Last week’s protests were 

effective 
precisely 
because 

they were disruptive. It is 
not every day that the Diag 
is populated with dozens of 
students for hours on end, some 
holding umbrellas to block the 
heat and others delivering 
food and water. The students 
who blocked the intersections 
of bus routes near the C.C. 
Little bus station sought to 
parallel the “inconveniences” 
racism and microaggressions 
pose for students of color 
on 
a 
daily 
basis. 
Though 

their protest lasted merely 
an hour, they had an impact 
that “inconvenienced” a large 
proportion of campus.

Intentionally 
disruptive 

student protests are some of 
the most effective ways to 
enact 
much-needed 
change 

on our campus and beyond. 
And in cases such as these, 
the nature of the disruption 
conveyed the message of the 
protest, especially to student 
demographics who otherwise 
would 
not 
understand 
the 

disruptions students of color 

on campus deal with regularly.

As such, these types of visible 

protests not only force passersby 
to think about the issues the 
protests are addressing, but 
they 
also 
start 
important 

conversations. When routine is 
broken, students question what is 
going on, seek more information 
and have discussions with peers. 
Furthermore, as an Editorial 
Board, we believe the fact that 
these protests began various 
discussions and debates about 
the issues the protests sought 
to address and whether their 
protest tactics were effective 
meant they made the issues at 
hand 
at 
least 

visible.

Protests 

are a critical 
step that goes 
beyond simply 
the 
desire 

for 
change. 

Substantial 
positive change 
requires 
more than an 
email from the 
administration 

condemning hateful actions and 
standing in solidarity with those 
affected. Emails are all well and 
good, but they can be brushed 
aside, 
archived 
and, 
quite 

frankly, ignored. Protests are 
exponentially more visible and 
powerful tools to enact change 
because they are much more 
difficult to ignore.

Human bodies and minds 

making 
observable 
calls 
to 

action can influence and inspire 
communities and individuals to 
discuss the issues and act, and it 
is our responsibility to support 
and encourage protesters in 
their work.

Opinion
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4A— Wednesday, October 4, 2017

REBECCA LERNER

Managing Editor

420 Maynard St. 

Ann Arbor, MI 48109

 tothedaily@michigandaily.com

Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan since 1890.

EMMA KINERY

Editor in Chief

ANNA POLUMBO-LEVY 

and REBECCA TARNOPOL 

Editorial Page Editors

Unsigned editorials reflect the official position of the Daily’s Editorial Board. 

All other signed articles and illustrations represent solely the views of their authors.

EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS

Carolyn Ayaub
Megan Burns

Samantha Goldstein

Caitlin Heenan
Jeremy Kaplan

Sarah Khan

Anurima Kumar

Max Lubell

Lucas Maiman

Alexis Megdanoff
Madeline Nowicki
Anna Polumbo-Levy 

Jason Rowland

Anu Roy-Chaudhury

Ali Safawi

Sarah Salman
Kevin Sweitzer

Rebecca Tarnopol

Stephanie Trierweiler

Ashley Zhang

P

rotests in the National 
Football League took 
center stage at the end 

of September as hundreds of 
players, coaches and owners 
knelt, raised fists or linked 
arms 
during 
the 
national 

anthem in a show of solidarity. 
Though the national anthem 
protests date back to last 
year when Colin Kaepernick 
first knelt to protest racial 
injustices, 
dozens 
more 

participated this past week 
in 
response 
to 
President 

Donald Trump’s controversial 
comment 
that 
protesting 

players should be fired. 

The show of unity drew 

national news headlines and 
also elicited sharp criticism 
from many who claim that 
the protests are disrespectful 
and unpatriotic. Others have 
gone further and trivialized 
the players’ cause, calling the 
protest’s pretext of enduring 
racial biases an “ocean of lies.” 
These lines of criticism are 
unfortunate and misguided. 
While it is understandable why 
some, especially those who 
have served our country, would 
be vexed by demonstrations 
during the anthem, it is equally 
understandable why players feel 
the need to protest. Furthermore, 
the act of protesting is not 
unpatriotic; rather, it is a staple 
of American democracy.

Any analysis of the national 

anthem protests is incomplete 
without an examination of 
why the players are protesting. 
Indeed, the players’ motives 
have been a central point of 
debate in the recent days, with 
some critics claiming NFL 
players should be grateful for 
what they have. They point 
to the average NFL player’s 
salary, which at $2.1 million 
in the 2015 season, is nearly 50 
times greater than the average 
American’s salary in 2014.

