Together with the 32 franchise owners, the NFL has decided on a new hymn policy for the coming season. Teams whose members kneel during the national anthem will be punished. This was announced by NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell at a press conference on Wednesday.
“This season all league and team members should stand and show respect for the flag and anthem. We believe that the decision will put the focus back on the game and the players,” said Goodell. He also explained that the public protest, in which some players and even entire teams bent their knees during the national anthem, gave the wrong impression that “thousands of NFL players are unpatriotic”.
The new “anthem policy” provides that clubs whose players kneel on the sidelines despite the ban on protests would be punished. Whoever decides not to stand has to stay in the cabin until the end of the anthem. Nevertheless, the goal was to continue working with players to bring values such as justice and fairness into society.
However, the players’ union was not informed of the decision taken by the NFL and the 32 team owners at the Spring League Meeting. In a statement via Twitter, the Players Association announced its disappointment at the decision and announced that it would examine the new policy in detail and contest it in case of doubt.
The dispute over the hymn protests in the NFL originated in San Francisco when the then franchise quarterback Colin Kaepernick knelt during the national anthem to demonstrate against racism and the oppression of the African American population in the United States. Many NFL players, but also athletes outside football, joined the protests during the anthem. Now the NFL – as US President Donald Trump has long been vehemently calling for – has acted and banished the protest into the cabin.