NFL free agent Eric Reid has always been a vocal critic of the NFL‘s handling of issues of race. Reid, who took a knee with Colin Kaepernick when they were 49ers teammates, has never shied away from holding the league accountable, and has been especially vocal on his Twitter feed over the past week.
As NFL teams try to finesse their messaging in the wake of George Floyd’s killing, Reid has consistently called out their vague and bland statements professing to care about black lives when they never supported Kaepernick’s protest.
A few days ago, during blackout Tuesday, Reid took individual teams to task for posting passive #blackoutTuesday squares and captioned them “Blackball Tuesday,” referring to Kaepernick’s essential blackballing from the league because of his decision to take a knee.
Late Thursday night, Reid hit the NFL harder after they posted another meaningless statement about their commitment to racial equality.
This is a time of self-reflection for all – the NFL is no exception. We stand with the black community because Black Lives Matter. pic.twitter.com/RtIdcEhj5w
— NFL (@NFL) June 4, 2020
The NFL said they were committing $20 million more to social justice causes this year, but Reid was quick to point out that’s just a fraction of the revenue the league generates.
Where do I start? In your self reflection you chose to tell us that you donated .00275% of your 2019 revenue of roughly $16B to the causes you care so deeply for. Yet you have not denounced the police 4 their history of murder nor have you addressed your own oppressive constructs,” Reid tweeted.
In his next tweet, which again, has been deleted, Reid wrote:
In your self reflection, you didn’t come 2 the conclusion 2 apologize for your numerous attempts 2 subvert the very movement that you now claim 2 be a part of, including but not limited to: breaking your own protocols in an attempt to force us from kneeling and blackballing Colin
Again, Reid is clearly fed up with the NFL trying to project one image while doing basically the exact opposite.
In your self reflection, you didn’t feel the need to reconcile your aforementioned actions. You aren’t trying to change the system. You are the system.
He’s correct. The NFL is the system, and so far, they have done nothing but push out feel good PR statements that don’t address their past complicity in upholding systemic violence. The NFL, like every other league and brand out there, wants to co-opt a a movement to appease the market, but has yet to talk about the specifics of what they’re going to change in the wake of the Floyd killing. At least one group of NFL players are pushing for more specific change from the league, and it seems like that chorus is only going to grow.
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