I'm with Kap.

If you’ve never seen the movie Watchmen, the opening credits (which this scene was taken from) is easily one of the best done ones I’ve ever seen, which says a lot because I am highly addicted to movies! It’s a scene which illuminates the tragedy at Kent State where a peaceful protest was broken up with uncalled for military force. It’s also a great way to start a blog post where I will defend Colin Kaepernick’s National Anthem protest.

I am very surprised (actually I’m not at all unfortunately) with the reaction that this protest has received. From people saying that he should be thrown out of the league for not standing for the National Anthem, people calling him un-American, saying he has no right to say anything because he makes so much money playing a game, and even bringing up his heritage as a half white, half black man, and those were the nicest of the things that people were saying!

But here’s the thing, for everyone who says that this protest is backwards, that he shouldn’t be disgracing the Anthem because it stands for everything he’s trying to fight for, you’re wrong. The National Anthem was derived from a poem from Francis Scott Key, a poem which ends with some pretty racists things:

"And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion,
A home and a country, should leave us no more?
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:"

What this portion of the poem is referring to, is the fact that the British offered to free any slaves who joined their forces (A promise they kept) and Key is relishing in the fact that they were able kill so many of the traitorous slaves (which in itself is a pretty big oxymoron).

But, what we celebrate is the first part of the anthem and many, many years ago (actually only in 1931) this was declared to be our National Anthem which was to represent everything that America stands for, and what we’ve recently found out, there is a heavy emphasis on the “Stands.”

So if I was a black man or woman, or heck if I had had relatives somewhere down the line who had been slaves, then I could see taking offense to this song, despite it being our National Anthem, but I think we all know that the slavery thing isn’t what this protest is about. What it’s about is the perceived amount of social injustice the black and other minority individuals and groups have to face every day. Something that is hard to dispute, and given the increased notoriety and exposure of the most recent, questionable shootings we have seen across all media (social, mass and all channels really), it is hard to dispute that there certainly is an issue that needs addressing.

Eric Reid joins Kaepernick's protest

So what happened after those shootings? What most people remember is the mass rioting and the call that all police officers are bad, and by rioting I mean they burnt shit down! And by all cops are bad, I mean some crazy bastards went after innocent officers and killed them, simply because they were wearing a badge (a badge which reads, “To Serve and Protect” even!). To say there was unease in this country is a massive understatement.

So some time passes, and Mr. Kaepernick has some time to think about all of these issues that minorities are facing, and as a professional athlete in arguably the most popular sport in the world (it has to be getting a little closer to soccer by now right?), he says that he can do what so many of those other people can’t or wouldn’t do. He can take a stand by taking a knee.

Now taking a knee was not his initial posture as I’m sure will be pointed out to me, he sat down during the National Anthem and the country went batshit (See how popular football is?). He is not a veteran protestor, he is a human being who saw some injustice and wanted to bring some attention to the cause and to do so in a nonviolent way. After the first initial backlash and his explanation, he has now started taking a knee rather than sitting, so that he can still show respect to the men and women who have fought and died protecting his right to protest.

That’s right people, those people that you are so concerned for, the ones who have fought and died for our freedoms, including the freedom of speech and the freedom to peaceful protest, those are the things they are fighting for! So when people say that Kaepernick and the others who have now joined him are un-American they are downright wrong. Other than a few people’s feelings, he is not hurting anyone or anything.

Kaepernick has been joined by players from other teams:

here opposite Brandon Marshall from the Denver Broncos

But there are people out there that say things like, in this country we stand for the national anthem, and if you don’t like this country than you can leave!

But those are truly the un-American people; they don’t get what this country is about at all. We disagree all of the time, and I guarantee that a lot of the people who have been vehemently bashing Collin Kaepernick and the rest of the NFL protestors have also spent plenty of time bashing the President of the United States of America, which seems like it would be un-American as well, but once again that would not follow suit with what this country was based on, and the rights and freedoms that men and women fight and die for every day. You get a say in the conversation, and you may be chastised for it, but not punished by law unless you are threatening or violent.

