To Knee or not to knee: that is the question

Up until now I’ve refrained from engaging with debates regarding taking the knee, the symbolic gesture originating from former NFL player and racial equality activist Colin Kaepernick.

This has come to represent anti-racism within sports arenas for many. I have several reasons for avoiding these debates so far and in truth I've always been uncomfortable with positioning my opinion as holding any weight in such debates. I’ve previously written about my own sense of fragility on these topics elsewhere (see Hobson and Whigham in Arday and Mirza 2018).

However, recently I’ve heard a number of a number of media sources discussing England Football fans booing which I wanted to address. Much of the discussion has centred upon whether the gesture in itself is good or bad, if fans are booing. I often think this attempt to reduce something as complex as racism and anti-racist struggles to a gesture being good or bad is overly-simplistic.

While I do not have the room to fully address his work here, Jamaican scholar Stuart Hall is my go-to theorist when trying to understand media representation. For Hall, any symbol has multiple meanings and interpretations which derive from its sources of production, consumption, identity, representation and regulation (check out the attached link to read more about this). While no symbol has a fixed meaning, he argues there are multiple meanings some which will be more dominant that others, which are consumed and re-presented as part of popular culture. From Hall’s perspective similar readings occur when people attribute similar meanings to a symbol (such as taking the knee), based upon participants shared identities and readings of cultural artifacts. Sorry if this is a really long way of saying there’s no one meaning.

So, for the most part I believe the most common interpretation of taking the knee is viewed as a symbol of resistance, solidarity and anti-racism. Often the counter argument has been that football fans are booing the symbol as they object to what are supposed Marxist origins of the Black Lives Matter movement, or an objection to left leaning politics more broadly.

The argument often goes that allowing footballers to kneel is symbolic of the anti-capitalist politics held by some of the founding members of the Black Lives Matter organisation. However, this an argument I struggle to get my head round, firstly the images of players kneeling are literally covered in brands and sponsors such as Nike, Adidas, Sky, Coca-Cola, Barclays and Budweiser who are some of the biggest corporations in the world. If anything, Stuart Hall would argue these images by association generate a new popular reading, and large parts of the population will now associate the swoosh of Nike with anti-racist struggle, whether as an organisation it is actively committed to this or not (their marketing definitely suggests so, but that’s a PhD thesis in itself).  

Secondly, this suggests that the anti-racist movements are united by a shared political and economic stance, however if you are to explore the history of anti-racist struggles in the west this has never been the case. In the American Civil Rights movements of the 60s the likes of Angela Davies, Malcolm X, Dr Martin Luther-King, didn’t all hold the same beliefs about the economy and the way to challenge racial inequalities. However, with much discourse and collective action they were able to make some progress, in the same way that  movements in the UK and across the world have since.

While symbols of resistance such as taking the knee or John Carlos and Tommy Smith on the podium at 1968 Mexico Olympics are emblazoned on history, much progress in anti-racist struggles have often come from black lead organisations who are united by the cause tackling racism and creating opportunities to challenge both stereotypes and structural inequalities. Historically, it has been these organisations which have mobilised people, provided networks to share knowledge and have created a sense of solidarity among black communities.  Since the murder of George Floyd, and the continued presence of taking the knee there has been a greater exposure of the black lead sports organisations working for social change and it’s the increased exposure and support for organisations such as these which I believe will prompt social change as opposed to the gesture of taking the knee itself.

Organisations such as the Black Swimming Association (Alice Dearing the first black swimmer to be selected to represent GB at the Olympics is one of its founders), Black Cyclist Networks, Black Collective of Media in Sport (BCOMS) and Sport Shifts are all black run sports organisations who look to challenge under-representation and exclusion from the sports industry.

By utilising methods which address the unique challenges of the sport or the industry they are operating in it is through institutions such as these that I think will have the most impact upon individual’s lives. Whether this is helping create a space where Black cyclists feel they belong as is the case of The Black Cyclist Network, challenging stereotypes around swimming in black communities  and promoting knowledge of culturally appropriate practises, or providing opportunities to develop expertise and knowledge to help gain opportunities in the sports industry where they have traditionally been excluded (such is the case of BCOMS and Sports Shifts). Its organisations such as these who I think will be the drivers of change, by being black led and sitting outside the bureaucracy of  larger institutions they have an agency to shape change in ways they think best suits their members.

You might ask, what has any of this got to taking the knee?, and you would be right. While taking the knee doesn’t directly benefit these organisations, if players continue to make the gesture it has potential to keep the discussion going regarding racial equality, which in turn keeps the exposure of organisations such as these going. Most of these organisations are run by a small group of committed individuals outside of their full-time jobs therefore exposure that helps these organisations to grow has the potential to provoke social change.