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Abby Withrow

English 111

Lucia Elden

December 1, 2017

The Star-Spangled Banner. The National Anthem of the United States of America. The

anthem of victory. All names of the famous song Francis Scott key wrote as a victory for

America, because the United States flag was still waving after a war. The National anthem

should be a celebration, a time to rejoice, a time to be jubilant, but the National Football League

(NFL) is making it a time of grief, sorrow, and pain. The NFL players are silently protesting

during the National Anthem. They are kneeling instead of standing up with the accustomed way

of putting your hand over your heart. The actions of these players are constructing a split nation

and sparking up debates after debates.

This controversy emerged from one player, Colin Kaepernick, who decided to kneel

during the Star-Spangled Banner. All Kaepernick wanted to do, was silently protest the social

injustices going on in America at that time. Instead, he made America furious and gained the

support of many other NFL players. This year, many NFL teams, including the Dallas Cowboys,

Green Bay Packers, Chicago Bears, etc., have knelt during the singing of our National Anthem.

One team, the Pittsburgh Steelers, even went as far as to not even come out of the locker room

for the Star-Spangled Banner. Gerald Graff stated something interesting in his article, Hidden

Intellectualism. He claims, Sports[are]full of challenging arguments, debates, problems

for analysis, and intricate statistics (p. 202). What Graff was talking about was, sports allow

people to be able to debate and have intellectual conversations. So, is this whats happening in

the NFL?
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Whenever controversy arises in a well-known, public situation, debate is inevitable.

There will always be people who stand for whatever is being argued, and people who are against

it. Graff would have some interesting thoughts about what is going on in the NFL right now.

Gerald Graff grew up in a small neighborhood in Chicago. He did not enjoy going to school and

only enjoyed playing sports. Eventually, Graff realized that sports taught him, the rudiments

of the intellectual life (201). Some of these include being able to make an argument,

weigh different kinds of evidencesummarize the views of others, and enter a conversation

about ideas (Graff 201). So, being able to debate is an essential part of an intellectual life. By

the NFL players kneeling during the National Anthem, Americans are becoming more

intellectual, according to Graff, whether people agree with the NFL players decision or not.

This is not a discussion about agreeing or disagreeing with the NFL, but about how

people, by arguing and coming to their own conclusions, are becoming intellectuals. Jack

Mezirow, author of Transformative Learning: Theory to Practice, would also agree with

Graffs ideas. Mezirow states, The more interpretations of a belief available, the greater the

likelihood of finding a more dependable interpretation or synthesis (88). Mezirow is saying that

when humans understand different point of views, they are able to learn and maybe transform

their frame of reference. Both Mezirow and Graff believe debating helps a person learn and

become more intellectual. So, these two authors would also agree that the debates, and

controversy emerging from the NFL, is allowing people to better themselves by being able to

debate and learn.

The National Football League players are kneeling during the National Anthem. This has

created one of the biggest topics of discussion this year. Yes, this is a controversial topic, but

one thing about this whole situation can be said; people are becoming more intellectual because
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of it. Both Jack Mezirow and Gerald Graff would support this statement, because of the fact that

the whole situation has created heated debates. Americans may not realize what is going on, but

they are becoming intellectuals by debating about football and the players actions. For those

Americans who think that the only time a NFL player should kneel is in the end zone for a

touchback, would be shocked to know that, according to Graff and Mezirow, out of this

controversy, intellectualism arises!

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Works Cited

Graff, Gerald and Cathy Birkenstein. "Hidden Intellectualism." They Say/I Say: The Moves that

Matter in Academic Writing. Ed. G. Graff and C. Birkenstein. New York: W. W.

Norton & Co. 2010, pp. 198-205.

Mezirow, Jack. Transformative Learning: Theory to Practice. Exploring Connections:

Learning in the 21st Century. New York: Pearson Education, Inc. pp. 87-93.