Beating your wife is worse than protesting during the national anthem. So, too, is sexually assaulting a woman.

While that might seem obvious, it needs to be clarified given The Associated Press' report Thursday that the Miami Dolphins are now including protesting during the anthem on their list of "conduct detrimental to the club." Under NFL rules, that's an offense punishable by a suspension of up to four games.

The Dolphins later told the AP that "all options are still open." But to give you an idea of how heinous at least one NFL team sees trying to draw attention to racial and economic inequality, a four-game suspension is one game longer than Jameis Winston will sit out for gr oping an Uber driver. And it's two more games than Ray Rice initially got for knocking his then-fiancée out cold in an elevator.

If “respect” for the anthem is so important to the Dolphins, I assume owner Stephen Ross also is issuing an edict to shut down concession stands and hold up entry to the stadium during it, right? I won’t hold my breath.

Miami Dolphins Maillot,The protests have been badly – and deliberately – mischaracterized from the start. Players are not protesting the flag, the anthem, the military or the police. They’re protesting justice and economic systems that discriminate – and sometimes kill – people of color.

Every day, it seems, there’s another video of a black person being harassed by police, a neighbor or a business for doing nothing other than being black. It’s ugly and it’s hateful, and it’s shameful that we still have to stand up and say, “This is not OK” in 2018.

But the NFL doesn’t even want to do that. The league and some of its owners would rather demand faux displays of patriotism to placate President Donald Trump and the segment of fans who oppose the protests.

Never mind that Trump is going to find one way or another to push the NFL around, because that’s what bullies do. Or that most American voters don’t object to the protests.

Yes, you read that right.

A survey published June 7 by Quinnipiac University found that 53 percent of American voters believe professional athletes have the right to protest on the field or court. And 58 percent said they did not consider NFL players who protest during the anthem unpatriotic.

The poll also found that voters were opposed, 51 to 44 percent, to the NFL fining teams if players protested on the field.

NFL owners approved a new policy in May that allows players to stay in the locker room during the anthem, but requires them to stand if they’re on the field. Teams, not the players themselves, will be fined if there are on-the-field protests, but that wasn’t punitive enough for the Dolphins.

The most maddening thing about all of this is had the NFL just left well enough alone, this likely wouldn’t have been an issue this season.

Players aren’t protesting because they enjoy doing it, they’re protesting to raise awareness of inequality. An agreement late last season between the league and The Players Coalition to devote significant money to social justice issues and provide a platform for their efforts seemed to satisfy them, and several said they would no longer protest.

“That was a vehicle that we used to draw attention,” New England Patriots safety Devin McCourty, who has emerged as one of the Coalition’s visible leaders, told USA TODAY Sports in March. “But doing some type of protest on the field every week is not going to stop an unarmed black kid from getting killed, or fix a criminal justice system in another state.”

Now, however, the players have to feel blind-sided, treated by the owners as nothing but props. Instead of helping make the issue go away, the Dolphins have only inflamed it.

But, hey, at least we know where Ross and the Dolphins stand when it comes to freedom.