I’m watching less NFL, but it has nothing to do with Colin Kaepernick

Filed in National by on October 21, 2016

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Everyone has good reasons for not watching the crap being put on TV by the NFL right now.

For me:

2) It has been warm and sunny the last few Sundays. Only a twit would stay in to watch TV on during an Indian Summer. and..

1) TOO MANY holding fouls called away from the play. Jesus Christ, these holds have no impact on the play. Stop dicking around.

HEY NFL, Your league SUCKS! it is so fucking slow because EVERY PLAY someone is penalized. Learn the “no call” or I’m going to start watching the English Premiere League this year.

About the Author ()

Jason330 is a deep cover double agent working for the GOP. Don't tell anybody.

Comments (62)

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  1. Another Anonymous says:

    Jason, I agree with you. There has been statistical analysis done on this and you are not the only one watching less. I would add that two of the debates were held during prime time games. Trump tried to claim that people wouldn’t watch the debates because a couple of them were to be aired during these games. It appears that the opposite was true. Given his performances, he should have wished that the NFL game viewership had performed dramatically better.

  2. chris says:

    Too much commercialism of the product and immature commercials turn me off now…college football MUCH better….. same thing happened to pro basketball

  3. Jason330 says:

    The militarization as well. All football games are sponsored by the recruiters of some branch of the armed services. They are turning every Sunday into compulsory patriotic rallies akin to something you’d find in North Korea.

  4. Another Anonymous says:

    Replays take too long; the worst officiating I have ever seen; pouting millionaires; billionaire owners recruiting players that should have been banned from the league; markets that have not had a winning program in decades; seemingly increased bad behavior on and off the field; too many penalties; long commercial breaks; poorer quality of broadcast teams; cost to go to games; obvious missed penalty calls; phantom penalty calls; etc.

    I actually think the worst thing that has happened to the NFL hasn’t been caused by the NFL. Fantasy football has hurt the average fan. People are more concerned with their fantasy players’ performances. I just hate watching a game with friends who are rooting for individual players and not our home teams!

  5. anonymous says:

    The take-a-knee trend (before the game rather than as time expires, I mean) spelled trouble the moment it surfaced for the simple reason that it highlights the glaring racial situation in the stadiums — white fans cheering black athletes play a brutal sport and, if they complain about their circumstances, curse them for being ingrates.

    Add this to the owners’ negligence towards the players after retirement, the evidence that the league hid knowledge of the risks associated with head injuries, many players’ Trumpian levels of misogyny, not infrequently leading to assault (another story today about a Giants’ player and wife-beater) — eventually it all adds up.

    Oh, I almost forgot the drunken, ignorant fans, most of whom like to think they’re experts in a game in which even the coaches involved say they can’t really tell what happened until they watch the films later.

    I stopped watching seven years ago. I don’t know how y’all can watch without feeling like you need a shower afterwards.

  6. pandora says:

    One of the things I’ve noticed is the number of kids I’ve known (throughout the K-12 years) no longer wanting to play football or attend the games*. This strikes me as a problem – but I don’t watch football, so what do I know!

    * I’m sure there are still schools that love football, but, in my (limited, personal) experience, I haven’t seen it. Sure, my kids might attend a game, but attend faithfully? Nope.

  7. Dave says:

    “I don’t know how y’all can watch without feeling like you need a shower afterwards.”

    I watch more for the strategy than anything else. I’m by no means an expert about football, but I’ve always felt it greatly resembles chess. If you play chess you can appreciate arrangement of the opposing teams, the moves, the countermoves, and positioning. There is a certain beauty in the game when you watch the execution of plays that unfold like multiple simultaneous chess moves. Plus it is the ultimate team sport that requires significant cooperation between players to achieve a common goal. Quarterbacks may be the stars but every person must play their role perfectly each play, just as the opposition must each play theirs.

    I also think that the popularity of fantasy football is a consequence of armchair coaches and quarterbacks and because with the advent of free agency, identification and sense of affinity with a particular team has been replaced with affinity for specific players, who began to move from team to team. Peyton Manning created a lot new Bronco fans when he moved to Denver to whom he brought his cerebral brand of quarterbacking.

    I suppose many see it as controlled mayhem but there many facets to the game which make it attractive to the military because the military is only as good as its skills and the ability to operate cooperatively as a unit.

  8. Liberal Elite says:

    I’m totally done, and done forever, watching brain injury ball… and I used to be a fan and regular watcher.