A lot of people are also bashing Collin because he is no longer the starting quarterback for his team and they say that he is just an attention grabber, that he’s simply doing this to be in the spotlight. I also have a problem with this. The man was the starting quarterback for a team that appeared in the Super Bowl just a few short years ago. If the subject of the protest wasn’t so important to him do you think he’d really be drawing all this attention to himself and occupying the time with the media which could be spent on trying to win his spot back? Football obviously is not the most important thing on this man’s mind as of right now.

He’s a spoiled rich kid from a mixed race family. He hasn’t known the true troubles of the people he is defending and really shouldn’t get a say in it.

Right after 49 individuals were killed at the Pulse Night Club in Orlando, I made a Facebook post stating that I was a gun owner, that I loved shooting and hunting, but that I felt that it was time to do something towards stricter gun laws. I said I wasn’t sure what we could do, but that it was time to start the conversation towards change. It wasn’t up a minute before I was being attacked for wanting to eliminate all guns. I had to double check what I had posted because I didn’t remember saying anything like that, but I was certainly being called out by several individuals.

Generally I’m pretty socially passive about these things. I might have an opinion, but I’m not going to voice it as I know that backlash for certain topics is flat out crazy (that’s right guys, you’re fucking crazy), but this bothered me as we had just recently lost all of these innocent people and it seemed like individuals were more concerned with their guns than with real human lives! Remember, I wasn’t saying anything about taking guns away, just stricter gun laws, or any ideas on how to work towards keeping the guns away from mentally unstable individuals…fucking crazy.

So I said screw this, I’m fighting the good fight here because idiots generally drown out the voice of the reasonable and I wanted my voice heard about working towards a better future with less gun violence. I matched every comment I received and even started commenting on other posts, kept stirring the pot to call out all of the lies people tell on subjects they find so near and dear to their own wellbeing. It was a strenuous task, and I’m sure I didn’t gain any friends by doing it, and the bottom line result from the whole thing was nil. Time passed and apparently our country once again forgot about gun violence as we’re so apt to do once the NRA and their enthusiasts get involved. Congress staged some sit-ins but then went on their scheduled break, so as most people generally thought may happen, we returned to the same shit, us just sitting back waiting for the next mass shooting to occur.

My point with my experience is this, I’m nobody. I’m just your average middle class Caucasian American who grew up in a good home and who writes silly thoughts on a silly blog. My stage is pretty small as I climb upon this soap box where we have about 200 people who once clicked the “like” button on our Page and I can also share my posts with all of my Facebook “friends,” many of which (like most individuals on Facebook) I have not spoken with or seen in years.

Now look at the stage the Kaepernick commands. The man sits down during the National Anthem and the next day the whole country and a lot of the world all of a sudden is drawn to this man and his message. It’s a big commitment, that little act of revolution.

And it shouldn’t matter if he’s black, white, both or something else. The Seattle Seahawks show of support for the message was without question on point. They stood in unity, not as a support strictly for the flag and against Kaepernick, but in unity for unity. What Kaepernick is fighting shouldn’t be a black thing; it should be a people thing. We should all be pissed off by the injustice we have now all been exposed to through police and anti-police violence, and an individual brave enough to stand up (or sit down, or kneel) in order to get the conversation started again should be heralded for his non-violent protest, which is an unalienable right of all people in a democracy.

I never thought I'd be a fan of anything Richard Shermann ever did,

but this show of Unity by the Seattle Seahawks was truly patriotic.

I stand with Kaepernick on this issue, because it’s an issue that needs to be addressed. It’s similar to why I made a stand for stricter gun laws. I live in this little utopian realm where when I see injustice, I feel like it’s my moral obligation to try and make it right if I have the power. In America we all get a voice, what we do with it is completely up to us.

So how will you use your voice? Will you sit and complain how this person is ruining your favorite past time by not standing during the national anthem (while you probably sit on your couch or easy chair watching the game), or will you respect the balls it takes to continue to kneel despite all the pressure he’s facing not only about his cause, but while trying to keep his job?

