When Enes Kanter Freedom was 9 years old, neighborhood children handed him an American flag and a lighter.
The children wanted him to burn the flag.
Growing up in Turkey, Freedom says anti-American sentiment was commonplace. Politicians routinely attacked the United States, Christianity and the West, and those messages filtered down to children.
“I looked down and thought, ‘This is not the right thing to do,’” Freedom recalls.
Confused, he ran upstairs to his mother.
“They’re telling me to hate America, hate the West, hate Christian people. What do I do?”
Her answer would shape the rest of his life.
“My mom said, ‘I’m not going to tell you what to do, but do not hate anyone before you meet them.’”
Years later, that young boy from Turkey would become an NBA player, an American citizen, a global human rights advocate, a New York Times best seller, a Nobel Peace Prize nominee and one of the most outspoken critics of authoritarian governments in professional sports.
Growing up, Freedom’s focus was simple: education and basketball.
His parents insisted on both.
When opportunities arose for him to remain overseas and pursue professional basketball as a teenager, his father pushed him toward America instead.
“He made me promise that I would be a good student before being a good basketball player,” Freedom says.
At 17, Freedom arrived in the United States. He attended high school in California, played college basketball at Kentucky and eventually became the third overall pick in the NBA Draft.
Basketball provided fame, opportunity and financial success. It also gave him something far more powerful.
A platform.
Looking back, Freedom traces the beginning of his activism to 2013, when corruption allegations engulfed the Turkish government. At the time, he viewed the issue less as politics and more as principle.
“If you’re fighting against free media and putting innocent journalists in jail, I’m going to say something,” he said.
The consequences were severe.
According to Freedom, Turkish authorities targeted members of his family. His father lost his position as a scientist. His sister struggled to find work despite completing medical school. His younger brother’s basketball opportunities disappeared because of the family name.
Eventually, relatives publicly disowned him in what Freedom believes was an effort to protect themselves from government pressure.
The situation escalated further when authorities detained his father and revoked Freedom’s passport.
Today, he remains unable to safely return to Turkey and a bounty has been placed on him, as he remains a target of the Turkish government because of his voice.
“Once they put my dad in jail, I knew there was no coming back,” he said.
For many people, that would have been enough to retreat into silence. Freedom went the opposite direction.
He expanded his advocacy beyond Turkey, speaking out against human rights abuses around the world and using his platform to amplify the stories of political prisoners, dissidents and persecuted minorities.
“Basketball was a tool for me,” he says. “I always asked myself, ‘How can I use this platform to be the voice of innocent people who don’t have a voice?’”
The work earned international attention.
In 2022, Freedom became the first NBA player nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, and received the Courage Award from the Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy.
The same year he became an American citizen, he legally adopted “Freedom” as part of his name.
The decision reflected his appreciation for rights he says many Americans may take for granted.
At his California high school, he remembers being shocked when classmates openly criticized President Barack Obama.
Growing up in Turkey, public criticism of political leaders often carried severe consequences.
“I thought they were crazy,” Freedom says with a laugh. “I thought they might be in jail tomorrow.”
Instead, his teammates explained something he was only beginning to understand: Criticism of the government was not only allowed in America, it was protected.
Today, Freedom worries that some Americans fail to appreciate how rare those freedoms are.
“People have no idea how blessed and lucky they are,” he said. “Freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of expression—if one generation takes it for granted, you can lose it in a heartbeat.”
While Freedom’s advocacy has taken him around the world, some of his most meaningful lessons about America came not in Washington, D.C., or on the international stage, but in Oklahoma City.
After being traded to Oklahoma City in 2015, he expected the routine that follows most NBA transactions: a physical, a press conference and a trip to the practice facility.
Instead, Thunder General Manager Sam Presti took him somewhere else.
From the airport they went straight to the Oklahoma City National Memorial & Museum.
Presti personally guided him through the memorial, explaining the history of the Oklahoma City bombing, the lives lost and the effect it left on the community.
“He told me, ‘This is what this city went through. Every time you go out there, remember who you are playing for.’”
The experience transformed how Freedom viewed both the city and his role within it.
“It was nothing I’d ever experienced before,” he says.
After playing in multiple NBA cities, Freedom still speaks about Oklahoma differently.
“The people are just different,” he says. “They’re respectful. They’re kind. They’re genuine.”
That connection became especially meaningful as the consequences of his activism intensified.
As relationships with family members became strained and the distance between Freedom and his homeland grew, support arrived from an unexpected place.
“When I lost my family, I was playing for the Oklahoma City Thunder,” Freedom says. “Literally, the whole state came together and became my family.”
For a man who has spent much of his life speaking about freedom, democracy and belonging, his relationship with Oklahoma remains one of the most meaningful relationships of his career.
Today, Freedom continues to travel the world advocating for human rights and democratic values. The risks have not disappeared. In fact, he says they continue to evolve.
Asked what he hopes young people take from his story, however, his answer returns to the lesson his mother taught him decades ago.
“Stand up for what you believe in, even if it means sacrificing everything you have,” he says. “Educate yourself. Read. And whatever you’re doing in life, try to bring good into this world.”
It is a lesson that began long before the NBA, long before the Nobel Peace Prize nomination, long before he became Enes Kanter Freedom.
It began with a mother who told her son not to hate people he had never met. It began with a father who valued education over basketball.
Those lessons carried him from Turkey to America, from basketball arenas to the world stage, and through sacrifices few people will ever understand.
Along the way, he found an unexpected connection in Oklahoma.
And that connection, as it turns out, is a story all its own.
A Conversation with Enes Kanter Freedom Part II will be published in the Oklahoma Gazette in the fall of 2026.
James Biscone is a native Oklahoman, attorney and author. He is a contributing writer to the Oklahoma Gazette.
This article appears in America At 250.