Bill Berkowitz for BuzzFlash: Colin Kaepernick and Ben & Jerry’s Sweet Deal, "Change the Whirled" Ice-Cream "To Advance the Liberation and Well-Being of Black and Brown Communities”
December 16, 2020
Colin Kaepernick teams up with Ben and Jerry’s “to advance the liberation and well-being of Black and Brown communities.” (Tidy Mice Photography)
By Bill Berkowitz
Anyone with a smidgeon of football knowledge recognizes that a bunch of the starting, and second and third string quarterbacks thrown out onto the field as this cockamamie COVID-19-infused National Football League season comes to a close, do not measure up to the still-blackballed Colin Kaepernick. There may not be an owner of an NFL team with the guts, and smarts, to bring Kaepernick in for a look-see, but that hasn’t stopped the broader public from understanding and honoring the impact Kaepernick continues to have in fighting for social justice and against police brutality. And that’s where the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream folks comes in.
Early next year, Ben & Jerry’s will be launching a new Kaepernick-inspired flavor called “Change the Whirld.” It will be a vegan ice cream, made with caramel non-dairy sunflower butter and fudge chips with graham crackers and chocolate cookies swirled in. The company said it created the flavor to celebrate "Kaepernick's courageous work to confront systemic oppression and to stop police violence against Black and Brown people."
"Ben & Jerry's believes Kaepernick represents the very best of us, willing to use his power and platform in the pursuit of equity and justice rooted in a commitment to love and resistance," the ice cream maker said in a written statement.
To recap: In August 2016, Kaepernick makes headlines by refusing to stand during the pre-game playing of the National Anthem. At first he sits, but after talking with former NFL player, and U.S. military veteran Nate Boyer, he decides to kneel instead. Kaepernick says that his goal is to call attention to police brutality and racism following the high-profile shooting deaths of multiple Black men earlier that summer.
Kaepernick’s protest inspired not only a rebirth of social activism among a broad swath of athletes, but it also brought a backlash against protesters. Kaepernick, who led his San Francisco 49ers to the Super Bowl in 2013, has not played a down in three years.
In addition to protesting, Kaepernick pledged to donate $1 million to "organizations working in oppressed communities." He donated $25,000 to the Mothers Against Police Brutality organization that was started by Collette Flanagan, whose son fell victim to police brutality.In 2018, Kaepernick announced that he would make the final $100,000 donation of his "Million Dollar Pledge" in the form of $10,000 donations to charities that would be matched by celebrities.
As CNN Business’ Chauncey Alcorn recently wrote, “Kaepernick's one-man protest sent shockwaves through the world of sports and politics, drawing praise from supporters of the Black Lives Matter movement and scorn from pro-police conservatives, including President Donald Trump. Kaepernick also received death threats.”
Kaepernick’s portion of sales from the ice-cream will benefit his Know Your Rights organization. According to its website, the mission of the Know Your Rights (KYR) campaign “is to advance the liberation and well-being of Black and Brown communities through education, self-empowerment, mass-mobilization and the creation of new systems that elevate the next generation of change leaders.”
The KYR 10 Points are: You have the right to be: Free, Healthy, Brilliant, Safe, Loved, Courageous, Alive, Trusted, Educated, and to Know Your Rights.
In April of this year, with the corona virus pandemic raging, the Know Your Rights Camp launched a relief fund for individuals impacted by the pandemic, and Kaepernick donated $100,000 to the fund.
"Their commitment to challenging the anti-Black roots of policing in the United States demonstrates a material concern for the well-being of Black and Brown communities," Kaepernick said in a statement. "My hope is that this partnership will amplify calls to defund and abolish the police and to invest in futures that can make us safer, healthier, and truly free."
In 2018, he became the focus of Nike's viral 30th anniversary "Just Do It" ad campaign. In 2019, he settled a lawsuit with the NFL for alleged collusion to keep him out of the league.
This year, the 33-year-old Kaepernick was inducted into the Nevada Athletics Hall of Fame. In addition, he is in preparation for a Netflix limited series based on his high school formative years.
After the murder of George Floyd and amid wide-spread protests, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell put out a statement – without mentioning Kaepernick’s name -- apologizing for not listening to the concerns of its African-American players. But, NFL owners have not changed their attitudes toward Kaepernick. In August, after the shooting of Jacob Blake, a black man, Goodell said that he wished the NFL had listened earlier to Kaepernick's reasons for kneeling.
Over the past three years, Kaepernick has received the: GQ Magazine Citizen of the Year (2017); Sports Illustrated Muhammad Ali Legacy Award (2017); American Civil Liberties Union Eason Monroe Courageous Advocate Award (2017); Puffin/Nation Prize for Creative Citizenship honoree (2017); Amnesty International Ambassador of Conscience Award (2018); Harvard University W. E. B. Du Bois Medal (2018); Ripple of Hope Award from the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights (2020).
In June, Michael Rosenberg of Sports Illustrated wrote, "Mainstream white America is going to reconsider Kaepernick at some point — the way it reconsidered Muhammad Ali years after he refused to go to Vietnam, the way it reconsidered Jackie Robinson and Jack Johnson. Progress comes in fits and starts, and this country tends to punish those who urge it to move faster. The reconsideration of Kaepernick has begun."
Kaepernick says he is ready to play should an NFL team give him a call. Perhaps with Trump gone, some NFL owner will have balls to do just that.
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