It is your unalienable right to disagree with me, but don’t try to say that what he is doing goes against America, because it is what makes America great, and look at that, we didn’t even need Trump to get us here!

A Life Lesson in Progress...

The summer of 2016 was certainly a great one for us at Voyageur's View, as we dealt with more and more families and just generally great individuals of all sorts. We had far too many rainy Saturdays, so our overall numbers were certainly down compared to what they have been in the past, but as we make a concentrated effort to provide a better camping experience for all, the experience is becoming a better one for our guests, our staff, ourselves and we'd like to think, our community. But our transition hasn’t been an easy one...

 When Christopher Ingraham first came to town last summer I spent some time discussing with him how our campground had once been known as a "party" campground and that we had really been doing our best to make it more favorable for families and just anyone who was looking for a great camping experience and he asked me, "How? How do you go from a party atmosphere like that to a family friendly one?" and that question certainly gave me pause.

 Ten years ago we decided that we had had enough of the crazy antics of some of the individuals who kept coming to our campground. We were certainly starting to get older (although I was only 23 at the time), but more than that, we knew that we had a beautiful facility that our parents had worked so hard to make a reality and we didn't like seeing people come in and destroy it. I would also say that it was pretty safe to say that a lot of the community did not respond favorably to our crowds or our operation. We knew that we didn't want to keep running it the same way, but the question first arose then.

 How do you turn a "party" campground into a family friendly one?

Well the answer had to start with the problem. How do we eliminate the individuals and groups who just want to come and destroy the place, party and leave? For those of you who remember how the place used to look mid weekend, there would be tents all the way out to the road and garbage would be flying all over the place as the clientele at that time did not care how the place looked. So we started with that issue. We started by cutting back the number of sites that we rented for our busiest weekends a little each year. We then would make golf cart trips around the campground to remind people to make sure they were using their garbage barrels and bags so that their garbage wasn't blowing around everywhere. It seemed like a pretty simple request, but when we would come back later, the garbage would still be flying all over the place. So our next step was to tell these individuals that they now had 30 minutes to pick up their garbage or they would be told to leave our campground.

 I know it seems a little harsh, but we needed to take a stand against the elements that were ruining our beautiful park and garbage was certainly an easy thing for individuals to keep track of, and after getting a warning such as that, it should be easy enough to get your crew to grab a couple pieces here and there and pick up your site. But if they didn't have it picked up in the allotted time, well, you never get anywhere with idle threats, so we evicted sites.

 It is important to note, too, that at this point we still were not taking any sort of damage deposit for our sites; it wasn't until our sister started insisting on taking a credit card imprint to make sure the sites got clean that we had any other sort of recourse than to remove individuals. If you ever drove by after a long weekend and saw our crew out picking up heaps and heaps of garbage, it was all done by individuals who paid less than $12 per site.

 I could go on and on about the horror stories of how asking people to pick up their garbage would even lead to fist fights and the involvement of the very awesome Sheriff's Office we have here in Red Lake County, but suffice it to say that without steadfast determination to vastly improve the atmosphere of our campground, there is no way we would still be around.

 Our security personnel back in the day (which usually consisted of our dad, Ryan, myself and few awesome local friends) really should have been getting hazard pay. They didn't take a lot of crap from the really bad people they were dealing with, but because of that, they made it known pretty loud and clear that certain behavior would no longer be tolerated at our facility. Patrick Swayze's Road House character certainly could have been inspired by some of these awesome guys that we had working for us!

 So we kept dwindling the numbers of our campsites until we got to what we felt was a manageable number, where we didn't need a staff of 10 - 12 guys at night to ensure things weren't getting burned down and our security crew got a bit tamer.

 We next had a great crew who had some military and law enforcement background who took the reins for us, as we had started to see a decline in the individuals who were only coming to destroy stuff and started to deal with more individuals who had serious attitude problems. This group of security was awesome because not only were they good at conversing with our guests, but when a problem did arise they knew the legal code and were able to assist our local law enforcement in not only making sure any perpetrators were being caught, but that they were also being prosecuted.