This notion is shortsighted 

and minimizes the impact 
of racial injustices, many of 
which are inescapable and not 
alleviated by wealth. A 2016 
Pew Research Center survey 
found that 71 percent of U.S. 
Blacks have experienced racial 
discrimination, and roughly 
half reported that in the past 
year “someone has acted as 
if they were suspicious of 
them because of their race.” 
The wealth of the protesting 
players does not fully shield 
them from racial profiling, 

nor 
does 
it 
diminish 
the 

importance of their message.

Furthermore, 
those 

criticizing 
the 
players 
as 

“ungrateful” fail to realize 
they are advocating for the 
entire 
Black 
community, 

especially those without a 
platform to protest against the 
injustices they face. Despite 
an abundance of evidence of 
the far-reaching impacts of 
implicit racial biases, only 
36 percent of whites believe 
racial discrimination to be a 
major reason Blacks lag behind 
whites in education, income 
and more.

Considerable 
media 

attention has been devoted 
to 
police 
brutality, 
but 

discussions of racial profiling 
in policing have often devolved 
into 
a 
tedious 
game 
of 

assigning blame, rather than a 
recognition of the omnipresent 
biases 
against 
racial 

minorities. Such recognition of 
the problem is essential for any 
progress to be made; the lack 
of recognition compels these 
players to protest. Efforts to 
trivialize the motives behind 
the protests grossly devalue 
the pervasiveness of racial 
injustices in the United States 
and the significance of NFL 
players’ willingness to stand 
up to it.

However, 
other 
lines 

of 
criticism 
have 
focused 

on 
the 
methods 
of 
the 

protests. 
Detractors 
claim 

the 
demonstrations 
are 

unpatriotic or disrespectful 
to 
the 
flag. 
Admittedly, 

the 
matter 
of 
patriotism 

is 
complex 
and 
delicate. 

Kaepernick’s own comments 
on the protest, particularly his 
statement from August 2016 in 
which he explicitly declined 
to “show pride” in the flag, 
are objectively unpatriotic (at 
least denotatively) and add to 
the narrative that the protests 
dishonor the national anthem. 

While 
intended 
to 

contextualize 
his 
budding 

protest, 
Kaepernick’s 

comments 
unfortunately 

reinforced 
a 
narrow 
and 

simplistic view of patriotism. 
Patriotism is far more than 
honoring the flag; regrettably, 
when it comes to the flag, 
some seem to care more about 
the physical cloth than what 
it represents. This attitude 
toward the flag has translated 
to the outlook that patriotism 

is expressed solely through the 
veneration of the flag, when 
the true hallmark of American 
patriotism is the defense of our 
country’s democratic values. 
To truly care about the flag 
is to care about injustices, 
free 
speech 
and 
political 

expression. 
Kaepernick’s 

protest promoted this more 
refined view of patriotism 
by calling attention to the 
inadequacy of merely honoring 
the flag in its physical form.

The United States is not 

held together by a common 
race, religion or even language. 
Rather, it is our shared civic 
values of democracy, justice and 
liberty that define our national 
identity. Our nation’s robust 
civic culture demands a form 
of patriotism that honors these 
values. Genuine patriotism is 
a celebration of liberties and 
freedoms, which is why there is 
a subtle, but inherent hypocrisy 
in calling the protesting players 
unpatriotic. Patriotism requires 
a respect for protest. Protest 
is 
intrinsically 
intertwined 

with our civic values, and it is 
through protest that so many 
of the rights we take as self-
evident were secured.

Furthermore, 
there 
is 

nothing innately unpatriotic 
about the national anthem 
protests. By and large, the 
protesting players are simply 
using the stage of the national 
anthem to point out that 
this nation is still far from 
achieving many of the virtues 
the 
anthem 
symbolizes. 

One can be patriotic while 
acknowledging 
that 
our 

country is not perfect — the 
two are far from mutually 
exclusive. American society 
has many areas where progress 
is needed. Racial injustice is one.

Realizing the promises of 

equality, justice and liberty for 
all is an ongoing process, and 
neither the protests nor the 
controversy surrounding them 
are likely to go away anytime 
soon. As the NFL season 
continues, 
it 
is 
important 

to recognize the players are 
protesting for a legitimate 
cause and furthermore that 
protesting is a form of free 
speech — and there’s nothing 
unpatriotic or un-American 
about it.

