Megan Rapinoe Did’nt have No Respect, On My Knees, I’ll Never Come Back Here” – Megan Rapinoe Booked Flight Out of US….. full story below

The first action I took was so discreet the only person who saw it was Sue [Bird]. To backtrack: after the Olympics, when we all got back to Seattle, Sue and I had met.

It was a group dinner and the vibe was totally platonic, not least because Sera, my fiancee, was there. We discovered that day that Sue and I were due to play in Chicago for our respective teams during the same week in September and several weeks later I headed to the airport to meet my team.

At check-in, one of my teammates, who was dating a player on Sue’s WNBA team, turned to me and said: “Oh, I’m going to the basketball game tonight and have tick …” Before she could even finish I’d shouted: “I want to go.” I should’ve known then. Never in a million years would I land from a flight and drive 45 minutes to see someone else play and yet I found myself desperate to go. That night, I showed up for Sue’s game.

The match was between Seattle Storm, Sue’s team, and Chicago Sky and when the anthem started to play, I remained seated. It was the day after Colin [Kaepernick] first knelt and I hadn’t told anyone I wasn’t going to stand up, but I also hadn’t not told anyone. It wasn’t planned. It was a reflex reaction – outrage on Colin’s behalf, a desire to show solidarity, and the conviction that what he’d done made total sense.

In 2016, young black men aged 15 to 34 were nine times more likely than other Americans to be killed by police. Of all the unarmed people killed by police in 2016, 34% were black men (who make up 6% of the population). How could any reasonable person believe Colin and other protesters didn’t have a point?

I thought no one had noticed. Recently, however, Sue told me she’d looked up from the court, spotted me sitting and knew precisely what I was doing. The fact she noticed, understood and still had the discretion to not bombard me with questions tells you everything you need to know about what happened next.

After the game, Sue and I met. I already knew she was funny and thoughtful. And of course I knew she was beautiful. We didn’t do anything but talk that night – there was no physical overlap with my fiancee back in Seattle, but, if I’m honest, there was an emotional one. Before parting, I told Sue I’d be on the road with the team for another week and when I got home I’d figure things out with Sera. She was calm about that, too. “All I ask is that you let me know,” she said.

By the time I saw Sue again, I was single. I was also splashed all over the news. After kneeling for the first time before the league game in Chicago, I knelt again a few days later in Maryland. Once again, the furore was instantaneous and huge. White people were mad. Whew, were they mad! Conservative commentators in the media immediately started shouting and yelling that kneeling during the anthem disrespected the military.