  9. This is a good thread, and I agree with lots of the reasons that have been cited for watching less. As someone who plays fantasy football (just one league at work), I plead guilty to Dave’s scenario.

    Al Mascitti once predicted that pro football would be extinct within (I think) 20 years.
    Mostly because of ‘brain injury ball’, which is an apt phrase. I find myself watching lots less. I’ve just sorta lost interest. Haven’t really thought about the reason, until now.

  10. anonymous says:

    @LE: Ditto. I was as much in the habit as anybody of watching every Sunday. I wish I could say the brain injuries made me quit, but in my case it was sports-talk radio. And the parking lots are worse. I think there’s a big overlap between those people, the Tea Party and Trumpkins — tribalism, rage, verbal and physical macho posturing are common to all three. All the Y chromosome stuff that makes us such a lovable species.

    @Dave: “there many facets to the game which make it attractive to the military ”

    And they go beyond teamwork and strategy. The strategy is, after all, to “negate” the foe. You’re not allowed to kill him in football, but injuring him — that’s a different story. Organized, yes. Mayhem, no. The raid on the quarterback is not merely an attempt to negate his passes but to, if possible, put him out of the game. There are penalties for doing so, but none so severe that it makes the goal unthinkable. I trust there are enough fans here that I don’t have to list the evidence.

  11. anonymous says:

    @pandora: Didn’t CSW just announce it was dropping football? I won’t be surprised if smaller schools, especially privates, go that route too. Some of the high school teams in Pa. that dropped it this year did so after starting with 30-some players and losing a dozen to injury within a game or two.

    The most alarming thing I have read about head injuries and high school football came from Steve Almond’s “Against Football: One Fan’s Reluctant Manifesto”:

    “Three years ago, researchers at Purdue University began monitoring every hit sustained by two high school teams. The goal was to study the effect of concussions.

    “But when researchers administered cognitive tests to players who had never been concussed, hoping to set up a control group, they discovered that these teens showed diminished brain function as well. As the season wore on, their cognitive abilities plummeted. In some cases, brain activity in the frontal lobes—the region responsible for reasoning—nearly disappeared by season’s end.

    “You have the classic stereotype of the dumb jock and I think the real issue is that’s not how they start out,” explained Thomas Talavage, one of the professors of the study. “We actually create that individual.”

    For me, that’s what dooms the high school game. It’s only a matter of time until this line of research is pursued and publicized, at which point people will point out the irony of using tax dollars to play a sport we know causes brain injuries under the auspices of educational institutions.

  12. ex-anonymous says:

    nfl tv ratings are down for the same reason ratings are down for other big live events: streaming. it’s still the best game to watch on tv (imho!). plays are complex and watching them develop can be a beautiful thing. instant replay helps to break it down. then next play, quite soon, a whole new set of possibilities plays out. aesthetics. i agree with carlin about the pastoral qualites of baseball vs. the militaristic qualities of football. and baseball is better at the ballpark, where you can really see and feel what’s going on.
    what dave says bout chess moves seems exactly right.

  13. ex-anonymous says:

    i think csw just moved to a smaller, easier division.

  14. Liberal Elite says:

    @a ” I think there’s a big overlap between those people, the Tea Party and Trumpkins”

    Maybe that was part of it for me, as well. Another is that the cable TV is gone at all houses, and I’ve become more selective at to which services we subscribe to (e.g. Hulu,…).

    Another is my explorational discovery of real football (aka soccer), and at this point, I find it far more enjoyable to watch (unless bad teams are playing–which is usually the case in the US).

    Oh… And before someone calls me a hypocrite, I do realize that soccer can create brain injuries too, but the problem is of a different order of magnitude.

  15. Frank says:

    I’ve stopped watching NFL and NCAA games entirely. Haven’t watched one for three years.

    I got tired of the corrupt overlords of big time football.

    It’s amazing how many interesting things you can do on a weekend when you don’t spend hours vegetating in front of flickery pictures of large men running into each other.

  16. Brock Landers says:

    Why spend the better part of a Sunday watching 11 minutes of action stretched over 3 hours of pickup truck, beer and boner pill commercials when you can watch an early morning European soccer league game while drinking coffee?

