Super Bowl 53: Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters urges Maroon 5 to take a knee during halftime show

Musician Roger Waters is urging Maroon 5 to take a knee onstage during the group's halftime show at Super Bowl 53 Sunday in Atlanta.

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The former bassist for the legendary rock band Pink Floyd released a video of his band kneeling onstage after their show in Hartford, Connecticut, in September of 2017.

"We did it in solidarity with San Francisco quarterback Colin Kaepernick's gesture of protest against the endemic racism and often deadly force meted out by police departments across this land," Waters said in a statement accompanying the video.

Roger Waters and band take a knee

There is a petition on Change.org/takeaknee aimed at persuading Maroon 5, Travis Scott and Big Boi to take a knee at halftime on Sunday: This is my band taking a knee at the end of a gig in Hartford, Connecticut on Sunday 24th of September 2017. We did it in solidarity with San Francisco Quarterback Colin Kaepernick’s gesture of protest against the endemic racism and often deadly force meted out by police departments across this land. It was the third Sunday of Colin Kaepernick’s lock out by the NFL. The message was clear, “Shut your mouth, boy!" Next Sunday will be the 36th Sunday he has been locked out of your national game. This is not a victory for the NFL, it is a defeat, you have denied football fans everywhere the pleasure and the honor of watching one of the greatest quarterbacks who ever played the game, and you have shown your true colors. You can sit in your boardrooms and huff and puff on your cigars in your glass boxes, but your action is a poke in the eye for everything that is decent in America. Colin Kaepernick is an American hero. If the USA is to have a future, it is the Colin Kaepernicks of this world who will lead you there, in fact, it is Colin Kaepernick who is leading you now. My colleagues Maroon 5, Travis Scott and Big Boi are performing during the halftime show at the Super-bowl this coming Sunday, I call upon them to “take a knee” on stage in full sight. I call upon them to do it in solidarity with Colin Kaepernick, to do it for every child shot to death on these mean streets, to do it for every bereaved mother and father and brother and sister. My mother used to say to me, “In any situation there is nearly always a right thing to do, just do it.” So, there you go my brothers, you are faced with a choice, I’m not saying it will be easy, all the Presidents men, all the huffers and puffers, will be royally pissed off, but, $#@%’em, I call upon you to do it because it’s the right thing to do and because somewhere inside you know it. Love Roger Waters

Posted by Roger Waters on Wednesday, January 30, 2019

Waters called Kaepernick "an American hero," and said it's the Kaepernicks of the world who will lead the U.S. in the future.

Maroon 5, Travis Scott and Big Boi are performing during the Super Bowl halftime show Sunday.

"I call on them to 'take a knee' onstage in full sight. I call upon them to do it in solidarity with Colin Kaepernick, to do it for every child shot to death on these mean streets, to do it for every bereaved mother and father and brother and sister," Waters said.

Kaepernick was the first pro athlete to take a knee during the national anthem at NFL games beginning in 2016 in protest over police brutality, and racial and social injustice.

Kaepernick, although a better quarterback than many of his peers, was not re-signed by San Francisco or any other team after the 2017 season. But after his protests, dozens of other athletes joined him in kneeling during the national anthem.

Colin Kaepernick receives the SI Muhammad Ali Legacy Award during SPORTS ILLUSTRATED 2017 Sportsperson of the Year Show on December 5, 2017 at Barclays Center in New York City.

Credit: Slaven Vlasic

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Credit: Slaven Vlasic