Sports used to be simple. The whistle blows and the athletes on the field put it all on the line to win the game. But now the drama begins well before the whistle blows.

Sports fans from different generations were interviewed and gave their thoughts on what has turned one of the greatest American traditions into something incredibly divisive.

If you go back and try to find Michael Jordan or Deion Sanders talk about their political views during their playing careers it is almost impossible. But today’s athletes will not shy away from opening up.

In week 2 of the 2016 NFL season; former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick and his teammate Eric Reid kneeled on the sideline during the playing of the national anthem. For many people, this is what they consider the start of professional athlete protests.

I was able to interview and survey 10 people at Tahoma High School, 5 students and 5 staff members. I wanted to get the different opinions from people growing up in a different age of sports and relating what they grew up with to what their opinions are now.

I asked each person to rate political involvement in sports when they were growing up and again for current day sports. I thought that the results from staff and student would be very different but they were instead very close with a few exceptions. Many of the staff and students picked lower numbers for political involvement in sports as kids, but there were some who picked 8 or 9. Physical Education and Outdoor Academy teacher Tracy Krause was one of the few who picked one of these high numbers.

“The Olympics were super political from the 68’ protests on the podium to the 80’ boycott and 84’ boycott,” Krause said.

However, when each interview subject was asked about politics in modern day sports, every person had picked a number higher than they had for when they were kids. Steve Bodwell who is part of the Tahoma Football coaching staff and a Leadership teacher was one of these people.

“They have an audience and people who want to hear from them [and there’s] a more public view of sports.” Are the two things that Bodwell attributed this rise to.

“Politics are much more polar than they used to be, people are more strongly opinionated in their views,” said senior Jeffrey Hostetter on the topic.

Athletes have been protesting for over a century. In the 1906 Olympics, an Irish long jumper named Peter O’Connor who won silver protested the raising of the British flag in his honor. He only wanted to represent Ireland and he climbed up the flagpole himself and flew the Irish flag.

During the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City 2 U.S. runners, John Carlos and his teammate Tommie Smith both raised their fist during the National Anthem for a salute to Black power. The 2 men were suspended from the U.S. track team.

However, if you would like to find the so called “Original Kaepernick”, then go back to the NBA in 1996 and you will find that Denver Nuggets guard Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf was praying for through the duration of the national anthem.

“It’s disturbing to me when it’s easy for teams to take back people who were physically abusive and were up on charges. But this is a man who is not only speaking his conscious, but he’s sending planes with food to Somalia, working with Meals on Wheels, and giving his shoes and suits away,” Abdul said this in an interview with New York Daily News this past summer, talking about Colin Kaepernick.

If you look at the NBA and NFL, these leagues are incredibly popular and have arguably the biggest fan following in the United States. However, the commissioners for these two major sports promotions have very different stances on how their players should handle social justice off the court or field.

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell had been surprisingly quiet on the Colin Kaepernick situation as well as the player protest as a whole until he was really forced to discuss it. President Donald Trump got involved over Twitter as per usual and called out the players who were exercising their first amendment right and wanted them to be fired.

Goodell then wrote a letter that seemed well overdue and asked all the teams to stand for the anthem. But the following Sunday, the players fired back at Trump. The largest number of players either sat, kneeled, linked arms, or in some cases didn’t even come out for the playing of the anthem. In many cases, the owners joined the players on the field to either kneel or link arms. Which is strange to me, because when it all started with Kaepernick, the owners hated it; but, I guess when an outsider calls out the league, then they feel the need to show unity.

In the NBA, commissioner Adam Silver handles players protesting very differently. Silver wrote a letter before the start of the NBA season had begun. “Critical issues that affect our society also impact you directly… Fortunately, you are not only the world’s greatest basketball players you have real power to make a difference in the world, and we want you to know that the Players Association and the League are always available to help you figure out the most meaningful way to make that difference,” said Silver.

The NBA has been allowing players to protest on the court for many years. Back in 2014 many players wore shirts during warm-ups that read “I can’t breathe” written on them in order to show their protesting against police brutality. The NBA has a slogan and a movement called “NBA Cares.” Silver supported but also condoned the act of the players voicing their opinions, “I respect Derrick Rose and all of our players for voicing their personal views on important issues but my preference would be for players to abide by our on-court attire rules,” said Silver. However, the NBA did not fine any of the players for this act.

Both the NBA and the NFL have their fair share of players protesting. I do not think that allowing players to protest social issues is either right or wrong. I believe that players should be allowed to demonstrate their views since they have the platform and the right to do so.

I believe that Mike Tomlin, head coach of the Pittsburgh Steelers said it best, “We will not be divided by this. We got a group of men in there who come from different social-economic backgrounds, races, creeds, ethnicities, and religions and so forth. That’s football. That’s a lot of team sports. But because of our position, we get drug into the bull—-, to be quite honest with you. And so some have opinions, some don’t. We wanted to protect those that don’t, we wanted to protect those that do. We came here for a football game today, and that was our intentions.”

Everything is changing these days. I believe that these athletes are doing what they think is best. Professional competitors have all the coverage in the world to get their opinion across. Whether they stand, sit, kneel, raise a fist, wear special clothes or whatever it is that they choose to do, nobody should have their opinion be silenced or their rights infringed upon.