KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — University of Tennessee athletes came together with the community and marched to denounce racism.
All across the country, professional and collegiate athletes have used their platforms to speak out against racism and police brutality over the last few days. Just recently, the University of Mississippi football team walked out of practice and took to the streets of Oxford to lead a protest. On Saturday, the Volunteers marched, so their voices could be heard.
Tennessee’s tight-end, Jordan Allen, a redshirt senior, said people should not just show support to the Black athletes, but show support to the Black community as a whole.
“Just go read the comments under our march,” Allen said. “Whenever we say something, such as Black lives matter, and people take so much offense to that. It’s sad because these are the same people that say that they love us. But go read the comments.”
Allen, along with his teammates, joined forces with the community and staff at the University of Tennessee protested to have their voices heard. Allen, a biracial football player from California, said he has dealt with racism personally. He said when he led a similar march years ago in his hometown of Fairfield, California, he received a lot of racist messages on social media.
Allen said he hopes Saturday’s march in Knoxville will bridge the community together.
“Today was important because of Martin Luther King and all of the people who have fought for us to have Civil Rights, and for us to not be judged for the color of our skin,” Allen said. “We wanted to continue that tradition, and hopefully, we get some real change.”
Roughly a little more than a thousand people showed up to support Tennessee athletes during their protest. Allen said he was glad to see people of various races and backgrounds come out and support them. He said the real change will come when people of all walks of life come together and speak out against social injustices.
Many of the Tennessee student athletes spoke in front of a crowd explaining why this protest was important to them, and they explained what it meant to be Black in America.
Phillip Fulmer, Tennessee’s Director of Athletics, said he was proud of the Vols’ student-athletes on Twitter.
Jordan Brown of WATE-TV Knoxville contributed to this story.
