Watch NFL Player Colin Kaepernick "Find His Independence" in Ghana

GHANA—NFL free agent Colin Kaepernick, known—among other things—for kneeling during the U.S. national anthem in protest of the systematic murders of black men and women, decided to boycott America’s Independence Day by taking a trip to Ghana. He took to Instagram, to deliver some of his thoughts during the day.

Starting with quote by Frederick Douglass he writes:

"What have I, or those I represent, to do with your national independence?

In a quest to find my personal independence, I had to find out where my ancestors came from. I set out tracing my African ancestral roots, and it lead me to Ghana. Upon finding out this information, I wanted to visit the sites responsible for myself (and many other Black folks in the African Diaspora) for being forced into the hells of the middle passage. I wanted to see a fraction of what they saw before reaching the point of no return.

I spent time with the/my Ghanaian people, from visiting the local hospital in Keta and the village of Atito, to eating banku in the homes of local friends, and paying my respects to Kwame Nkrumah’s Memorial Park.I felt their love, and truly I hope that they felt mine in return."

Kaepernick could genuinely have felt the urge to reconnect with an ancestry that has been forcibly robbed from him. But, in his quest to “find home” he told a very narrow story of Ghana and Ghanaian people.  From the smiling school children waving and clapping, to the drum circle, to him being draped in kente by a local authority figure, the video seems heavily staged.

Check out the video below to form your own opinion on the matter: