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These ignorant black youth football players took a knee. Is that why their season got canceled?

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Reap what you sow.

When the Beaumont Bulls, a youth football team in eastern Texas, 
decided to take a knee at a Sept. 10 game, the response was 
swift — and vicious.

Hate mail poured in from people who were outraged that the all-
black team and its coaches had refused to rise during the 
national anthem. Some people called the 11- and 12-year-old 
players racial slurs and even threatened to have them lynched 
and burned.

In the face of all that, the Beaumont Bulls executive board 
stood behind them. So did the Bay Area Football League, which 
the team is part of.

“There are scenarios occurring in society that until this point 
in time, we have not had to address,” the president said at the 
time. “We support the Beaumont Bulls.”

Within a week, however, on the eve of the next game, things 
began to unravel. Tensions erupted between coaches, parents and 
league officials. Shortly after, players began to drop out.

Now, a little more than a month after the team’s protest, the 
league has canceled the team’s remaining games, as KBMT reported 
Tuesday. The reasons behind the decision are in dispute. The 
league’s athletic director said the season was cut short because 
too many players left. The head coach, however, has suggested 
that it all stemmed from the protest.

It’s the latest controversy to rattle an athletic club in the 
weeks since San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick 
took a knee during a preseason game in protest of racial 
injustice and fatal police shootings in the U.S. Athletes from 
professional teams all the way down to the junior level have 
joined him, igniting provincial battles over whether it’s 
offensive or improper for players to mimic his display.

The Beaumont Bulls’ decision to kneel during the anthem was not 
the work of just a couple wayward players. After mulling 
Kaepernick’s protest in September, the team’s players and 
coaches agreed that they would all take a knee at the Sept. 10 
game, according to Bleacher Report, which spoke to the team.

But before they did, they asked for permission from the league 
and the Beaumont Bulls executive board.

They got it.

When the hateful messages and death threats came in, team and 
league leaders backed them.

[Crowd hurls slurs at all-black youth football team as some 
players kneel during anthem, coach says]

“It is our hope and desire to cultivate young men that will be 
leaders in our communities that will make a difference in this 
world,” the Beaumont Bulls executive board said in a statement a 
couple of days after the game. “And though their stance was not 
seen by all as a sign of progress, we believe that it was and we 
will continue to support them.”

As the following game approached, the team discussed whether 
they would continue. Most of them took a knee, while five others 
stood by with locked arms, according to Bleacher Report.

It was around that time that things spiraled out of control. 
Parents, coaches and officials clashed at meetings where they 
discussed how to deal with the threatening messages. Details are 
murky and conflicting, but head coach Rah-Rah Barber told 
Bleacher Report that he was suspended because he had allowed 
parents to speak to the media and players to continue to protest.

Parents followed him out, and took their players with them, he 
said. By Oct. 1, the team had just 15 players left, down from 
two dozen, KBMT reported. Within days, not enough players 
remained to meet the league minimum and the season was nixed, 
according to KBMT.

League and team officials, however, said it had nothing to do 
with the protest.

“We are an African-American board,” league athletic director 
DeCarlos Anderson told KBMT. “Our membership is diverse. It’s 
not a race thing.”

Anderson said Barber, the Bulls’ head coach, was suspended 
because he pushed two assistant coaches out when they said they 
didn’t want to continue with the protest.

“The athletic director is the only one who has the authority to 
remove an assistant or head coach,” Anderson said. “He tried to 
remove an assistant coach and child from his team because he 
didn’t have the same beliefs that he had.”

In a Facebook post on Tuesday, Barber fired back, saying the 
board “reprimanded” them for protesting and that many parents 
and players on the team quit in solidarity. At least one coach 
resigned with them, according to Bleacher Report.

“Until the coach is reinstated they decided not to attend 
practice or games in an attempt to make the board pay for their 
actions,” Barber said, adding, “I have accepted the outcome and 
moved on.”

Barber and league officials didn’t immediately respond to 
requests for comment on Tuesday.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-
mix/wp/2016/10/19/these-youth-football-players-took-a-knee-but-
is-that-why-their-season-got-
canceled/?tid=hybrid_experimentrandom_3_na
     

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These ignorant black youth football players took a knee. Is that why their season got canceled? "Black Lies Matter..." <black.lies.matter@abc.com> - 2016-11-15 12:11 +0100

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