(no subject)

[shadowkat]

My mother and I were laughing our heads off over THIS.

Mother called this horrendously hilarious. She's not wrong.

During Sunday’s NFL games, scores of NFL players knelt during the national anthem, imitating the protest initiated by Colin Kaepernick, the former 49ers quarterback who took a knee during the anthem to protest police brutality and racial injustice. The widespread protest was adopted after Donald Trump lashed out at Kaepernick’s actions in a campaign rally, saying, “Wouldn’t you love to see one of these NFL owners, when somebody disrespects our flag, to say, ‘Get that son of a bitch off the field right now – He’s fired’?”

(Trump also doubled down and called for a boycott of the NFL until the protests stop, hilariously not realizing that there was already a left-wing call for a boycott against the league’s racism.)

There are a lot of football games on Sundays, and players protested at almost every single one. Even those players who didn’t kneel linked arms in a sign of unity with their teammates, and almost every football organization had issued a statement of support for protesting players before today’s games.

Apparently, or according to my mother who watched the game (I don't watch Football unless it's the superbowl and the Giants are playing), the Pittsburgh Steelers, outside of one player, refused to come out on the field during the playing of the national anthem.

Me:Uhm, what do they normally do?
Mother: They normally come out on the field, stand and put their hand over their chest. Lately they've been kneeling in protest. But the Steelers decided to not come out at all.
Me: Well, that does save the knees.

Mother: Owners of the Football teams and heads of the NFL who had supported Trump and contributed to his campaign, are now, standing shoulder to shoulder with their teammates in protest against him.
Me: Wow. Guess they are regretting that campaign contribution about now.

Mother: He's told Americans to stop watching football and said the sales are decreasing, and less people are attending games...meanwhile the stadiums are filled to capacity. He also told them to fire the people kneeling.
Me: Like they are really going to fire the guys scoring the goals. Come on. Also Americans don't stop watching football.
Mother: They don't care about the violence and the injuries...
Me: There's a boycott of it going from the left...
Mother: That's mainly about the injuries.
Me: No I think that's a separate boycott. Although, honestly I don't see how any of these boycotts will work, people who love football will continue to watch football and go to football games. Unless you give them a deeply personal reason not to.

Comments

[conuly]

There was an article in the NYTimes about... some football player who killed himself in prison, where he was after murdering his wife. They showed pictures of his brain from his autopsy. I don't know shit about the brain, but it looked bad.

This is getting a lot of traction lately. I think it's going to have an effect within a generation or two.

[dlgood]

The player in Question was Aaron Hernandez - he was convicted of murdering a friend. It's understood that he likely committed suicide because doing so before his sentencing allowed his will to go to his girlfriend and children rather than be seized by the estate of his murder victim.

He was 26 and hadn't played for 3 years. His brain was said to resemble that of a 67-year old man.

[conuly]

Thanks. Got some of the details wrong, I see. No surprise - I was too busy staring in horror at the holey cauliflower slices that were his brain.