In this study, scholarship was extended on the cultural meanings of race and athlete activism by interrogating one key media spectacle surrounding athlete protests: President Trump’s 2017 speech questioning the National Football League (NFL) players’ character, with a focus on NFL owners’ responses. The NFL owners’ statements (n = 32) were subjected to critical discourse analysis. Discourses of post-racial nationalism and functionalism and the subject positions of “good player citizen” and “benevolent facilitator” (re)created meanings of the protests devoid of racial politics, linked to ideologies of color blindness, meritocracy, and diversity. These discourses and subject positions allowed the NFL owners to control protest meanings to maintain White privilege and appeal to their White fan base. These findings expand research on color-blind racism in sport, which perpetuates neoliberal ideals and the myth of a post-racial America, via taken-for-granted language use within discourses.

在这项研究中，通过询问围绕运动员抗议活动的一种主要媒体景观，扩大了关于种族和运动员行动主义的文化含义的奖学金：特朗普总统2017年的演讲质疑国家橄榄球联盟（NFL）运动员的性格，重点是NFL所有者的回应。NFL所有者的陈述（n = 32）经过了严格的话语分析。后种族民族主义和功能主义的话语以及“好行为者公民”和“善意促进者”的主题位置（重新）创造了没有种族政治的抗议活动的含义，这些抗议活动与色盲，精英管理和多样性意识形态有关。这些话语和主题位置使NFL所有者可以控制抗议的含义，以保持白人特权并吸引白人球迷。