SURVEY: Racist White People More Likely to Oppose Athlete Protests

By Kenrya Rankin Apr 21, 2017

Anonymous insiders revealed last month that many NFL team executives hate Colin Kaepernick and refuse to sign the quarterback because of his 2016-2017 season protest of police violence. Now, a new survey from The Washington Post explores why so many football fans also dislike the man who kneeled on the sidelines during the national anthem—and the other athletes he inspired to do the same.

Back in October, the publication created an online survey that asked 2,000 people the following question:

Recently, a number of professional athletes have protested the treatment of African Americans by not standing during the singing of the national anthem. Do you support the right of these athletes to kneel during the singing of the national anthem?

The responses, which were released yesterday (April 20), revealed a clear racial division. While just 34 percent of all those surveyed said they support the athletes’ right to protest this way, 61 percent of the Black respondents backed it, while only 28 percent of Whites did.

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Researchers also asked those same people to share how they related both Black and White people to commonly held stereotypes about Black people. The specifically asked if they thought the races were lazy or hardworking, unintelligent or intelligent and violent versus peaceful. When White people associated positive attributes with Whites and negative ones with Blacks, their answers were analyzed as evidence of stereotyping. The result: White people who hold racial bias against Black people were more likely than those who didn’t reveal bias in the survey to oppose these protests that support the lives of Black people.

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