Thread: South Africa ... team directive to take the knee

Blame it all on Kaepernick,

Originally Posted by havnfun

Blame it all on Kaepernick,

TBH, I don't blame Kaepernick. He made a personal decision to publicly express his views ... and many have followed his lead.

In this case, the SA Cricket Team, a sporting organisation has instructed a player to publicly display support a movement which he may or may not identify with.

If you decide personally to take a knee ... great

If you decide personally not to take a knee ... great

It's a personal decision ... fuck being told by an organisation how to think and feel.

^Its a bit like the Trump version of American politics.

Hell of a hill to die on, protesting against protesting racism.

Originally Posted by AntRobertson

Hell of a hill to die on, protesting against protesting racism.

Different views from different folks.



'The gesture is an American one': Marseille explain that they didn't take the knee against Manchester City as they 'don't accept US habit as easily as in the UK'

• Marseille have explained why they didn't take the knee against Manchester City
• The French club were criticised after their players stood as City's players knelt
• Marseille insisted that they stood to support the cause in their own way
• They stated that they don't accept US habit as easily as in the United Kingdom

Marseille explain why they didn't take the knee against Manchester City | Daily Mail Online

We've been down this road before. Like, everyone has gotta do this-




No thanks.

Originally Posted by David48atTD

Quinton de Kock

Living up to his name.

Originally Posted by cyrille

Living up to his name.

Indeed, cyrille.


Tough one . . . what started off as an individual choice soon became a cause and is now seemingly obligatory.

Agreed with the first, agreed with the second . . . don't agree with the third.

Originally Posted by David48atTD

It's a personal decision ... fuck being told by an organisation how to think and feel.

Summed up.

Originally Posted by panama hat

what started off as an individual choice soon became a cause and is now seemingly obligatory.

Having said that I can also see why SA Cricket Board got twitchy about a 'divided South African cricket team' and mandated. He could have avoided all this earlier...

Originally Posted by Saint Willy

Having said that I can also see why SA Cricket Board got twitchy about a 'divided South African cricket team' and mandated.

True, it all seems innocuous enough, it's the obligatory issue which may rankle. Him being South African does highlight the issue more.

Originally Posted by Saint Willy

He could have avoided all this earlier...

By not joining the tournament based on his performance? It's a tricky one for sure.

Some of the angst stems from the sudden decision to enforce 'the knee'.

The decision apparently made after criticism of the SA cricket T20 team after the image I posted above.

If they were told, before they left SA that it was team policy that the knee would be part of team culture and dissection was not allowed ... that would have been fairer on all.

Not something I agree with, but at lest the players would have had a choice to participate or not in the World Cup.

Originally Posted by David48atTD

Some of the angst stems from the sudden decision to enforce 'the knee'.

The decision apparently made after criticism of the SA cricket T20 team after the image I posted above.

If they were told, before they left SA that it was team policy that the knee would be part of team culture and dissection was not allowed ... that would have been fairer on all.

Not something I agree with, but at lest the players would have had a choice to participate or not in the World Cup.

It's so utterly trivial that you have to be a diehard racist prick (or "De Cock") to make an issue of it.

Taking the knee is divisive - Quinton de Kock is not racist for refusing to do it.

If his career comes unstuck because of his wish to exercise his personal freedom, it would be added to cricket's lengthening roll of shame

SIMON HEFFER
26 October 2021 • 4:55pm
Simon Heffer




Quinton de Kock has bowed his head previously ahead of matches, rather than take a knee


For decades it has proved impossible to keep politics out of cricket. It was why for more than a quarter of a century South Africa were international pariahs. However, if one thought the end of the iniquitous apartheid regime would bring an end to such problems, one was wrong.

Things that ought to be a matter of conscience - such as how one expresses one's disapproval of racial prejudice - are now not treated as such by some cricket boards. And so the South African board has felt it right to make it mandatory for its players to 'take the knee' before matches in a forced display of virtue signalling about race: and Quinton de Kock, in exercising his absolute right not to have his conscience dictated to, preferred not to play in Tuesday's T20 match against the West Indies rather than engage in an action he felt uncomfortable with.

I don't for a moment imagine that the South African wicketkeeper is a racist. I imagine that, like tens of millions of others, he finds such public gestures absurd and irrelevant to his own belief in equality and equal treatment. But it is precisely because of the apartheid past that South Africa's board is so insistent on the gesture.

A statement put out by the board after de Kock's refusal to abide by its wishes included justifying the forced gesture by referring to the country's 'history'. De Kock has not explained himself, and if one believes in the idea of a free society (which South Africa, despite its much greater problems of descending into anarchy, technically still is) there is no reason why he should. The West Indian Carlos Brathwaite, who says he is on good terms with de Kock and has never felt him give the slightest indication of racial prejudice, has urged him to explain himself.


If de Kock wishes to give reasons - and he should not be required to do so - some are fairly obvious.

