Colin Kaepernick is known as much for his athleticism as he is for his activism. The former San Francisco quarterback raised his voice against racial injustice and police brutality by kneeling during the national anthem in 2016. At the time, it sparked both significant praise and backlash.
Kaepernick was called anti-police, labeled a “traitor” by a league executive, and received countless death threats. He became the face of Nike, which drove some consumers to #JustBurnIt and set their products on fire.
A decade on, and Kaepernick hasn’t been signed by an NFL team since. But he’s back in business. This time, as CEO of his own new venture, Lumi—an AI literacy startup aimed to help Gen Alpha and Gen Z find their voices and write their stories. And he’s unapologetic about the power of speaking your truth.
If he could go back in time, the one piece of advice Kaepernick would give his younger self is this: Don’t let fear of backlash silence you.
In an on-stage interview with Fortune’s Orianna Rosa Royle at Web Summit Qatar, Kaepernick spoke about how, early on, it’s easy to overedit what you want to say because you’re trying to “not hurt people’s feelings…But it’s not actually what you want to say.”
He cautioned that playing it safe rarely leaves a mark.
