Ten years ago, the San Francisco 49ers quarterback refused to stand for the national anthem. He was accused of disrespecting the flag, the game, and America. In a rare interview, he talks about inspiring a global gesture of civil rights

Colin Kaepernick still gets up at 4.30am every morning to train. “Strength training, speed training, position training – still do all of the same type of workouts I did while I was playing,” he says cheerily. “And then go about the rest of my day.” It is almost 10 years since Kaepernick last played a game of top-flight football. His career was abruptly and cruelly cut short just as it was peaking, after the National Football League (NFL) effectively closed ranks and shut him out for being too political. Now, at 38 years old, he is well aware that his chances of a return are dwindling by the day, but he remains as game-ready as ever. “I stay relentless at it,” he continues in his easy drawl. “I look at it from the perspective of, ‘What are the things that I can control?’ And what I know I can control is being prepared for when opportunity knocks, and to also continue knocking, on my end, looking for ways and opportunities … just staying resilient and focused and disciplined – that is what’s gotten me to this point in my life.”

Kaepernick’s story is defined by the events of late 2016, when he repeatedly refused to stand for the pre-game national anthem – resulting in a chorus of booing on the pitch, insults and outrage off it, and exclusion from the sport he still loves. He was one of the biggest names in the game at the time; quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers, a national celebrity, sponsored by major brands, and looking back, his actions fed into so much that has happened since: the rise of Donald Trump, the Black Lives Matter protests and a global reckoning with racism, then the backlash against what is now being called “Woke 1.0”, and the resurgence of a white nationalism that the US complacently assumed was in the past.

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Colin Kaepernick has accused NFL owners of colluding against Macklemore after the rapper was removed from Ed Sheeran’s tour over comments he made onstage about Palestine.

Kaepernick, whose NFL career was effectively ended in the wake of his protests against police violence, says he sees parallels between himself and Macklemore.

A decade after Kaepernick’s quiet protest shook the NFL, his exile looks less like an aberration than a blueprint for the culture war that followed

America likes nice round numbers, perfect for anniversaries and reflections, and it has, suddenly, been 10 years since Colin Kaepernick first protested police killings – more accurately, police killings of Black people that went unpunished either internally or by the courts – by taking a knee during the national anthem for the entirety of the 2016 NFL regular season. He never played in the league again.

Ten years covers a lot of ground, especially in these years of American darkness, and many of the important details surrounding Kaepernick, his banishment and significance have disappeared, time replaced by more time and more darkness – time moving faster than ever, at internet speed, where nothing matters, where nothing sticks. We consume by clip, by click, by meme, and knowledge by meme is not knowledge at all.

Conservatives once demanded sports stay apolitical. Now they’ve embraced a new culture-war politics, and Sophie Cunningham has become one of its most valuable stars

Invoking a wounded innocence that their desire for sports to be simple, just like they used to be, conservatives for a decade and a half have dreaded the word “politics”. Now they cannot get enough.

Philadelphia Eagles defensive coordinator Vic Fangio has spent 40 years in the National Football League unknown except for his defensive schemes, but last week opened his press remarks mocking the congressional testimony of Dr Anthony Fauci, jokingly invoking the Fifth Amendment before taking questions. Apropos of nothing, President Trump publicly surmised that LeBron James might be a racist. Indiana Fever guard Sophie Cunningham is now in the act, accepting the role as the right’s anti-Black, anti-transgender culture war ambassador, the role originally intended for Caitlin Clark.

Cunningham intentionally yanked Sheldon down by her neck and was hailed as a protector. A year later, the Mercury’s Alyssa Thomas put her fist to Clark’s throat – accidentally, Thomas says – and was excoriated as reckless and worse. The circumstances were different, but both were undeniable fouls that merited punishment from the league. One player – Cunningham, who is white – earned a flood of new endorsements in the aftermath. The other – Thomas, who is Black – a barrage of death threats.

It’s a truth that is as inescapable as it is difficult to grapple with. Cunningham prides herself on being an open book, but through her representative, declined to discuss the role race played in the public perception of her fight and rise. So, too, did a handful of current WNBA players.