The taking-the-knee gesture is a symbol of the Black Lives Matter movement, for whom removing the unquestioned disadvantages that people of colour experience in some parts of the world is only a minor part of their programme. The movement harbours a number of committed Marxists who make no secret of their desire to overthrow capitalism. That was not least the reason why some Premier League football clubs in England stopped making the gesture: there were more practical and less tainted ways of showing solidarity with minorities, such as advancing members of them on merit in their respective sports, and taking firm action against those working in sport and those who turn up to watch it who engage in overtly racist acts.

But de Kock may also be sensitive to the way in which people are infantilised by being forced to act in a communal fashion when they may well wish to behave differently. It is not a way to treat serious adults. And he may well also be sophisticated enough to realise that such a gesture, especially when forced and thus made insincerely, assists in no way in the elimination of racism from cricket, sport in general or the wider world.

Until and unless de Kock comes out and admits he regards people of colour as inferior - which one must sincerely doubt he ever would - then his freedom of conscience and right to act as an individual in matters of conscience must be respected. He was less than two years old when South Africa was last under white rule, so to talk of the apartheid years and manufacture some association between him and that era is preposterous. And South Africa's board, which appears to have imposed this diktat on its players without proper consultation or planning, seems entirely to reflect the chaos in which its benighted country finds itself nearly three decades after majority rule.

It should treat its players as adults, not as foolish children who need to be taught some manners: and recognise that with the advent of maturity, a man or a woman is entitled to exercise his or conscience.

De Kock, who has never acted against the interests of black people, should be credited with a conscience and not just with being bloody-minded. If his career comes unstuck because of his wish to exercise his personal freedom rather than being dictated to, it would be an act to be added to cricket's regrettably lengthening roll of shame.
Taking the knee is divisive - Quinton de Kock is not racist for refusing to do it

a gesture that is becoming more divisive by the day should be consigned to the dustbin. BLM is not an organisation that seeks harmony or reconciliation, but an activist group that is knowingly and actively causing friction and disruption and nobody in their right mind should be bowing down to it by performing useless and absurd gestures in the name of fighting racism.

‘Let’s ignore racism’, says racist.

Of course the problem with racists is that to them there will never be an acceptable way to protest racism because it’s perceived as an attack on them.

Anyway, now we know exactly how to respond to that gay Haka.

That bait is rotten.

Originally Posted by AntRobertson

Of course the problem with racists is that to them there will never be an acceptable way to protest racism because it’s perceived as an attack on them.

Ant, no issues in 'protest(ing) racism' ... I'm mindfull that I have kids who are 1/2 Thai.

But to be instructed to protest racism (or be dropped) ... that's a firm no from me.

Originally Posted by David48atTD

Ant, no issues in 'protest(ing) racism' ... I'm mindfull that I have kids who are 1/2 Thai.

But to be instructed to protest racism (or be dropped) ... that's a firm no from me.

Ok but that doesn't alter the point. Stand, sit, kneel, yell, remain silent, hop about on one leg to protest racism... Racists are not gonna like it and call it 'divisive' or some such other irony-free label.

Colin Kaepernick was called a 'son of a bitch' by the same POTUS that called Nazi-flag carriers 'fine people' and blackballed from the NFL for peacefully protesting, LeBron James was told to 'shut up and play basketball' for voicing an opinion and so on and so on.

Those who have an interest perpetuating the the status quo will never accept anything that threatens it.

Originally Posted by David48atTD

Some of the angst stems from the sudden decision to enforce 'the knee'.

The decision apparently made after criticism of the SA cricket T20 team after the image I posted above.

If they were told, before they left SA that it was team policy that the knee would be part of team culture and dissection was not allowed ... that would have been fairer on all.

Not something I agree with, but at lest the players would have had a choice to participate or not in the World Cup.

Or even tell the players that it's up to them, as a playing group to take the knee or not take the knee...

Originally Posted by Saint Willy

Or even tell the players that it's up to them, as a playing group to take the knee or not take the knee...

It should be the captain's decision.

Perhaps it was.

Stand, Kneel who cares.

The loony left are everywhere.

don't do as they say and you're marked.

Originally Posted by Chico

don't do as they say and you're marked.

You are marked because you display a complete lack of understanding

Originally Posted by AntRobertson

Ok but that doesn't alter the point. Stand, sit, kneel, yell, remain silent, hop about on one leg to protest racism... Racists are not gonna like it and call it 'divisive' or some such other irony-free label.

Colin Kaepernick was called a 'son of a bitch' by the same POTUS that called Nazi-flag carriers 'fine people' and blackballed from the NFL for peacefully protesting, LeBron James was told to 'shut up and play basketball' for voicing an opinion and so on and so on.

Those who have an interest perpetuating the the status quo will never accept anything that threatens it.

You seem to have totally missed the point Ant. Your statement is just clouding the issue IMO. This sort of enforced woke crap proves nothing, does nothing and says nothing.

This reminds me of Life of Brian and Reg's bad back. "Solidarity Brother".