Born on November 3, 1987, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Colin Kaepernick is known for his work as a civil rights activist and for his career as a quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers. Kaepernick was born to a white mother and a Black father and was put up for adoption at five weeks old. His adoptive parents, Rick and Teresa Kaepernick, are a white couple with two biological children, Kyle and Devon. Colin played many sports as a child, including football, basketball, and baseball. He attended the University of Nevada, Reno on a college football scholarship, and played from 2007-2011. Throughout college, he was a celebrated quarterback while maintaining a 4.0 GPA. In 2011, following his college graduation, Kaepernick joined the San Francisco 49ers as a backup quarterback. Throughout most of his professional football career, which spanned from 2011 to 2016, Kaepernick was known for his abilities as a quarterback, and he spoke about politics only privately. Starting in 2016, Kaepernick began to be more vocal about political causes on Twitter, and in August of 2016, he sat on the bench during the playing of the national anthem.
Colin Kaepernick played baseball, basketball, and football throughout his life.
Growing up in a mixed-race family, Kaepernick has stated that he has always been aware of the differences in how he was treated compared to his white siblings. The Kaepernick family lived in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, until Colin was four years old, before moving to Turlock, California. Turlock is a city with a majority white population, and "fewer than 2 percent of residents identify as African-American" (Branch, 2017). As one of the few people of color in Turlock, Colin became used to people assuming that he was not with his family when they were in public together. In a New York Times article, Kaepernick gives an anecdote about how he was rarely assumed to be a part of his family because of their different racial backgrounds. At one point, a motel manager asked young Kaepernick if there was something they could help with because they believed that he was a Black man standing too close to a group of white people to whom he had no relation (Branch, 2017).
From 2007 to 2001, Colin Kaepernick attended the University of Nevada on a football scholarship, where he majored in business management and continued to excel academically. Moving from his small town to a university setting led Colin to think a lot more about his identity and the ways in which his race had impacted his life. He began to learn about the experiences that other people of color had while growing up, and "...his curiosity in African-American history and culture began to foment..." (Branch, 2017). Kaepernick faced racist treatment from white teammates because he was a Black quarterback, as well as occasionally facing racist treatment from Black teammates for being raised by a white family. In his junior year of college, Kaepernick joined Kappa Alpha Psi, a majority Black fraternity, with his friend and teammate Brandon Marshall (Branch, 2017).
In the first years of his NFL career, Kaepernick was largely regarded as a positive influence in the football world, and most of his posts online were centered around positive and un-remarked upon interactions with fans. In 2013, "...he mostly thanked fans, promoted appearances and kept opinions to himself..." (Branch, 2017). In an interview in 2013, Kaepernick reported that supporters had written to him for many reasons, some of which include; his tattoos, because he is adopted, and his biracial identity. However, some of these early responses to him as a player and as a public figure were less than positive. One reporter stated that Kaepernick's tattoos made him look like a criminal, and others were upset at the fact that he didn't show interest in reuniting with his birth mother after she reached out and said that she wanted a relationship with her son. As the way that the press viewed Kaepernick changed, so did his demeanor in interviews. He went from the player who, in college, was known for being "...deft and polished with the news media..." to the NFL player who was "...all sulking expressions and terse answers" (Branch, 2017). After the 49ers somewhat average season in 2014, Kaepernick's name was fading from the minds of the public and from the headlines.
"I don't think people should stand with pride for something that they don't believe in, period. I just don't think that. I think if you don't feel that way, then let's fix it. Let's work together to make this situation better." -Nate Boyer (NPR, 2018)
On August 26, 2016, the media spotted Kaepernick's silent protest for the first time. He had sat out on the bench twice before, but he had not been in uniform, which likely contributed to his anonymity. Only one reporter spoke to Kaepernick after the game to ask why he had refrained from standing with his teammates, to which he replied, "I am not going to stand up to show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses black people and people of color" (Branch, 2017). He clarified that he didn't ask anyone in the NFL for permission, because he was "...not looking for approval", to "...stand up for people that are oppressed" (Branch, 2017).
Several days later, former Green Beret and Seattle Seahawks player Nate Boyer posted an open letter to Kaepernick on social media, explaining his stance and clarifying why some might find his gesture offensive. Boyer explained that the American flag and the playing of the national anthem are often seen as representative of respect for those who have served in the US armed forces. After this post reached Kaepernick, he and Boyer met in person and discussed ways of protest that would manage to still get Kaepernick's message across without causing people to feel as though his protest was anti-military. As a compromise between sitting and standing for the anthem, Boyer suggested kneeling. Boyer explained in an interview with NPR that he "...thought kneeling was more respectful..." because of how kneeling has been used to signal respect historically (NPR, 2018). As Boyer pointed out, "...people kneel when they get knighted...to propose to your wife...to pray... [and] in front of a fallen brother's grave to pay respects" (NPR, 2018). Shortly after this conversation, Kaepernick knelt for the first time during the playing of the national anthem, Boyer standing beside him in solidarity.
