Colin Kaepernick Graces The Cover of GQ, Honored As Citizen Of The Year
By: Kayla Pasacreta
Kaepernick, photo via GQ
Thank you GQ for putting some respeck on Colin Kaepernick's name! GQ is featuring Colin Kaepernick as citizen of the year, and their spread on Kaepernick is everything. The cover photo of Kap features him donning a well-picked fro, black turtleneck, and black leather jacket. If you're anything like me, your head was probably thinking modern black panther!
GQ's spread description is "Celebrating the man who became a movement." And that, Kaepernick indeed is. Love him or hate him, Kap has garnered national attention to the plight of black people and police brutality. If you needed any more proof Kap is poppin', he's been the subject of several of Donald Trump's tweets. The Donald even went as far as calling him a son of a b--tch, so you know Colin is doing something right.
Kaepernick's profile, titled Kaepernick Will Not Be Silenced, chronicles the athlete's transition into activism on the public scale. GQ says Kapernick didn't want to talk too much about why he's doing what he's doing. Instead, the magazine relies on powerful photos of Colin and imagery of the athlete through the words of other people like Women's March founders, filmmaker Ava Duvernay, U.C. Berkeley professor Ammer Hasan Loggins, and 49ers safety Eric Reid.
Kaepernick, photo via GQ
Rapper J. Cole offered some powerful words in support of Colin,
“ And suddenly something that he’s been doing blindly for his whole life—standing for the national anthem—now feels uncomfortable. Why? Because now it feels phony! It feels like, Man, how can I stand for this thing when this country is not holding itself true to the principles it says it stands for? I feel like we’re lying. And look what happens to him. Had he not done that, this guy would be making millions of dollars right now. Period, point blank. And more important than the money, he was living his dream. He sacrificed his dream.”
GQ does a brilliant job of conveying Kaepernick's mission without a traditional interview. The gravity and importance of his silent protest speaks volumes without Kaepernick even having to say anything. This is what makes Colin Kaepernick such a powerful force in history. His activism will forever be revered in history, aligning him alongside icons like Muhammad Ali.