  17. FrankP says:

    Don’t watch anymore and most of the parents I know won’t let their kids play the sport at school because of head injuries and other dangers. I’m also pretty disgusted with the league’s response to the domestic violence among its players and watching supports them, so I don’t watch to make sure they get the message I don’t support their actions. And watching the game doesn’t have the appeal now that I know what it does to the players and that the downstream feeder pattern is young kids who are being damaged beyond repair to feed this “entertainment.” I’ll find something else to watch on TV. And it looks like a lot of other folks feel the same way. The game is losing its appeal to anyone who has a conscience.

  18. FrankP says:

    CSW moved to another division because they weren’t allowed to drop their football program even though they wanted too. Smart kids and their parents want nothing to do with the game (you won’t find the parents of Asian kids letting their sons play football; their sons play cello and chess and go to medical school or become engineers.)

  19. FrankP says:

    ex-anonoymous, your thin “streaming” excuse doesn’t explain the dip in merchandising, which is also tanking along with viewership. the nfl is scrambling and sponsors are also fleeing because the demographics of the fans are that it’s a dumber, whiter, less educated audience — who has less money to spend and less sophistication in spending it. Dumb old white guys will continue to watch, but young folks are turning to European football and other sports. Football is for old drunks who don’t care about people getting hurt. They just want to be amused.

  20. Jason330 says:

    All th boner pill ads are telling about the demographics.

  21. FrankP says:

    Yeah, the Viagra crowd is still nostalgic for the glory days of the gridiron, but the millenials, gen x’ers and younger boomers don’t want much to do with this old guy’s pasttime

  22. Jason330 wrote:

    “All th boner pill ads are telling about the demographics.”

    “Boner pills. They’re not just for TV golf any more.”

    Which reminds me, have they taken that Arnold Palmer blood pressure medication ad off the air now that he’s…dead? A friendly huckster right to the end.

  23. Brock Landers says:

    Not just Arnold Palmer, Chris Bosh was in many of the same Xarelto commercials and he unfortunately can’t pass a physical to resume his NBA career.

  24. ex-anonymous says:

    frankp: blah blah blah. look up nfl and streaming, if you’re capable. and are you trying to tell me people below old-boomer status (65?) don’t watch football? you may not like the nfl — or maybe you’re just in love with your own moral preening — but don’t make shit up.

  25. Frankp says:

    Sounds like some old white guy took his boner pill so he could stay awake for his Sunday football. No the NFL ‘s demographics are trending older and whiter. I did look em up. Go back to you barcolounger and your beer. My point is this sport is bad for kids. People who don’t care about the safety of kids can continue to support it. People who approve of the NFL and its response to the domestic violence of its players can continue to watch. It”s a free country. streaming indeed.

  26. Frankp says:

    And I predict many schools will soon be following the lead of places like charter and sprigfield Montgomery county high school, a public high school which dropped its football program this year because of head injuries and poor player turnout. Parents just aren’t gonna risk their kids brains for the public amusement. Also, I think you’re gonna see schools not want to pay the insurance premiums they will face after a few lawsuits find they knew the dangers the kids faced. The NFL teams are also still facing massive legal blowback from legal action for the way they manhandled their players health — yet another reason not to support them by watching their games. Look, rowing and boxing were both once americas most popular sports. 100,000 people regularly turned out to watch a regatta. “Streaming” didn’t explain why fewer people showed up. These sports were replaced by others as new generations of fans had new priorities and new interests. Football won’t disappear, but it’s audience is shrinking, dying and getting very white. Like Trump’s pool of fans. White, not very bright and without a conscience.

  27. ex-anonymous says:

    frankp: 23-34 and 35-44 are the two largest age groups of nfl fans according to a recent demographic survey. this season, some of the old folks have stopped watching because of kaepernick, which would lower the age demographic more. when younger fans watch, it’s more and more likely they are watching on a streaming service.

    everything is not political. i have no problem with kaepernick and i still like to watch football. in fact, i don’t even think they should play the national anthem at all. patriotic displays are self-serving bullshit. maybe they should all take a knee.

    and the idea that anybody who watches football is a trump fan is ridiculous. there’s no bigger trump hater than me. but your type likes to paint anybody who disagrees with you with a very broad brush.

    if you don’t want to watch football, fine. but looks like you just want to display your purity. and you sure are fascinated with boner pills. got a problem?

    i do think football should be made safer and the sport should be doing more on that. meanwhile, i don’t think people playing the game would appreciate somebody like you telling them what they can and cannot do.

