“Plantation owners.”

This was what Michael Wilbon of ESPN’s, “Pardon the Interruption” called NFL Franchise owners in response to the news that teams such as the Dolphins and Cowboys are restricting their players from “disrespecting” the flag in some way. It is absurd to compare the lives of NFL players to those of slaves. NFL players and all professional athletes in general have many more rights than slaves, slaves were treated like animals the NFL players are treated like royalty. It’s true that black athletes and many other people of color face racism today, but the wealthy athletes of the NFL are not slaves and the wealthy NFL franchise owners are not “Plantation owners.”

Athletes, no matter their race, play a sport for their occupation, and get paid to do so as well. Slaves were seen as property for their owners.  The only way Wilbon believed slaves and football players can somewhat be seen as similar is that they make money for their “owners.”

However, Mike Wilbon raises a brilliant point, the correlation that he implies between the NFL and the plantations of the antebellum South is clearly present. Even following this crooked logic, all employees could then be seen as slaves, working because they have to, not because they want to. Like plantation owners, only the higher-up members of a business or corporation truly benefit from unhappy or oppressed workers, which doesn’t make sense in the slightest.

The NFL player’s arguments for protesting the National Anthem is that people have the right to kneel due to the first amendment. However, the arguments against is that troops fight for America’s flag and die for America’s flag. Both are valid and it is arguable that troops also fight for the protection of the first amendment which is being violated by preventing people from kneeling. People work under the first amendment and the other nine every day and yet still experience rights being violated in the workplace. While calling the NFL franchise owners “plantation owners” is a stretch, the comparison cannot be ignored.