A sports commentator says that football players required to stand for the national anthem are like plantation slaves.
NFL football players are nothing like plantation slaves, even if the team owner tell them to fulfill their contractual obligations and stand for the national anthem. Plantation slaves aren’t paid millions of dollars. Plantation slaves aren’t free to leave the plantation. Plantation slaves were subject to beatings and no one gets to treat NFL football players that way. Claiming football players are like plantation slaves is stupid.
The Washington Times reports, “ESPN host compares Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones to a slave owner.”
On the same day that Jemele Hill was suspended from ESPN for tweeting about politics, another network personality, Michael Wilbon, compared Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones to a slave owner.
Mr. Wilbon, co-host of “Pardon the Interruption,” took issue with Mr. Jones’ stance that players who do not stand for the national anthem before football games will not play.
“And the word that comes to my mind―and I don’t care who doesn’t like me using it―is plantation,” Mr. Wilbon said on Monday’s show. “The players are here to serve me, and they will do what I want. No matter how much I pay them, they are not equal to me. That’s what this says to me and mine.”
ESPN declined to comment on Mr. Wilbon’s remarks.