  28. pandora says:

    Anyone who hasn’t watched Concussion needs to. If you didn’t find the NFL vile before you will after watching this movie.

    Across the board their behavior is disturbing. Can someone explain why an end zone dance is a huge no no, but abusing women is… complicated?

    Via Deadspin:

    Goodell answered Conway’s first question about touchdown celebrations by saying that “as a professional athlete you’ve got certain standards that you have to meet. You have to dress in a certain way, you have to perform in a certain way and within certain rules. And what anyone does on that field reflects on everybody. And off the field. And that’s why we all focus so much on ‘these are the standards we want to meet’ and lets meet them.”

    Conway then asked Goodell to talk about the dichotomy of punishing players for touchdown celebrations, but continuing to mishandle domestic violence investigations. (Shortly after Conway posted the transcript, the league fined Odell Beckham “$24,309 for unsportsmanlike conduct when he took off his helmet during his touchdown celebration Sunday,” per Ralph Vacchiano of SNY.)

    Goodell’s answer was essentially: No, it’s actually the fans who are the idiots here.

    Conway: The criticism that comes back to you is that people see punishments for touchdown celebrations but then only one game for a domestic violence incident. It must be very difficult to balance those things and explain them?

    Goodell: They are. I understand the public’s misunderstanding of those things and how that can be difficult for them to understand how we get to those positions. But those are things that we have to do. I think it’s a lot deeper and a lot more complicated than it appears but it gets a lot of focus.

    I would never let my kids play football. There are a ton of parents who feel exactly the same way. Football is on its way out.

  29. Dave says:

    “Football is on its way out.”

    Seriously, no it’s not. Don’t quit your day job. As a cultural oracle, you would definitely go hungry. The sport will evolve perhaps, but it’s not on it’s way out. Remember when boxing was on it’s way out? Now we have mixed martial arts which is more violent than boxing.

    However, whether it’s boxing, MMA, or football the origins are ancient. MMA dates back to the Olympics of ancient Greece where fights originated as hand-to-hand combat performed as a sport called pankration. American football has its roots in football-like games include the Greek game of Episkyros and the Roman game of Harpastum. Look at the similarities of Episkyros to American football:

    “the game was played between two teams of usually 12 to 14 players each, with one ball and the rules of the game which allowed using hands. The teams would try to throw the ball over the heads of the other team. There was a white line called the skuros between the teams and another white line behind each team. Teams would change the ball often until one of the team was forced behind the line at their end”

    Will society attempt to make such games, like Rugby and football less violent? Sure. Will the games evolve? Sure. But they’ve been with us since ancient times. They are part of our id as humans. Rumors of its death are greatly exaggerated.

    While we have made great strides in evolving towards a more enlightened species, we remain at our core, human and will continue to solve problems on battlefields. And in the absence of actual battlefields, we practice individually and as teams on simulated battlefields of grass, canvas, and boards (chess).

  30. puck says:

    ” Can someone explain why an end zone dance is a huge no no, but abusing women is… complicated?”

    WTF? Assault carries jail time; excessive celebration invokes a 15-yard penalty. I think jail time is the bigger no-no.

    Also, nobody will sue you for falsely accusing them of excessive celebration, so no need to be careful about following legal guidelines. That makes it less complicated.

    I really haven’t been following the NFL police blotter. But football like boxing is not a sport played by gentlemen. There is a huge profit motive and many owners will try to find a place for a talented convict. Even so, in recent years the teams seem to be rightfully shunning players with an active history of abusing women.

  31. anonymous says:

    “Assault carries jail time; excessive celebration invokes a 15-yard penalty.”

    Please, by all means, list all the players who have spent time in jail for assaulting the women in their lives.

    The point was about the penalty imposed by the league. It’s 10 weeks for banned substances, 2 weeks for spousal abuse. There’s a not-so-fine line between being a contrarian and being a dipshit. If only you would learn where it is.

  32. puck says:

    Straight to the ad hominem so soon?

  33. anonymous says:

    “They’ve [sports] been with us since ancient times.”

    Well, sure, provided you overlook that 1,200-year period in which Western society collapsed. Sports are pursued only when survival is not a 24/7 concern.

    “Remember when boxing was on it’s way out? Now we have mixed martial arts which is more violent than boxing.”