Even with the endorsement of a former Green Beret, many NFL fans and viewers were upset at Kaepernick's method of protest. Kaepernick and teammates who have kneeled with him have been met with "...boos and angry shouts..." (Beacham, 2016), and in some cases, "...profanity and obscene gestures..." from veterans in the stands (Beacham, 2016). One NFL fan even brought a sign with them to hold in the stands that read "You're an American. Act like one." (Beacham, 2016). Kaepernick has reported that through social media, he has received death threats, while others who protested in solidarity across the country (and across multiple sports and age groups) were "...called the N-word and threatened with lynching..." (Gregory, 2016). The NFL faced pressure over the years from fans, sponsors, and politicians to punish players who kneeled during the national anthem, or to ban the action altogether. In 2018, the NFL released a set of rules regarding kneeling during the national anthem where they stated that all players, coaches, and staff are required to stand. One caveat they added was that players could remain in the locker room during the playing of the anthem, in order to protest, seemingly missing the fact that the public nature of kneeling is what made the form of protest effective. Following backlash from this decision, the NFL quickly stated that players would not be punished for kneeling. Throughout it all, the protestors continued to spread their message, as teammates and coaches joined them.
In the years since these harsh responses from fans and the media, public opinion has slowly shifted. Kaepernick remains a controversial figure, but more people have come to understand the motivation behind his actions, and have learned about the realities of police brutality in the United States. In 2020, the NFL released a statement regarding the Black Lives Matter movement, which was met with many comments asking why they hadn't supported players' protests before. In response, the league released a video stating that they were wrong for not listening to players' protests and calls for action and that they should've been more receptive to these messages. They did not, however, mention Kaepernick or any other players by name.
NFL 2016 statement regarding kneeling during the national anthem.
NFL 2018 statement about kneeling during the playing of the national anthem.
NFL 2020 response to BLM movement and lack of previous support.
When Nike announced its collaboration with Colin Kaepernick in 2018, the reactions ranged from supportive comments on social media posts to cutting up and burning Nike shoes and products. Nike customers who disliked Kaepernick's method of protest and felt that it was a way of disrespecting the military chose to display their disagreement by posting images and videos online of their destroyed Nike gear. One person cut the top off of their Nike socks so that the "swoosh" logo wasn't visible, one person doused their sneakers in gasoline before setting them on fire, and another lit the shoes on fire while still wearing them (Sporting News, 2018).
These attempts from fans to shame or "cancel" Nike into cutting ties or ending the collaboration with Kaepernick were unsuccessful in many ways. Nike stood by their decision to release these ads, along with ads featuring Serena Williams and Odell Beckham Jr, and did not cut ties with Kaepernick after the backlash. Canceling is "...a choice to withdraw one's attention from someone or something whose values, (in)action, or speech are so offensive, one no longer wishes to grace them with their presence, time, and money" (Clark, 2020, p. 88). In this case, customers who wanted to "cancel" Nike for engaging with Kaepernick did so by refusing to buy new Nike products and destroying the ones they currently owned. They did, however, continue to draw attention to Nike's brand and collaboration with Kaepernick, which does not seem to align with their goals of "canceling" the brand. The symbolic gesture of destroying products wasn't hurting Nike financially- in fact, "...whatever minor hit Nike's stock [took] in the immediate aftermath is outweighed by the long-term attention the brand has received" (Abad-Santos, 2018). Additionally, supporters of Kaepernick's message and Nike's decision to work with him might see these protests and decide to buy more Nike products, doing the opposite of what the protestors wanted from their shaming campaign.
Kaepernick's silent act of protest erupted into a much larger conversation about patriotism and the values of a nation. Shame was a central element in this conversation. Shaming, in its many forms, is essential in building the idea of a nation. Shame can be "...'brought onto' the nation by illegitimate others...", or those who don't represent its values (Ahmed, 2014, p. 108). In the case of Kaepernick and other protestors, the nation was shamed for allowing someone to publicly "disrespect" its military. Of course, this was not Kaepernick's goal, but enough people interpreted his manner of protest in this way that the United States was shamed by its own citizens. While many saw this act as unpatriotic, others viewed it differently. Shame, and shaming powerful figures, can be used as a way to give power back to marginalized groups. In this case, Kaepernick was using his platform as an athlete to try to hold the United States accountable for the brutality that Black Americans face at the hands of the police. The policing system is a much larger entity than Kaepernick, yet his platform and his protest allowed him to use shame as a powerful tool to fight back.
