Off Wing Opinion

From Long Island's Newsday comes this story about sports, politics and protest:

Toni Smith accomplished what was seemingly impossible - she drew a crowd to a United States Merchant Marine Academy women's basketball game.

More than 300 midshipmen filed into Liebertz Gymnasium last night, most coming because of a Manhattanville player whom they deemed to be unpatriotic.

The midshipmen paraded in with 10 American flags and boisterous chants of, "USA! USA!" and "Leave our country!" For the entire second half, 50 plebes, each holding American flags, lined the 90-foot sideline opposite Manhattanville's bench. Five more plebes unfurled a 25-by-35 foot flag behind the Valiants' basket.

Undeterred by the overt show of patriotism and pregame heckling that continued throughout the game, Smith, a 5-10 senior captain for Manhattanville, did what she has done in each of the Valiants' previous 21 games. At the playing of the national anthem, she turned to the side and looked at the floor. It was the only place to avoid seeing the red, white and blue in the flag-covered gym.

Smith, a Sociology major and a native of Manhattan, has steadfastly refused to comment as to why she's protesting, although sources inside the administration at Manhattanville, a small, private college just North of New York City, told Newsday that she was protesting against American foreign policy. Meanwhile, the president of Manhattanville issued a statement saying that, "While Ms. Smith is expressing her personal views and not necessarily those of the college, the First Amendment guarantees her right to do so."

While I don't agree with Smith, it's clear she's involved in a very lonely protest. Smith is a graduate of the Beacon School -- an alternative public high school on Manhattan's West side. It's a good bet she, like any other graduate of a New York area high school, knows someone who perished on September 11th.

As one might guess, New Yorkers aren't exactly tolerating overt acts of dissent these days, and the reaction of the fans at the Merchant Marine Academy -- where graduates are eligible for an officer's commission in the U.S. Armed Forces -- was entirely predictable.

I have just one last thought. While I'll defend Smith's right to protest to the last, I can't imagine any circumstance where I would turn my back on the flag. If anything, Smith's seems to conflate protesting against the Bush Administration's foreign policy with protesting against the nation of her birth -- something which is an entirely different proposition.

POSTSCRIPT: This isn't the first time an athlete has turned their back on the flag in public. Back in 1997, then Denver Nuggets guard Mahmoud Abdul Rauf staged his own protest. As Peter Steinfels wrote in the New York Times:

For over 60 games, Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf, the Denver Nuggets star point guard, avoided standing while the national anthem played. Only when fans began asking on radio talk shows about his conduct did the 27-year-old player, who converted to Islam five years ago, declare that the nationalism implied in the song ran counter to his belief that "Islam is the only way.

Was this a classic exercise of religious conscience -- like Jehovah's Witnesses' refusal to pledge allegiance to the flag? Or was it more like the political protests of athletes during awards ceremonies at the 1968 and 1972 Olympics? The Council on American-Islamic Relations in Washington reported that standing for a national anthem did not contravene Islam.

The NBA saw the player's refusal to stand as a vilation of the rule that requires players and coaches to stand "in a dignified posture" during the anthem, and suspended Abdul-Rauf. Civil libertarians said the N.B.A.'s action might violate the Civil Rights Act, which requires employers to accommodate the religious beliefs of employees if it can be done without hardship. Denver fans were less sympathetic, complaining that a player making $2.6 million this year should be more appreciative of the United States. In a Denver Post poll, 72% of Denver-area adults took issue with Abdul-Rauf. On Thursday, he agreed to stand during the national anthem in the future while praying privately for suffering humanity.

He did so Friday night; the Nuggets lost to the Chicago Bulls. Some people saw the compromise as a forced compromise. Others saw it as a maturing of belief, after discussions with Muslim leaders and athletes. Either way, the devout athlete had given the nation a moment of reflection on religion, politics, patriotic rituals and the demands of conscience.

One of the prominent Muslims who took Abdul-Rauf to task for his refusal to stand during the anthem was NBA great Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. He noted that Abdul-Rauf should have stood during the anthem as a sign of respect due to the fact that the United States protected his freedom of worship.

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 13th, 2003 at 11:20 am by Eric McErlain and is filed under Basketball, Misc. Sports, Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.