    Boxing was indeed on its way out. It has been replaced, mostly, with MMA, which is far less popular and lucrative. The point isn’t that football will disappear, it’s that it will lose its primacy among American pastimes. Two years ago, with ratings rising, there were lots of articles about how the only way the NFL would continue to grow was by growing its audience share among women. How do you figure that’s been going?

    “They are part of our id as humans. Rumors of its death are greatly exaggerated.”

    Competition is what’s part of simian (therefore human) nature. Violent competition is practiced only by societies that engage in violent warfare. Conflating competition with a desire to see debilitating injuries inflicted is a mistake, IMHO.

    Lots of people are so busy with the present they can’t think clearly about, let alone foresee, the future. When you say the status quo will win out, you show an ignorance of history — the status quo always loses in the end, and this season’s slide in ratings might be the beginning of the end of football’s cultural dominance.

    It is becoming, and will further become, an element in the culture wars. And we know which side wins the culture wars.

  34. anonymous says:

    “Straight to the ad hominem so soon?”

    When a dipshit has the floor, yes.

    Don’t forget the list, Mr. False Equivalence. You love to complain about the ad hominems, and in doing so you usually ignore the actual challenge that preceded it. You’re not fooling anyone except perhaps yourself.

  35. anonymous says:

    @Ex-A: Got a link for that study? I tried to Google it, but all I found was a lot of self-congratulatory bullshit from the NFL.

  36. Liberal Elite says:

    @a “The point isn’t that football will disappear, it’s that it will lose its primacy among American pastimes.”

    Agreed. There’s every indication that Football will become the nation 4th or 5th most popular sport in the not too distant future. Baseball has been in a long slow decline for decades, but Football’s decline will likely be much faster.

  37. puck says:

    “Don’t forget the list”

    I’m not jumping through your fucking hoop, although you do look silly standing there holding up that hoop in your pink tutu waiting for a poodle. There are at least two lists easily found on Google.

  38. FrankP says:

    I work in marketing so demographics is my game, ex-anon, probably not yours. Those 23-44 year olds are a bigger watching group because there are more of them than you old dudes, who are dying off. Sure some of them watch but they are dumber and whiter and advertisers know it. The PR message you’ve bought is the one being promoted by the NFL to cover their decline: Folks are watching our game via streaming, they’re not abandoning football! Please advertisers, don’t run away! But just look who’s still advertising and you’ll see who the watchers are: Drunks, limp dicks and guys who drive Buicks.
    My point is that watching football and cheering for it makes you one of “them”, the dumb folks, the folks who don’t care that you’re watching and supporting something that’s dirty, that smells, that has a down market patina of the low-class, un-educated group of people who just don’t pay attention to what the people who play it, pay for it and run it do. If that’s moralizing, I wear the the accusation proudly. I have a conscience and it bothers me. You obviously don’t. You care more about your entertainment and that’s your choice. I’m sure you have huge numbers of friends and family, don’t need to drink yourself into a stupor to forget your active and productive life and pay no heed to the ads for boner pills from your easy chair. Have fun. I’m gonna go do something besides argue with you.

  39. mouse says:

    At the risk of my manhood being attacked, I don’t get why anyone would sit inside on a warm sunny Sunday to watch a bunch of millionaire steroid laden freaks knock each other down to get a funny shaped ball all in financial support of gambling and thug interests?

  40. ex-anonymous says:

    you again? why don’t you go back and worry about that limp dick that seems to fascinate you. or consider why it’s so important to you to harp on the “low-class” demographic. there are a lot of football fans i would also consider low-class, or at least macho assholes (and there are many who aren’t). i still like the game itself. but i’m not the one campaigning for sainthood (smugness might hurt your chances), making sure everybody knows what a high-minded guy you are. and do you really not get the streaming idea? you must be great at marketing. i understand that football’s popularity will probably decline. why don’t you gloat after the dip becomes significant. now you’re just desperate to make up things that suit your beliefs.

  41. mouse says:

    A cursory review of the NFL and current reality show culture easily predicts the Trump phenomena

  42. Frankp says:

    Hehe…can always get a “rise” out of you old guys by referencing your preferred mess…go back to sleep.

  43. Frankp says:

    Make that meds! And if having a conscience makes me high minded, again thanks for the compliment. (Easy to bait the old guys with manhood challenges. Clinton does it with trump too!)

