Megan Rapinoe Is The Patriot America Needs Right Now

By now, the name Megan Rapinoe is known to many more than it was known months ago, even for people who have been oblivious to the fact that the is an unprecedented spectacle playing in the 2019 World Cup. While the USWNT has been a strong team for ages, certainly much better than their male counterparts, people are now paying attention and Rapinoe is at the center of it. She’s the US National Woman’s Team star, having scored five goals in five 2019 World Cup matches, two of which were against France, the host country and the team who was most likely to send the US team home (they didn’t). Rapinoe is also used to playing hard outside the field, too, most recently having spoken out against Donald Trump and then unapologetically doubling down on her comments. And Rapinoe has just been named Sports Illustrated’s Sportsperson of the Year.

Having won the World Cup final against the Netherlands, Rapinoe has become something of a star in her own right, in large part thanks to the controversy she has been steering. But don’t let this distract you from what she should really been known for: a class A soccer player and an activist against the gender pay gap.

On the field, Rapinoe will go down in history for what The New Yorker calls “freewheeling play, precise footwork, and uncanny vision facilitate the flow of the United States’ offense.” She’s the player to have scored both goals against France, the first of which was a low shot, delivered hard from a free kick that somehow passed through a wall of legs, both French and American, and right into the net. The goalkeeper, lost in the confusion that ensued by such a low kick, tried to guess where the ball would go, helpless. She has also scored every goal for the United States during the knockout rounds she has played: two against Spain, and against France. (She was absent against England due to a minor injury).
@mrapinoeRapinoe knows how to win a crowd over, but she doesn’t shy away from making trouble, either. She posed nude with WNBA player Sue Bird, her wife, in the ESPN the Magazine’s Body Issue. She was the first white athlete to support Colin Kaepernick by taking the knee during the national anthem. While the USWNT is not afraid to stand up for what they believe in (particularly when they sued their own federation for gender discrimination), Rapinoe emerged as the most iconic spokesperson for this very cause, perhaps because of her consistency about the players’ battle for equal pay. Their arguments are hard to refute. The USWNT gets paid a fraction of the men’s team in spite of being far more successful, and far more popular. Now that the US team has won the whole tournament twice in a row, this has inevitably helped their cause.

Tradition mandates that the President extends them an invitation to the White House. However, just some weeks ago, before the game against France, a video surfaced in which Rapinoe was asked whether she was excited about visiting the White House after the World Cup. “I’m not going to the fucking White House,” she said.

If anyone thought Rapinoe would back down just to please fans, they couldn’t have been more wrong. “I am not going to fake it, hobnob with the President, who is clearly against so many of the things that I am [for] and so many of the things that I actually am,” Rapinoe told Sports Illustrated. “I have no interest in extending our platform to him.”
@mrapinoeAs usual, Donald Trump steer protests against him towards a protest deemed unpatriotic. “Megan should never disrespect our Country, the White House, or our Flag, especially since so much has been done for her & the team. Be proud of the Flag that you wear. The USA is doing GREAT!” Unluckily for the President, Rapinoe is far, far more articulate than him.

“I feel very fortunate to be in this country, I’d never be able to do this in a lot of other places,” she said. “But also, that doesn’t mean that we can’t get better, it doesn’t mean that we can’t strive to be better. I think this country was founded on a lot of great ideals, but it was also founded on slavery. I think we just need to be really honest about that, and be really open in talking about that so we can reconcile that and hopefully move forward and make this make country better for everyone.”

Rapinoe’s understanding of patriotism should go unchallenged. She speaks out in favor of American values; she stands up against gender pay gap in in this country; she plays for this country, she has scored for this country and now she lead the country into the World championship. So, who’s the real patriot?
@mrapinoe

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