#long before Sonnett came around I liked KO and Ertz and I still decided to not support them the MOMENT they decided to not kneel

[that-soccer-guru]

You didn’t start caring about what happened to these players who stood until sonnett stood, and tbh it’s a bad look. I get you’re angry, but it seems more like you want revenge on these players (especially sonnett who you adored) than caring about Black players. Benching would break this team before the Olympics. Players are not more important than Black lives but Kaiya McCollough spoke on her experience at Washington spirit, and she mentioned that her mind was constantly ‘i don’t want to cost my team a championship/a shield’ because of speaking out. If players are benched for their choice to not protest, then it will be a dramatic break in the team. It’s not as simple as punishing a student for being awful. And if we make everyone, even those who disagree to kneel for social aspects, then it is false and performative. Right wing news will latch on and target this team if that happens. Please listen to Black women about this instead of being reactionary.

I literally have been saying this WHOLE time that every player who doesn't kneel can get fucked. When Kelley O'Hara didn't kneel, when Julie Ertz made a SHOW of it, two people who I really admired and looked up to, I said it then, I'll say it now.

This isn't a Sonnett thing, I've been with this since the kneeling started in full force. I just haven't been asked what I would do about it if I could until Sonnett. But my opinion has been the SAME this whole time. Bench. No call ups. Be better or get out.

And I said it before too, if Hinkle can get booted the fuck out of the NT for being a homophobe in a team with LGBT players, these 6 should get booted out for wearing BLM gear without doing the actual part of the performing that matters. Even if it doesn't change SHIT, you know what they are now? they're figures for racist assholes who hardly care about the sport but who think we should have athletes do their sport thing and stop talking politics. And again, let's be real, Hinkle would've been given a slap on the wrist if she had been a white woman. Hell she'd still be around. At least she had the guts to be a homophobe to our faces, these players are still hiding under the pretense that they "talked to their teammates" who by virtue of being black would get shit on if they kicked up a fuzz because yes that is the way this fucking country works.

I can't support that and I'm not going to.

Luckily I'm not Vlatko Andonovski so what I say doesn't matter. But maybe this fucking team needs to organize its priorities. Because these people are Americans first and whatever else after, and as Americans who are watching their country burn because of its refusal to change, they should think a little harder about what they're doing and what they're not doing.