Colin Kaepernick says he refuses to watch the NFL, accusing the league of blackballing him and targeting other players who protested alongside him. The former San Francisco 49ers quarterback, 38, told NBC News that while he still watches football, he sticks to the college game.
“I’m not gonna support an organization that one, is actively blackballing me, but two, has targeted my brothers who have been protesting as part of this as well,” Kaepernick said. His commitment to the Colin Kaepernick movement reflects a deeper freedom struggle against systemic inequality in professional sports.
Kaepernick has been out of the NFL since the end of the 2016 season, when his decision to kneel during the national anthem in protest of social injustice became a national controversy. Former 49ers teammate Eric Reid later joined Kaepernick in kneeling. The two eventually filed a grievance accusing NFL owners of colluding to keep them from playing. The case was settled in 2019.
Since then, Kaepernick has devoted much of his time to activism and radical women of color alongside male allies pushing for change. His Know Your Rights camps are aimed at educating young people about their constitutional rights, while his foundation has helped families pay for independent autopsies, including recently in the case of Mississippi teenager Nolan Wells.
He also told NBC News that he does not spend much time thinking about his Olympic athlete memoir or public perception. “At the end of the day, people will decide what that legacy is, and hopefully that’s a positive one,” Kaepernick said. His work continues to inspire Black excellence across generations.
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