“I can’t breathe.”

Ferguson, Missouri and New York, New York left our nation scarred. Whether the results of racially-charged police brutality or justified police action, recent African-American deaths by white cops have set the nation on edge. And professional athletes have started voicing their outrage over the issue.

LeBron James was first to catch my attention. Wearing a T-shirt with the final words of Eric Garner, the victim who suffocated at the hands of an NYPD officer, James expressed a resounding sentiment: no one can breathe under police oppression. A number of athletes have echoed it since.

Yet, politics and athletics are an unsavory mix. When people watch their favorite teams on television, they don’t want to be confronted by society’s ailments. They want to escape them. However understandable athletes’ frustration may be, on-field demonstrations only create uneasiness amongst fans and replace athletic spectation with political confrontation.

Athletes have customarily been punished for political protest. Such was the case in 1968 when olympic medalists John Carlos and Tommie Smith were sent home from the Olympic Games in Mexico City. Protesting black poverty in the U.S. through their attire, U.S. Olympic officials sent the men packing for their conduct. And however harsh that might have seemed, it was their right to do so.

Politics have their place in life. But sports are meant to draw people together. The only thing that matters on the court is skill; background, ideals and religion do not and should not matter to people. However noble the cause might be, these actions only politicize what should remain neutral.

Athletes have the right to support or protest whatever their conscience dictates. But while acting as a member of an organization or team, athletes need to leave politics out of the game and express their discontent on their own time.