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In what has to be the best story of the pot calling the kettle black, aĀ Bay Area police union says that Colin Kaepernickās quiet protest against the national anthem is āharassing behavior.ā
The head of the Santa Clara, Calif., police union wrote a letter Friday threatening to stop working San Francisco 49ers home games unless the team takes action against the controversial quarterback, NBC Bay Area reports.
The Santa Clara Police Officersā Association said that failure to stop Kaepernickās police-brutality protestsāwhich take the form of sitting or kneeling during the national anthemāācould result in police officers choosing not to work at your facilities,ā and implied that theĀ 28-year-old quarterbackās actions constitute āharassing behaviorā toward police.
Additionally, San Francisco cops earlier this week wrote their own letter demanding thatĀ Kaepernick apologize.
āWe hope your organizations choose to do the right thing and at least apologize to the many officers Mr. Kaepernick has disrespected for no apparent reason,ā San Francisco Police Officers Association President Martin Halloran wrote.
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Some find it quite ironic that these demands are coming from unions that represent the very same police departments where members were caught inĀ April in text messages calling people of color ācockroaches,ā ābarbariansā and, of course, the n-word; the San Francisco Police DepartmentĀ fired eight cops last year for just that.
Just last December, Santa Clara County jail officers also had their own racist text-message debacleāsame town, same field.
Regardless of the so-called backlash, many other players are refusing to stand for the anthem, including fellow 49er Eric Reid and Seattle Seahawks corner Jeremy Lane, who remained on the bench as his teammates stood for āThe Star-Spangled Bannerā before their game against theĀ Raiders.
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Read more at NBC Bay Area.
