Whites who believe negative stereotypes about blacks are more likely than most to oppose athletes kneeling during the national anthem, according to researchers who studied the issue, the Washington Post reports.
In yet another Kanye-shrug-inducing survey, researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst conducted a nationally representative online poll in October to determine whether negative racial opinions contributed to opposition to protests against the national anthem—not just in Colin Kaepernick’s case. The survey 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 results were startling.
Actually, they weren’t startling in the least, but when reporting on race and scientific research, the law mandates that you include at least one sentence that says “the results were startling,” to allow white people to act shocked when they learn that racism can actually be quantified.
Thirty-four percent of the people surveyed supported athletes’ rights to kneel during the national anthem, while 30 percent opposed it strongly. But the results were divided strongly by race. Sixty-one percent of blacks supported the right to protest during the song, while only 28 percent of whites agreed with sitting during “The Star-Spangled Banner.”
The study then asked the respondents to rate blacks and whites according to certain traits (hardworking vs. lazy, violent vs. peaceful, and intelligent vs. unintelligent). They used the results of how people ranked each race as an indication of their racial bias. For instance, the people who thought blacks were lazier and less intelligent were ranked as more biased than those who thought the races were about equal in each category. The survey also asked questions about age, gender, education, political affiliation and how they felt about the country.
The UMass professors found that the people who held the most racial bias were far more likely to oppose athletes protesting during the anthem. Even when the researchers controlled for areas like party affiliation, patriotism, education, age and gender, people who held strong racial biases were 25 points more likely to think it is offensive when players kneel in protest. In fact, the results were almost exactly correlative: The more racial stereotypes the subject believed, the more likely they were to dislike the stance against the Kaepernick-inspired protest.
Although this study seems very conclusive, racism cannot explain why no team has signed Kaepernick yet while lesser quarterbacks have received record paydays. I mean, what person in his right mind would reject an experienced, clearly qualified leader who has verifiable proof he knows what he is doing, and instead select an unqualified, talentless hack with no history of success and put him in charge of ...
You know what? Never mind.
Read more at the Washington Post.