Protesting made these athletes patriots (Opinion)
Jackie Robinson
(CNN) The President has excoriated football players who have joined a protest movement by former 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick as unpatriotic. But the President is overlooking history -- which shows athletes now lauded as heroes  like  Jackie Robinson and Muhammad Ali   raising  their  voices (or taking a seat) in protests similar to Kaepernick's.
 Jackie Robinson   rightfully celebrated for showing enormous grace under pressure while breaking baseball's color line  refused to stand for the National Anthem after  his  playing days.
Jackie Robinson as a Brooklyn Dodger.
As  he  described in  his  1972 autobiography   Robinson -- like contemporary NFL players --  was protesting against institutional racism.  He  was expressing  his  feelings of alienation from America's system of racial apartheid.
 Robinson 's pugnacious brand of civil rights activism set the stage for succeeding generations of black athletes. Eleven-time NBA champion Bill Russell emerged as one of the most outspoken civil rights advocates of the 1960s  at a time when the city he played in  Boston  represented one of the most racially segregated cities in the North.
Above all  black American athletes are citizens  fathers  brothers  husbands and sons who have a right and responsibility to continue a long struggle for dignity exemplified by Jackie Robinson  Bill Russell and many others.
(CNN) The President has excoriated football players who have joined a protest movement by former 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick as unpatriotic. But the President is overlooking history -- which shows athletes now lauded as heroes  like   [TGT]  and Muhammad Ali   raising   [TGT]   voices (or taking a seat) in protests similar to Kaepernick's.
  [TGT]    rightfully celebrated for showing enormous grace under pressure while breaking baseball's color line  refused to stand for the National Anthem after   [TGT]   playing days.
 [TGT]  as a Brooklyn Dodger.
As  he  described in  his  1972 autobiography   Robinson -- like contemporary NFL players --  was protesting against institutional racism.  He  was expressing  his  feelings of alienation from America's system of racial apartheid.
  [TGT]  's pugnacious brand of civil rights activism set the stage for succeeding generations of black athletes. Eleven-time NBA champion Bill Russell emerged as one of the most outspoken civil rights advocates of the 1960s  at a time when the city he played in  Boston  represented one of the most racially segregated cities in the North.
Above all  black American athletes are citizens  fathers  brothers  husbands and sons who have a right and responsibility to continue a long struggle for dignity exemplified by Jackie Robinson  Bill Russell and many others.