald Trump’s time in office, it has not been unusual for an event of national importance to be met with a tweet or two from the president. In fact, it’s something of a daily occurrence. However, when he took to Twitter Saturday night — speaking out against National Football League players for “disrespecting” the American flag by kneeling during the national anthem — Trump was the one met with a national event.

On Sunday, in a day of demonstrations, hundreds of NFL players across the country engaged in peaceful protests during the national anthem. In London, the Baltimore Ravens and Jacksonville Jaguars took a knee. In Chicago, the Pittsburgh Steelers skipped the field altogether, staying in the locker room during the anthem. The Seattle Seahawks and Tennessee Titans followed suit. In Philadelphia, both the Eagles and the Giants had a mix of players kneeling and linking arms with their teammates.

In Boston, the New England Patriots also joined the movement — a first for the team, who had yet to engage in public protest until Sunday. Well over a dozen of the teams’ players took a knee during the national anthem, in addition to many others who locked arms in solidarity — including well known quarterback and friend of Trump Tom Brady. The players were met with a wave of boos and calls to “stand up” from the crowd, which the players ignored.

The movement of professional athletes kneeling during the national anthem began last September when then-quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers, Colin Kaepernick, was the first to take a knee in protest, immediately making waves coast to coast. Though the kneeling continued throughout the season, the buzz from the protests largely died down — until Trump was inaugurated into office. Now, we’re at a whole new level.

The players involved in the movement identify the protests to be about racial and social injustice in the United States. However, the timing of Sunday’s demonstrations suggests these protesters also have a certain outspoken president in mind when they’re taking a knee.

It’s no longer even a movement limited to the world of football. On Saturday, rookie catcher for the Oakland Athletics, Bruce Maxwell, became the first professional baseball player to join in. It is clearly an issue that’s growing, and fast.

In typical Trumpian fashion, no lesson was learned on Sunday from the result of his remarks the night before. After Sunday’s protests, the twittersphere saw a whole new slew of content from the Oval Office. Trump blatantly bashed the NFL — encouraging teams to suspend and fire the players who protested, and even asking Americans to boycott the NFL as a whole.

Now, for the first time in history, the American flag and national anthem are becoming politically charged — these things clearly mean different things to different people. Some people stand during the national anthem as a way to show their support for American values and ideals. Other people kneel during the anthem for the very same reasons. The national anthem isn’t about being blindly patriotic and undyingly loyal to our country. Yes, it is patriotic to stand together in song, but it is also patriotic to use your First Amendment rights to engage in thought and discussion about what that song means.

However, as interesting of an issue as it may be, Trump’s rantings and ramblings online are still uncalled for. He was not adding to these ideas and debates, he was just being a bully. Meanwhile, any number of important issues in domestic and international politics were going unaddressed, at least until he logged out of Twitter. Simply put, Trump has more important things to do.

There is not a job in the United States that calls for more professionalism than that of the president, and yet Trump continues to bring nothing but unprofessionalism to the position. When Trump tweets, more often than not it is to argue with people who disagree with him, or attack people who have hurt his feelings. He is is almost never making an original statement, and almost always responding to what other people said about him or his policies or his friends.

Being in public office is about making positive change in our country, and that means standing up for people and ideas — not dragging them through the mud online. Donald Trump may have gotten the validation he needed on Sunday from retweets and likes, but the only people that truly took a stand this weekend were the ones taking a knee.