Ideally, James Franklin would like to spend his days this week focusing on Indiana, the next Big Ten team looking to knock his No. 4 Penn State team from the Big Ten’s pedestal.

Realistically, he knows nobody around football, at almost any level that receives national attention, can focus completely on football these days. Not when talk about protests during the national anthem, and how some players balance the social injustices they want to bring into the national discussion with president Donald Trump’s insistence that anybody who protests during the playing of the anthem lose their job.

“I have strong feelings as a United States citizen,” the Nittany Lions’ head coach said during his weekly teleconference. “I do have strong feelings as a college football coach. And I have very strong feelings as an African American. “But to me, those conversations and those things are personal. Those are private, to our team.”

But when asked about his views on the protests and the National Football League’s show of force against Trump’s words over the weekend, Franklin did point out that he is happy — even proud — of how his players have responded in their own way.

More than a handful of Penn State players have taken to Twitter in recent days and months to bring attention to causes they deem important. Linebacker Jason Cabinda, freshman cornerback Lamont Wade and backup offensive tackle Sterling Jenkins have been among the most vocal in bringing issues of racial inequality and the increasing presence of white supremacy groups on college campuses to the fore. Wade released a more-than four-minute statement on Youtube on Sunday, titling it “Who’s really disrespecting the flag?”

In it, he reminds what the colors of the United States flag were meant to represent: Red, hardiness and valor; blue, vigilance and justice; and white, purity and innocence. Then, Wade spoke of the fates of men and youngsters like Trayvon Martin, Eric Garner, Tamir Rice, Mike Brown and Philando Castille, all killed unarmed either by police or citizens; of black men and women being shipped to this nation as slaves. “If the flag had a voice,” Wade asked, “do you think it would feel respected by these acts?”

Franklin said he was proud of Wade for speaking his mind, for standing up for what he believes is right. He added, though, that there has been too much attention to the negative differences in the nation’s citizenry than is paid to its differences in a positive light. Embracing and appreciating those differences, he said, is what makes the United States great.

And, he acknowledged someone holding the complete opposite opinion as Wade should be able to express that opinion, too, as long as it is done in “a thoughtful and caring” way and is looked at “from many different perspectives.”

“That’s what I want our team to do is to be able to have dialogue and be able to have love for one another and support for one another and respect each other,” Franklin said. “Not always agree, but respect.

“We are able to have really good discussion as a family. There are guys that are voicing their opinions with their teammates face-to-face. There are guys that are voicing their opinion socially. What’s most important for me is that guys don’t react and make an emotional decision or have an emotional outburst, that they take their time and think it through. That they’re thoughtful and express themselves and are articulate. That’s what this country is about.”