Kaepernick had learned through his lived experience and his extensive education that "...being black in America is a constant awareness that others view one as a problem” (Harris-Perry, 2011, p. 109). He had felt shamed for his racial identity before, whether it be by racist white teammates for being biracial, or by Black teammates for being raised by a white family. Colin Kaepernick knew the power of shame, and he used it to draw attention to an issue that he and those in his community were (and are) facing.
The power of fans is also something that should not be understated. The NFL was obviously quite unsure of how to proceed with its stance on kneeling during the anthem because every stance it took was criticized by one group or another. Now that groups such as the NFL, the 49ers, and individual players such as Nate Boyer or Colin Kaepernick, are accessible to the average user on social media, fans have more direct ways to contact them. This is a "... double-edged sword of public prominence and accountability...", where the very accessibility that allows these social media pages such as the NFL to interact more directly with their fans also allows fans to hold them accountable for their actions in a much more direct way (Ng, 2022, p. 17). In 2016 and 2017, fans of the NFL who disapproved of Kaepernick's protest used their power to shame the NFL for their support of a supposed anti-military message, resulting in the league banning kneeling in 2018. Supporters of Kaepernick, however, also used social media to shame the NFL, for not allowing players to peacefully protest. In 2020, when the league posted messages supporting the Black Lives Matter movement and grieving the losses of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery, Kaepernick's supporters questioned the authenticity of the NFL's posts. Similar to those who disliked Kaepernick's protests, supporters used the power of social media to shame the NFL until it posted a second video apologizing for the way that it dealt with protests in the past, and stating that it should have stood by players instead of quietly banning them from the league and enacting a kneeling ban.
Kaepernick hasn't stopped engaging in activism even since his public protests in 2016 and 2017 led to him being unofficially barred from the NFL. During this time, he has donated $100,000 monthly to charities that profit causes that he supports, largely without any public recognition. Kaepernick has donated to a range of groups, from Black Veterans for Social Justice to 350.org, an environmental group. Kaepernick is also the founder of the "Know Your Rights" campaign, which aims to "...advance the liberation and well-being of Black and Brown communities through education, self-empowerment, mass-mobilization and the creation of new systems that elevate the next generation of change leaders" (Know Your Rights Camp). These camps are free, and teach Black and brown youth their rights and how to interact safely with police.
Abad-Santos, A. (2018). Why the social media boycott over Colin Kaepernick is a win for Nike. Vox. https://www.vox.com/2018/9/4/17818148/nike-boycott-kaepernick
Ahmed, S. (2014). Shame Before Others. In The Cultural Politics of Emotion (NED-New edition, 2, pp. 101–121). Edinburgh University Press. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3366/j.ctt1g09x4q.10
Beacham, G. (2016). Kaepernick, 49ers teammate kneel during national anthem. Associated Press News. https://apnews.com/general-news-352575f165684e1182f0b4cd8b845eb8.
Branch, J. (2017). The Awakening of Colin Kaepernick. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/07/sports/colin-kaepernick-nfl-protests.html
Clark, M. D. (2020). DRAG THEM: A brief etymology of so-called “cancel culture”. Communication and the Public, 5(3-4), 88-92. https://doi.org/10.1177/2057047320961562
Gregory, S. (2016). All Across the Country, Athletes Are Fueling a Debate About How America Defines Patriotism. Time Magazine. https://time.com/magazine/us/4503993/october-3rd-2016-vol-188-no-13-u-s/
Haislop, T. (2020). Colin Kaepernick kneeling timeline: How protests during the national anthem started a movement in the NFL. Sporting News. https://www.sportingnews.com/us/nfl/news/colin-kaepernick-kneeling-protest-timeline/xktu6ka4diva1s5jxaylrcsse
Harris-Perry, M. (2011). Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in America. Yale University Press. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/unh/detail.action?docID=3420728
Know Your Rights Camp. https://www.knowyourrightscamp.org/
National Public Radio. (2018). The Veteran And NFL Player Who Advised Kaepernick To Take A Knee. National Public Radio. https://www.npr.org/2018/09/09/646115651/the-veteran-and-nfl-player-who-advised-kaepernick-to-take-a-knee
Ng, E. (2022). Cancel Culture, Popular Media, and Fandom. In: Cancel Culture. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-97374-2_2
Sporting News. (2018). Reactions to Nike's Colin Kaepernick ad range from applause to burning shoes. Sporting News. https://www.sportingnews.com/us/nfl/news/colin-kaepernick-nike-advertisement-reactions-burning-shoes-social-media/fzb4dh8x6bpr1nqv3wph15bb7