On Friday’s episode of “The Ben Shapiro Show,” the Daily Wire editor-in-chief talks about Colin Kaepernick’s “Unthanksgiving Day” celebration, in which the former football player promotes being ungrateful. Video and partial transcript below:
[Colin Kaepernick’s] latest bid for attention — since he obviously doesn’t want to play quarterback in the NFL — he trashed the United States on “Unthanksgiving Day,” which I guess is sort of like your “Unbirthday” in Alice in Wonderland …
[Kaepernick] said that he was accusing the United States of having stolen billions of acres of land from indigenous people, and then he released a video on his Twitter account to play into all this.
So here’s Colin Kaepernick, a millionaire thanks to the Western system he is currently criticizing, in America, a country that he apparently really does not like in many ways. Here he is cutting a video on Unthanksgiving Day because apparently we’re not supposed to be thankful to God that we live in this country, we’re not supposed to be thankful to God that Western civilization arrived on these shores.
We’re supposed to pretend that everything would’ve been better for the world if Europeans had never come to the continent, which again, that is not to discount any of the evils Europeans committed when arriving on this continent. But to pretend that the world would be a better place, broadly speaking, if Europeans had never colonized the United States, is to be completely ignorant of world history, economics, and pretty much everything else.
Here’s Colin Kaepernick doing that routine, presumably — well, leaning back in his mansion and watching this thing on his Twitter account created on his iPhone.
KAEPERNICK: It’s been fifty years since the occupation, and that struggle has continued for fifty years. Before that fifty years, and it will continue from this point. It is our responsibility to honor our ancestors, and honor our elders, by carrying on that struggle. Don’t let their sacrifice be in vain. That’s why it’s important for all of us to be here today, to show that we’re together, that we’re unified, that we have that solidarity. And I hope to spend many more of these with you.
Then Kaepernick wrote on Twitter:
“Spent the morning at Indigenous People Sunrise ceremony on the 50 year anniversary of the occupation of Alcatraz. The U.S. government has stolen over one point five billion acres of land from indigenous people. Thank you to my indigenous family, I’m with you today and always.”
Spent the morning at the Indigenous People’s Sunrise Ceremony on the 50 year anniversary of the Occupation of Alcatraz. The US government has stolen over 1.5 billion acres of land from Indigenous people. Thank you to my Indigenous family, I’m with you today and always.✊🏽 pic.twitter.com/6cTuktUlQN
— Colin Kaepernick (@Kaepernick7) November 28, 2019
Okay, it is certainly worthwhile to recognize that the United States is based on European peoples coming to land that they did not originally discover — there were people here already, and then taking over that land.
It is also important to recognize that as the entire history of human migration over the course of all of human history — literally all of it — and that before the Europeans even arrived on this continent, there were plenty of people who were colonizing each other’s lands. There were internecine warfare between Native American tribes, there were people who were colonizing other people’s land — this has been happening throughout history. To single out European colonization of the Americas as unique evil in the history of the world is simply ridiculous.
Not only is [it] ridiculous, it’s particularly ridiculous on Thanksgiving, which is a day specifically designated to be tolerant and open. Thanksgiving is a day that was specifically created in order to recognize the common humanity between Native Americans and European peoples who arrived on the continent. It’s a ridiculous take on American history — a context-free take on American history — but unfortunately, it is this sort of view of America that is splitting the country.
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