 Who wants to come back to a place where you actually have accountability anyway?

 We seriously can't thank all of the crews that came before enough; they paved the way for our new breed of security guards, who are certainly more on the customer service realm of the spectrum than anything else. They are as personable as you could hope for and they also have a background in bouncing at bars around the area so they have had their share of dealings with intoxicated individuals.

 It doesn't really seem to matter what you do, or where you camp, chances are you're going to run into individuals who have had a few drinks. Ninety-nine percent of the time, this is not an issue, most people are pretty fun loving and respectful regardless of their impaired state, but every now and again, we still get groups or individuals who push the boundaries a little too far, and only in extreme cases do we ask any of these groups to leave the night of an incident. Our general rule now is to make sure the group is in bed, not being a pain for the groups around them and then we go and speak with them in the morning to tell them that they are no longer welcome at our facility. We then speak with the groups surrounding the problem site and let them know what the situation is, and try and reassure the other groups that this is an isolated incident rather than the norm. More times than not, we will also refund the groups around the problem site so they know how seriously sorry we are that they had to put up with the rude behavior of the other campers.

 So after explaining all of this to Chris, we then had a few weekends where we dealt with some real jerks. They were removed from our facility for various infractions of our rules and were certainly very rude to our staff and other campers while they stayed with us and on their exit from our facility.

 In the past we would deal with these individuals while we were removing them, lose a night or two of sleep over it, and then just get back to dealing with great individuals. But those times of only dealing with these jerks at our facility appear to be over, as the new generation of (excuse my French) assholes, are now taking to the internet to bash our (and I'm sure every other) company for not allowing them to do whatever the hell they want.

 We saw it all this year from false allegations of sexual assault, to made up user names and emails to leave multiple reviews to hurt our overall rating, to a really classy group who tried to target the family market by claiming they had been down to our facility with their families and had a terrible experience because of our rude staff and terrible facilities.

 The good news is that we have a lot of individuals who come to our facility once a week (if not more) all summer long. Groups who have been coming since we opened in 1985, who once brought their wedding party but now bring their grand kids. We also know that we maintain our facilities better than most campgrounds because the thing is not a business to us, but another part of our family. As far as our staff goes, these reviewers better watch out because we have the absolute best kids that work for us. Saying something bad about them is not a wise thing to do. We have always been a family business and those kids (a lot of them are kids of individuals who will read this) are like little brothers and sisters to us (maybe kids as we're no longer that young I guess!).

 We've tried to provide a family type atmosphere to our guests because our end of the operation has always been a family atmosphere. The kids that worked for our parents in 1985 still come back to check on our dad as well as tell stories of our mom. They come to see the place where they probably had their first job, and second family. We'd like to think that it's the same reason that our guests return year after year, and week after week.

 For years we had it listed on our website that we did not recommend our activity for families on the weekends due to the crowd we drew. There are still remnants of that crowd that we are working diligently on removing (damn the reviews!) but this year we re-did our website and removed that as well as told a little more of our story, to let people know that we are a family run operation that encourages family to take part in our activity.

 Maybe it was the fact that we lost our mom far too early or the fact that when that happened, those same wonderful kids that we consider brothers and sisters took over the operation for us so we could grieve. Maybe it’s the fact that although many businesses are brick and mortar, ours has many moving parts including a heart that beats stronger everyday with the wonderful guests and staff we get to call friends and family.

 Ask me how you change a "party" campground into a family campground and I certainly won't have any direct answer, but for us it's always been one and we won't stop improving the atmosphere until it feels the same way for all of our great guests. Partiers, Internet Trolls, and everything else I'm sure we'll see in the years to come are but side notes to the unbelievable people we get to serve and work beside every day. Plus, there is no state more beautiful as the one we live in, and the natural beauty of Red Lake Falls certainly sells itself, just ask Chris, Bri, Jack and Charles Ingraham!