The Absolute Hypocrisy of Football Nation America

If you thought that the football fans and sports fans of this country were a bunch of heartless brutes, have I got a survey to back up that mentality...

Deadspin is still around for the time being, and reports today on a recent survey (May 31-June 6 of 2016, 1,000 people surveyed) by the Center for Public Opinion at the University of Massachusetts in Lowell.

This survey showed attitudes and beliefs of the polled participants on sports, concussions, and specifically their role in football.

The findings damn a nation of bloodlusty football fans as branded hypocrites....

• Two-thirds of the respondents believe that concussions and head injuries are a major problem and public health concern.  Only 6% deny this reality.
• 85% believe there is at least probable truth (half polled believe this, a third on top of it believe it is absolutely true) that football can cause CTE.
• 87% believe CTE and the brain damage resultant is a serious public health issue.
• In what may be a very telling statistic, though:  Only SIX PERCENT of those polled actually know someone with CTE.  This may speak volumes of the resultant hypocrisy, since I would have to think, if more people could experience what CTE does to people by knowing people with the ailment, they may have very different attitudes about the sport of football (and anything else which causes CTE).
• A majority of all polled, including across all demographic sub-polls, state concussions are a major problem. This includes men (almost 3 in 5), parents (63%), and two-thirds of all people who watch sports on TV twice a week or more.
• Three-quarters of all polled believe that tackle football should not be introduced under the age of 14.  One in five would like to see tackle football abolished, never introduced.  Another one in five would like to remove high-school tackle football, and only introduce tackle football at age 18.
• Almost two-thirds of those polled believe it is a lie when they are told that tackle football is a safe activity for kids pre-high-school.
• The same statement on high-school football is effectively a 50-50 split, with only a small majority believing it the truth.
• Pop Warner Football is not seen in a positive light in this survey.  Taking only about the 41% of those polled who know about Pop Warner Football, three in five of those surveyed believe Pop Warner, as an organization, has not done enough versus head injuries and concussions.
• Taking into consideration soccer, three in five believe it is a lie to say a header in soccer is a safe activity before high school.
• Two in five surveyed say they do not watch sports on television much at all, if ever.
• Almost 1/3, 29%, say they watch two days a week or more, and their responses on the organizational actions on head injuries, CTE, and concussions are striking.
• Two in five do believe the NFL takes appropriate action vs. CTE and concussions.  There's the hypocrisy in a nutshell.  There is no way over 100,000,000 people routinely go to High Mass every First Sunday in February with some of these numbers if the NFL's LIES on the subject are not believed.
• A slight majority believe the NFL has not taken such appropriate action.
• The numbers for the NCAA and NHL (especially with fighting) are similar.
• For those who do believe they know on the high-school and USA sport levels whether or not appropriate actions are being taken, it's a 2-1 split against the sports sanctioning bodies on whether they do or do not.

Wow.

That's a damning piece of survey right there.

Read the highlight at the link above, as I just paraphrased their work for you.

I am routinely (and, quite often, correctly!) criticized for de-emphasizing the human injury element of the American sports machine (especially football) versus the rigging of games.  I have, in the past, attempted to say to these people that it adds the element that not only are these people dying, they are doing so for a manufactured lie.

The fact is, and these numbers point it out, that the fact these players are injured and dying basically must take forefront, and probably abolish one or more of the pillar sports upon which our entire society exists.

In this vein, there is at least one more interesting down-the-table result that the Deadspin article delves into:

• African-Americans actually were more likely to declare tackle football dangerous and not want their children to play.  In fact, the most likely demographic to want their children to play tackle football?  White middle-income ($30-100K) Americans with some college education.

If you wish, you can juxtapose two frightening realities:  The first being that many people hold a very low opinion of the rank-and-file football player, but (the second) believing the ESPN Hype that it is all about the quarterback.  Basically, White Johnny and Jane want their son to be the star quarterback, with all the perks.  Many African-Americans, however, know their son would be destined to be some kind of a battering ram.

Just think of that when your Packers and Patriots and Broncos and Crimson Tide and Trojans and Badgers and Blue Devils and Cardinals and Hilltoppers take the field this fall...

Or will you?