  44. mouse says:

    “The last bastion of fascism”

  45. ex-anonymous says:

    frankp: no, YOU’RE the puppet. (thought maybe you’d understand trump logic.)

    but wait, there’s more. what’s with the age stuff? you have no idea how old i am. are you young? is that one more thing for you to be sanctimonious about? i mean, way to go, managing to be born at a later time than some other people.

    thought you said you were finished with this thread. so why don’t you go see if you can find another high horse someplace else?

  46. Dave says:

    “I don’t get why anyone would sit inside on a warm sunny Sunday to watch” ______________ (insert activity of your choice, bowling, golf, dressage, downhill skiing, motocross, etc.)

    Answer: Because not every Sunday is warm and sunny and because as a species we have always been fascinated by the endeavors of others that challenge themselves physically or mentally. Sure, there are many other reasons, including gambling and living vicariously. But it’s entertaining watching someone succeed which is second only to wanting them to fail.

    It doesn’t matter if they are millionaires because that would simply be envy pretending not to be. As for the steroids, it’s their body they should have the ability to choose what they do with it. Sort of being pro-choice as it were.

    Team sports, such as rugby (110 players paralyzed thus far) has the same Greek and Roman roots as American football and is more popular than ever. For centuries humans have been attempting to kill themselves (mostly boys who start when they are young), but the danger is part of the attraction. Climbers will continue to attempt Everest summits regardless of how many of them die.

    Steering our children away from such endeavors may protect them while they are under our care. But eventually many of them will find ways to test their limits. It’s part of the human condition.

  47. Ben says:

    you’re right. Full contact sports that are driven by a patriarchal structure and historically homophobic and violent are the only way our kids can grow into adults.

  48. Frankp says:

    Just love to watch you old guys twist in the wind when your fantasy life gets interrupted. Ex anon: Tell me you’re not 70 or older, a former would be jock in high school, at least one failed marriage if not two and probably a serious alcohol and drug guy to boot. You’re the nfl’s sweet spot. No conscience to speak of, no sympathy for the players or the rascist pipeline that feeds the league. No investment in the misogyny that it breeds. hey, it’s just women the players are assaulting and brutalizing and you don’t care about them either. It’s your amusement that matters. This is a game we are talking about. The day is coming and coming soon when saying you are a football fan is the equivalent of saying you enjoy NASCAR. Dumb, white, undereducated, redneck.

  49. ex-anonymous says:

    frankp: i think you have daddy issues. try to overcome them. or maybe the cool kids were mean to you at school (last year?). you’ve really got a bug up your ass about this.

  50. anonymous says:

    Pink tutu? Poodle? Somebody’s got gender issues I guess.

    Look at the list yourself, smart guy. Now count how many players — not ex-players, who no longer have the team PR people looking out for them — were convicted of a sex crime and went to prison. I counted one, but maybe I missed one.

  51. Ben says:

    “At the risk of my manhood being attacked, I don’t get why anyone would sit inside on a warm sunny Sunday to watch a bunch of millionaire steroid laden freaks knock each other down to get a funny shaped ball all in financial support of gambling and thug interests?”

    because for as long as humans have been alive, we have loved watching other humans hurt each other. The Romans had gladiators, we have football, The Walking Dead, constant wars….People watch hockey for the fights and boxing for the injuries…. it’s human nature to enjoy competition and violence. THIS IS NOT A DEFENSE OF VIOLENCE, SO SHUT THE HELL UP……. The key is to overcome those base instincts and embrace competition (which drives excellence) while making sure no humans get hurt… It is for THIS reason that the only sport I watch anymore is BattleBots.

  52. mouse says:

    Go team! grunt grunt

  53. anonymous says:

    “because for as long as humans have been alive, we have loved watching other humans hurt each other.”

    Yet it is also true that as long as humans have been alive they have loved watching other humans care for each other.

    You can’t justify a thing by citing human nature, because human nature includes almost every human behavior, including many of the behaviors we outlaw (most obviously murder). If football is human nature, so is opposing football.

    A lot of what people call “human nature” is actually culture. Our culture obsessively values “winning,” and not simply winning a game or a meet. We’re obsessed with who’s No. 1. Yes, competition is part of the human skill set, but we emphasize it and call it human nature.

    Yet we live within a few score miles of a sect that values not competition but cooperation. Everyone marvels at the Amish practice of barn-raising — the whole community coming together to build a barn in a day or weekend. The Amish value humility and cooperation, and so those equally human traits come to the fore.

    As the old saying goes, You live what you learn.

