From that article:
“For all the cries of hyper-politicization, it is impossible to imagine that an organization so carefully and deeply woven into America’s cultural fabric could ever avoid America’s politics, even if it wanted to. The debates held within the NFL’s borders ― about the long-standing dearth of black quarterbacks, coaches, executives and owners; about domestic violence; about labor; about prescription painkillers, marijuana and drug testing; about access to health care and any other number of issues ― are merely football-centric versions of the same political debates happening outside of them.
There is no such thing as a politically agnostic NFL, and the NFL we know today would not exist if there were.
The same is true of the current protests, on which the NFL’s default position is unavoidably political. Its choice to play the national anthem before games; its embrace of the singular view of patriotism that says wrapping yourself in the American flag is the only way to express love for your country; its unquestioned love of the military and military symbolism, from fighter jet flyovers to camouflage uniform accoutrements to the millions of dollars its teams took from the Pentagon to promote the military’s causes ― these are all forms of political speech, of the sort that has wrongly fed the notion that players kneeling during the national anthem to protest America’s ongoing racial injustices are somehow, first and foremost, disrespecting America’s troops.
There is no such thing as a politically agnostic NFL, and the NFL we know today would not exist if there were. What’s different today is who inside the NFL is engaging in politics, how they are doing so and what they are demanding.”
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