Wearing ignorance

COREY DULIN | COLUMN

SARAH NEFF | CONTACT SARAH AT SANE@UMICH.EDU

Preserving patriotism

NOAH HARRISON | COLUMN

R

ecently at a concert I 
danced in a dark bar 
while cringing at the 

guy in front of me. He was in 
his 
own 
world 

and wasn’t really 
doing any harm 
— but I would 
describe 
him 

as that person, 
the person who 
decides 
that 

the 
best 
place 

to 
practice 

dramatic 
interpretive 
dance 
mixed 

with Beyoncé-esque moves is 
in a crowded concert venue. 
But besides the fact he kept 
jumping up off the floor every 
few seconds, what I remember 
most about him was his head 
wrap. 

His head wrap looked really 

nice; there was a small knotted 
ball at the top, and he put 
lavender plants inside the knot. 
But his head wrap was also out 
of place.

In the United States, head 

wraps have been a prominent 
feature in Black life and style 
for centuries. Originally the 
product of sumptuary laws 
made to shame Black women, 
head wraps became a way 
for Black women to express 
their culture and unique style. 
Slaves and other Black women 
were forced to wear rags and 
turned them into something 
rich. I never thought I would 
see a white guy in a head wrap, 
and when I did, I thought it 
was interesting.

But, at the same time, I 

could see a little glimmer of 
problematic behavior. People 

in our country, from slightly 
obnoxious 
concert-goers 
to 

Donald Trump, see no real 
issue 
in 
misrepresenting 

and 
misinterpreting 

symbols and actions.

With 
Halloween 

coming up, seeing this 
man in a head wrap left 
me in a nervous state. 
As someone who gets 
scared easily and has 
had enough of looking 
at offensive costumes 
and depictions, I am 
not 
looking 
forward 

to 
the 
upcoming 

holiday. I know some student 
organizations post guides to 
let students know if a costume 
is offensive or not, but you 
would 
think 
people 
have 

enough common sense to know 
what is appropriate and what 
counts as offensive.

I thought the head wrap 

incident was minor and hope 
people will use more creativity 
and 
fewer 
stereotypes 
to 

pick a Halloween costume, 
but 
appropriation 
and 

misrepresentation of identities 
are serious problems. When 
items of cultural significance or 
items specific to a marginalized 
group are worn because they 
look cool or because people 
think it would make a good 
Halloween costume, we forget 
what these items represent. 

But the problems different 

cultures overcame — and still 
work to overcome — are not 
just represented in physical 
objects 
like 
head 
wraps, 

but also in actions. So when 
athletes take a knee during the 
national anthem, it is not about 
the flag or for the purpose of 

disrespecting the country — it 
is to call attention to issues in 
our country.

Colin 
Kaepernick 
didn’t 

start this protest to disrespect 
the flag — he started it to bring 
attention to the murders of 
Black men and women at the 
hands of police. So why Donald 
Trump calls Kaepernick and 
every athlete who takes part in 
these peaceful protests a “son 
of a bitch” but can’t say much 
about gun-toting Nazis other 
than that they “were very fine 
people” makes no sense to me. 
He gets angry when people take 
a knee and act in a way that is 
peaceful, but when another 
group incites violence, he is 
fine with it.

Our 
identities 
sometimes 

blind us from the cultural 
significance 
of 
items 
and 

actions 
of 
other 
groups. 

Because of this I feel we should 
all take a minute to step back 
and workshop things. We don’t 
need to go over and check 
whether every single thing is 
culturally 
appropriated, 
but 

some things are not only worn 
for style or done because it’s 
cool, but because they have an 
important purpose that needs 
to be recognized. One way to do 
this is to talk to others. We can 
learn a lot by talking to people 
who aren’t exactly like us.

So before calling someone 

a “son of a bitch” or wearing 
something offensive to a concert 
or a Halloween party, maybe 
consider the implications of 
what you’re wearing or saying.

Corey Dulin can be reached at 

cydulin@umich.edu.

Noah Harrison can be reached at 

noahharr@umich.edu.

FROM THE DAILY

Don’t stop disrupting

I

f you found yourself at the Central Campus Transit Center, 
also known as the C.C. Little bus station, last Monday, perhaps 
you were dismayed your normal bus had been rerouted. If 

you found yourself walking through the Diag, perhaps you were 
confused by the crowds of people surrounding a man kneeling 
at the block ‘M.’ These two protests in response to recent racist 
incidents on campus intentionally disrupted the normal flow 
of everyday life at the University of Michigan. The Michigan 
Daily Editorial Board is fully supportive of these protests; they 
challenged the routine of everyday life, called attention to the 
hostile climate caused by acts of racism and made the issues at 
hand accessible to the wider campus and Ann Arbor community.

COREY 
DULIN

Illustration courtesy of Roshini Ankireddygari

