Duck Dynasty alum and At Home With the Robertsons star Willie Robertson hosted a discussion about athletes taking a knee and protesting during the national anthem with several NFL players. Along with his wife, Korie, Willie Robertson spoke with NFL players including Arian Foster, Michael Thomas, and Nate Boyer and said the player protests felt “a little un-American” to him.
Korie said she wanted to understand the racial aspect of the protest during the anthem, especially because one of her sons is black. But she can’t escape the feeling that the protests are disrespectful. Korie said she has softened her opinion on kneeling. But Willie saw it a different way.
“Personally, I don’t have a problem if someone wants to wear a logo or something,” the Duck Dynasty star said. “It’s when they got to the flag, of choosing that exact time to make your protest, I just felt like the flag should really bring us together… yeah, that just feels a little un-American.”
Willie also said he wants sports to be about sports, not politics.
“I understand, though, wanting to change for sure,” he said. “It’s just like, is that the best time? You know? The flag and even, for me, football. When I watch football, I don’t want to be thinking about who the president is and what the politics are. I just want to watch either my favorite team or two teams go after it.”
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For his part, former Houston Texans player Arian Foster waved off concerns about building burning down and protests turning into riots. Foster said that he feels protests only cross the line when they cause bodily injury to other people.
The former Houston Texans star said there is no wrong or right way to protest, “as long as you don’t cause bodily harm to somebody else [and if you do[that’s not a protest anymore. That’s an act of war, that’s an act of aggression. So, what I’m saying is as long as you’re not causing bodily harm, I can’t dictate how you, as another man, protest.”
Robertson, though, found the idea of burning down buildings was the wrong way to protest. “I would certainly rather that [people kneeling during the anthem], than burning down buildings. I don’t like that in protest,” he said. “I’d rather somebody choosing to kneel or stand as a way of whatever they’re going to do than being violent or destroying somebody’s property.”
Willie Robertson added that there is “definitely a line you can cross” while protesting.
“I definitely think there’s a line you can cross protesting. I mean, if you started destroying property, or taking it, or stealing it, or burning it down, I don’t think that’s appropriate,” he said.
“That’s actually infringing on someone else’s rights, Korie added. “If the purpose of protest is to make change for good, you’re actually causing harm to someone else [by violence], that’s a line that shouldn’t be crossed.”
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