美国国家公共电台 NPR How The NFL's New Rule On Protesting Is Being Perceived By Players

 

LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, HOST:

The NFL this past week announced a ban on players kneeling in protest during the playing of the national anthem¹. If they choose not to stand, players may stay in the locker² room. But if they violate the new rule, the team will be fined. Let's bring in Howard Bryant, author of the book "The Heritage: Black Athletes, A Divided America, And The Politics Of Patriotism⁴." Thanks for joining us.

HOWARD BRYANT: Hi, Lulu. How are you?

GARCIA-NAVARRO: I'm good. How are the players that you're talking to reacting to the stand that the NFL's taken?

BRYANT: Well, I think they've taken the position that the NFL has decided⁵ to fully⁶ engage with this culture war initiated⁷ by the president when he first attacked the NFL players back in September. One of the questions of the book that I was asking is, who gets to be the patriot³? And when the president first called the players unpatriotic, then said that they shouldn't have jobs, now he's even saying that dissenting⁸ players maybe shouldn't even be in the country. And that the NFL is going along with it, as well, I think this has really reignited some really bad blood between the players and the owners.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: And how is that manifesting itself? I mean, what conversations are the players having, and what can they actually do?

BRYANT: I think that the players believed after Colin Kaepernick wasn't signed last season that they had still reached some sort of...

GARCIA-NAVARRO: And Kaepernick, of course, started this whole taking the knee.

BRYANT: Back in 2016. That's right. And that they had agreed with the owners to then a $90 million partnership⁹ to fight social justice. So I think they had believed that they had reached an accommodation. Now we're seeing that that accommodation isn't such an accommodation. And I think the players are trying to strategize with their union to figure out just what's going to happen.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Hmm. That looks like it's setting up a real confrontation¹⁰ between primarily, you know, African-American players and - the owners of these teams are white, predominantly, which is really the dynamic that's at play here. I mean, do you think that that's at the heart of this, that these owners and these players just see things fundamentally differently?

BRYANT: Well, it is seen as a hostile act by the players. There's no question about that. But one of the things, Lulu, that does get me about this is that we talk so much about division, but one of the things that has been very clear - one of the unifying¹¹ themes - is the fact that none of the veterans that this is supposedly about - even though the players are fighting against police brutality¹² - nobody wants to see the flag or the national anthem weaponized. They don't want to see citizenship¹³ weaponized. And the veterans that I've spoken with do not want to be used as commercial props¹⁴. And yet sports is doing both. And so it's sort of ironic¹⁵ in a way that all of this patriotism and nationalism was supposedly brought to bring people together post-9/11, and it's been the most divisive thing in America, which is a very strange thing to be talking about on Memorial Day weekend.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Can you explain that term weaponizing patriotism? Because it's come up a lot, and you just used it again. What should we understand when we hear that?

BRYANT: Well, I think the players do not want their citizenship questioned. What they're doing in this protest is the ultimate example of citizenship. But instead, what we've seen in sports over the last couple of years now is to paint the players as unpatriotic instead of thinking about their reasoning, which is police misconduct and about supporting some of the people who don't have a lot of power in our country. It's been directed toward the flag as if the players don't care about their country when, actually, they do. For how many decades did we say that we were tired of these athletes being so rich and so detached? Now they're involved, and we're calling them unpatriotic. That's one of the great collisions about this.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: That's Howard Bryant, author of "The Heritage" and senior writer for espn.com and ESPN The Magazine. Thank you so much.

BRYANT: Oh, my pleasure. Thank you.

1 anthem   

n.圣歌，赞美诗，颂歌

参考例句：

• All those present were standing solemnly when the national anthem was played.奏国歌时全场肃立。
• As he stood on the winner's rostrum,he sang the words of the national anthem.他站在冠军领奖台上，唱起了国歌。

2 locker   

n.更衣箱，储物柜，冷藏室，上锁的人

参考例句：

• At the swimming pool I put my clothes in a locker.在游泳池我把衣服锁在小柜里。
• He moved into the locker room and began to slip out of his scrub suit.他走进更衣室把手术服脱下来。

3 patriot   

n.爱国者，爱国主义者

参考例句：

• He avowed himself a patriot.他自称自己是爱国者。
• He is a patriot who has won the admiration of the French already.他是一个已经赢得法国人敬仰的爱国者。

4 patriotism   

n.爱国精神，爱国心，爱国主义

参考例句：

• His new book is a demonstration of his patriotism.他写的新书是他的爱国精神的证明。
• They obtained money under the false pretenses of patriotism.他们以虚伪的爱国主义为借口获得金钱。

5 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

6 fully   

adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地

参考例句：

• The doctor asked me to breathe in,then to breathe out fully.医生让我先吸气，然后全部呼出。
• They soon became fully integrated into the local community.他们很快就完全融入了当地人的圈子。

7 initiated   

n. 创始人 adj. 新加入的 vt. 开始，创始，启蒙，介绍加入

参考例句：

• He has not yet been thoroughly initiated into the mysteries of computers. 他对计算机的奥秘尚未入门。
• The artist initiated the girl into the art world in France. 这个艺术家介绍这个女孩加入巴黎艺术界。

8 dissenting   

adj.不同意的

参考例句：

• He can't tolerate dissenting views. 他不能容纳不同意见。
• A dissenting opinion came from the aunt . 姑妈却提出不赞同的意见。

9 partnership   

n.合作关系，伙伴关系

参考例句：

• The company has gone into partnership with Swiss Bank Corporation.这家公司已经和瑞士银行公司建立合作关系。
• Martin has taken him into general partnership in his company.马丁已让他成为公司的普通合伙人。

10 confrontation   

n.对抗，对峙，冲突

参考例句：

• We can't risk another confrontation with the union.我们不能冒再次同工会对抗的危险。
• After years of confrontation,they finally have achieved a modus vivendi.在对抗很长时间后，他们最后达成安宁生存的非正式协议。

11 unifying   

使联合( unify的现在分词 )； 使相同； 使一致； 统一

参考例句：

• In addition, there were certain religious bonds of a unifying kind. 此外，他们还有某种具有一种统一性质的宗教上的结合。
• There is a unifying theme, and that is the theme of information flow within biological systems. 我们可以用一个总的命题，把生物学系统内的信息流来作为这一研究主题。

12 brutality   

n.野蛮的行为，残忍，野蛮

参考例句：

• The brutality of the crime has appalled the public. 罪行之残暴使公众大为震惊。
• a general who was infamous for his brutality 因残忍而恶名昭彰的将军

13 citizenship   

n.市民权，公民权，国民的义务(身份)

参考例句：

• He was born in Sweden,but he doesn't have Swedish citizenship.他在瑞典出生，但没有瑞典公民身分。
• Ten years later,she chose to take Australian citizenship.十年后，她选择了澳大利亚国籍。

14 props   

小道具； 支柱( prop的名词复数 )； 支持者； 道具； （橄榄球中的）支柱前锋

参考例句：

• Rescuers used props to stop the roof of the tunnel collapsing. 救援人员用支柱防止隧道顶塌陷。
• The government props up the prices of farm products to support farmers' incomes. 政府保持农产品价格不变以保障农民们的收入。

15 ironic   

adj.讽刺的，有讽刺意味的，出乎意料的

参考例句：

• That is a summary and ironic end.那是一个具有概括性和讽刺意味的结局。
• People used to call me Mr Popularity at high school,but they were being ironic.人们中学时常把我称作“万人迷先生”，但他们是在挖苦我。