In the digital era, a broken clock is now right only once a day – and that has been true for Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg when it came to Colin Kaepernick’s kneeling protest during the National Anthem at NFL games. We wrote last week about a new study which found that disdain towards political correctness isn’t exclusively a “right-wing” phenomenon, but rather a phenomenon in which 80% of Americans are united. So on that note, perhaps its no surprise that even a liberal like Ginsburg couldn’t stand Kaepernick’s showboating, which she called “a terrible thing to do.”
The comment came over two years ago in the month before the 2016 election (after Trump already began publicly criticizing Kaepernick), when Ginsburg was promoting her book “My Own Words” during an interview with Katie Couric. Her opinion echoed what many on the Right have argued – that Kaepernick is obviously afforded First Amendment rights like anyone else – but his particular method is counterproductive.
Interestingly enough, her comments are going viral once against this week.
“I would have the same answer if you asked me about flag burning. I think it’s a terrible thing to do, but I wouldn’t lock a person up for doing it. I would point out how ridiculous it seems to me to do such an act,” Ginsburg told Couric. Her denunciation of Kaepernick’s protest came after Ginsburg acknowledged the issue of police brutality as a problem, and expressed optimism that more people were taking note of it.
Listen to her words below:
If a hardcore leftist like Ginsburg is no fan of the “taking a knee” protest, you can take it as a strong indicator that most Americans don’t buy it, either. And the data supports that thesis. Prior to Kaepernick’s protest, the NFL was the second-most favorably viewed sports league, and quickly became the most disliked after it.
Kaepernick, meanwhile, said in response that it was “disappointing to hear a Supreme Court justice call a protest against injustices and oppression stupid [and] dumb.”
Little does he seem to know, Ginsburg is hardly the only one who thinks that.