  54. Dave says:

    “The Amish value humility and cooperation, and so those equally human traits come to the fore.”

    Yes the Amish also run the puppy mills in PA and kill the puppies rather than treat them humanely because they consider them livestock. Even though I’m criticizing the Amish, because I consider the practice of puppy mills to abhorrent and take every opportunity to criticize the Amish for this, I really pointing out that they are not all of this or that.

    Further, one of the favorite sports of the Amish softball and hockey. Now they may play a less violent form of hockey (http://lancasteronline.com/news/amish-hockey-player-cited/article_1dcbfef3-5193-5b94-b91e-b465e331ffd6.html), however, they are fans of professional football, hockey, and other violent sports as much of America is. Many Amish are avid hunters, including trophy hunting.

    Culture is a broad term. So is nature and nurture. I don’t think we can necessarily ascribe a behavior to just culture or nature. One thing is clear, we humans, are pretty violent and self serving. Of course so are a pack of wolves. In our case some call it culture. In the wolves case, we call it nature, because we don’t consider wolves as having culture. I’m not so sure we have culture either. Maybe it’s just pack behavior (mob rule).

    Ultimately, we cannot ascribe every foible to single silo because separating culture from nature is always going to be a subjective endeavor. Things we humans have been doing for thousands of years has to have some basis in our nature because it transcends many cultures and societies across many eras. Militant sports (including hunting) have more to do with dominance than anything else because at it’s core, it’s about survival. And as it happens, survival is at the core of cooperative behavior as well. Two sides of the same coin.

  55. mouse says:

    Tribal today, tribalism tomorrow, tribalism forever. Go team! Did you see that hit!

  56. Dorian Gray says:

    De gustibus non disputandum est.

    I suppose some people just have a more refined palate.

    Also, a timely essay from yesterday in The Atlantic:

    http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2016/10/football-kids-heads/504863/

  57. pandora says:

    This thread is interesting… and revealing. If we go with the “human nature” argument then there’s nothing to be done about the problems. Hey, it’s human nature! Can’t fight it, or change it!

    I don’t buy into this argument. I don’t think masculinity has to be toxic. Football (and other sports) has some big problems that need to be addressed. It’s possible to like football, critique its problems and offer solutions. Chalking it up to human nature says that this is simply the way it is. But maybe that’s true, given all the male shaming going on on this thread.

  58. anonymous says:

    @Dave: I think we basically agree here, but I’m not sure you see the point I’m trying to make: You can use “human nature” to justify anything. But folks in this thread are using “human nature” to argue for the popularity of a very specific form of organized, entertaining but violent sport.

    Put it this way: The Amish like sports, too. The brand of baseball they play is more lethal than the brand we play, so they don’t shy away from violence. But the Amish aren’t watching the NFL on TV every Sunday.

  59. pandora says:

    Great article, Dorian. Thanks! So glad I never let my kids play football.

  60. Frankp says:

    Anonymous you get the point I was trying to make before the old guy got his shorts in a knot. This is entertainment we are talking about and using violence that infects our culture with violence and damages our children for Sunday afternoon diversion isn’t a reasonable choice. We have a lot of entertainment choices. I’m lobbying against this one because of its overwhelming harm. The geezer who defends it won’t defend it on its merits, just insists it is not losing popularity when it clearly is. The need of football fans to be a part of the sport seems to be tied to its continuation. As if their Id will collapse with their sport. This emotional connection to teams replaces individual connections to family and friends and the sport gets more attention than real life. So we have given a sport incredible power over education and commerce and even law, because of obsessed fans. Recognizing its waning power is crucial to dismantling the sports domination of our culture. Its deniers, like climate change deniers and birthers and 9/11 conspiracy and even newtown square denier theorists live in their own fantasyland.

  61. mouse says:

    I think I may get one of those big football team blow up things for my front yard.

  62. anonymous says:

    @Frank: Yes, some people are seriously invested in the continued popularity of the sport, as if a decline in its popularity was some kind of personal attack.

    It’s funny that last year, when “Concussion” came out, these were the same people who made much of the fact that NFL ratings had never been higher, so obviously nobody cared about the dangers. Now that ratings have fallen, they’ll accept any reason except the accumulation of bad news on head injuries.

    It also bears noting that, for all the theories — guesses, really — about the cause of the ratings decline, nobody has done any actual research on it. Those who confidently assert ANY reason for the drop are just taking their biases out for a stroll.