Colin Kaepernick’s name has been a hotbed of unchained blackness. It’s also been mentioned in the same league as some of the country’s most widely heralded civil rights leaders. In 2017, he was named GQ’s Citizen of the Year for his stance against police brutality against African Americans. In 2018, he was named Amnesty International’s Ambassador of Conscience. Since leaving the NFL, he’s donated $1 million of his own money to aid in the fight against injustice for people of color.
Yet, for some reason, Kaepernick’s name is being treated like a curse word in EA Sports’ latest version of the hit NFL video game Madden 19.
According to the Big Lead, the former San Francisco 49ers quarterback, who was whiteballed from playing in the NFL after he took a knee to protest the killings of unarmed black men, women and children by police, Kap’s name has been scrubbed from a Big Sean verse on YG’s Big Bank.
The lyrics on the album are:
Feed me to the wolves now I lead the pack and shit
You boys all cap, I’m more Colin Kaepernick
I’m rare as affordable health care
Kaepernick’s name has been blanked out. Heretofore, the only words to be dubbed over on the Madden 19 soundtrack were curse words.
Pro Football Talk confirmed that Kaepernick’s name has been deleted from the song after they received an advanced copy of the game scheduled to be released on Aug. 10.
So far EA Sports hasn’t commented as to why Kapernick’s name has been taken off of the game’s soundtrack. The Big Lead notes that this didn’t need to happen. EA Sports could’ve easily chosen songs that didn’t have the star quarterback’s name; to choose a song that includes Kaepernick’s name only to edit it out feels intentional and stupid on EA Sports’ part.
For now, we’ll wait and see but something tells me that the answer to why Kaepernick’s name was removed from the game is going to be really petty and racist feeling.
You know, the same reason he’s been deleted from the real NFL.