October 11, 2017
Page 5
An Unusual Ally
c onTinued from P age 3
a nation and the hallmark of our
liberty. It is time we stop pointing
fingers and fueling division, issu-
ing threats, and denigrating those
exercising their opinions. If we
don’t start talking with each other,
rather than talking past each other,
we will never solve issues facing
our communities and police forc-
es,” Turner said.
At its peak, around 200 NFL
players kneeled rather than stand
for the National Anthem last month
to conscientiously object to police
brutality against African Americans
and other issues of racial inequality.
The demonstrations came just days
after a comment from President
Trump to a mostly white audience
condemning the mostly black play-
ers’ participation in the protests.
“Wouldn’t you love to see one
of these NFL owners, when some-
body disrespects our flag, to say,
‘Get that son of a bitch off the field
right now. Out. He’s fired. He’s
fired!” Trump said at a Sept. 22 ral-
ly in Alabama.
Opposing that kind of rhetoric,
Turner stressed the importance of
players’ rights as members of a
collective bargaining union.
According to City University
of New York Law Professor Marc
Edelman in a Forbes op-ed, there is
little evidence to support it would
be legal for an NFL team owner to
fire a player for this kind for peace-
ful demonstration, since the play-
ers are under contract.
Players’ collective bargaining
agreement calls for a formal arbi-
tration process in the case of firing
a player, so even if owners did lev-
el a complaint against a player, the
firing would not necessarily hap-
pen by the owner, Edelman said.
In 2016, black males aged 15-
34 were nine times more likely
than other Americans to be killed
by law enforcement in police ac-
tions, according to a racial dispar-
ities report, The Counted. They
were killed at four times the rate of
young white men.
Though the number of deaths
caused by police has fallen slightly
since the fatal shooting of Michael
Brown in 2014 -- the unarmed
black man in Ferguson, Mo. whose
death sparked protests in Fergu-
son and across the country -- there
were 1,091 deaths caused by police
recorded in 2016, and 169 of those
deaths were people who were un-
armed.
Turner would like to see a con-
versation between all representa-
tives of the NFL and on a national
scale to start the process of finding
solutions.
“As an African American and a
police officer, I see both sides of
the coin,” Turner said.