Have you seen the movie "Concussion," and has it made you rethink your attitudes about football?

I have been following the growing evidence about football and concussions for a while, so the movie merely confirmed my thinking.

I agree that football will be phasing itself out in the next fifteen years or so.

That danger from football is much worse at the high school and college level than with the pros. High schools are where you get half trained volunteer coaches who really don’t understand or care about the extent of the problem.

I haven’t seen it, but it came up in a Spanish language group I used to attend. One woman felt parents who let their children play football is a form of abuse.

Basketball is a contact sport; football is a collision sport.

I’m a huge sports fan, but football has lost its appeal for me. There’s just something about the brutality… Now that we’re learning about the devastation, can this society continue to condone and support?

Succinctly put @Love_my_doggie. Nice. I agree 1000%.

@JLeslie Well, if they are aware of how fucking dangerous it is, and they let them play, or worse, encourage them to play, then I almost have to agree with the woman.

Old school road cyclist here:

What is football?

Is it one of those so called sports where the participants actually sit down and rest during the competition?

^^I say that about football too. Actually, it applies to many team sports. My husband races cars as a hobby, and during that competition you have to pay full attention the entire time on the track. If you don’t you can crash and die and kill others. An opthamologist even told one driver to make sure he uses eye drops, because the drivers are surely blinking less then they should be.

^ 14 minutes of actual play in a typical baseball game.

LOL.

Agreed, anyone that thinks race drivers aren’t athletes donsn’t know what their talking about.

I rethought my attitude about football after my cousin suffered major neck injury. He’s been disabled for forty years now, with multiple suicide attempts because of chronic pain and depression.

I refused my football scholarship to a small college. But only because I wanted to pursue art. Lost all interest in sports after high school. I had many other sports options and still remain athletic tossing the Fball around and going to the batting cages. I don’t follow any pro sports whatsoever.
_______

I do wonder though… what that certain huge man body type will do without football. My average size could translate to any other sport with ease. But there are some fellas with bodies so enormous that football is literally the only option to them for team sport activity.

Every school had their token giants. Sure some could pursue academics. But some simply could not. Football was/is their talisman for notoriety. They could be somebody and we were all grateful that our team had the behemoth men. Not only for what they could do, but for the intimidation of the other team… who also had their own titans.

What other team sport will the mammoth man play? Some low income families view their giant child as a potential savior with a prospective career in the football. These families may not be capable of pushing academics. What now are the athletic dreams they can promote to a jumbo child?

I’ve heard about the documentary and since I’m a documentary fan, I’m planning to watch it one day.

I have friends on FB who have kids that play football, and it seems that even among elementary school age kids, it’s still going strong. My opinion is there’s just too much money in high school, college and pro football for it to just fade away.

I wouldn’t let my son play it if I had a son.

@jca ” My opinion is there’s just too much money in high school, college and pro football for it to just fade away.” Yeah, you need to see the movie. I’ll give you one hint: The NFL has enormous power because of that money.

I think it’s disgusting that our society would encourage sacrificing lives for money. I find it horrifying that our society would encourage a sport that makes 28% of the players become violently insane after a few years of playing. ” Its presence in domestic violence is also being investigated”

“On December 1, 2012, Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher killed his girlfriend and drove to Arrowhead Stadium and killed himself in front of then GM Scott Pioli and then head coach Romeo Crennel. .... The lawyer also hired a medical examiner to examine Belcher’s brain for signs of CTE. On September 29, 2014, it was confirmed that he suffered from CTE.[28]”

CTE

@Dutchess_III: Studies show the same from pro hockey. Read on:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/02/sports/hockey/stephen-peat-nhl-enforcer-concussions-cte-health.html?_r=0

There’s just too much money to be made on all sides from pro sports – hockey, football, etc. including the players who are willing to take the chance.

Yes, and boxing, too.

But they have to have a field to choose from. If parents won’t let their kids play football anymore (and I guarantee you, any parent who has their kids playing football, if they watch the movie, the child won’t step foot on the field again,) where is the NFL going to get their players? And if people quit watching football, there will be no more money to be made.

It’s up to the country, the people, whether or not football dies, not up to the NFL.

Yes @Dutchess_III but there’s not only money but a lot of jobs involved – advertising, stadiums staff, players, agents, publicists, managers, radio and TV announcing and show production, etc. These things are not going away any time soon. Not even within fifteen years.

What does any of that matter? If there are no fans and no players, there is no money, and no need for advertising, agents, publicist, whatever. They’ll just have to get different jobs.

You can continue to support the game. I will not.

This year’s football season will be interesting. I don’t think Rick will quit watching, but I bet he sees it in a whole different light. If a player gets hit hard he won’t be shouting out in admiration any more.

@Dutchess_III: I don’t support football. I don’t watch it, except maybe the Super Bowl like many in the country also do. I don’t know anything about football and if I’m at someone’s house and it’s on the TV, I have no idea what’s going on. I just see running and throwing and crashing.

I’m saying any industry that has a lot of jobs dependent on it will not go away quickly or easily. You may feel differently which is fine. Time will tell.

I guess there are enough people who are willing to destroy others for entertainment that will keep it going.

Now I’m frustrated. My daughter has a male friend, and she watches his two boys quite often. They’re 12 and 10.
Today we were talking, and she made a comment about how good the 12 year old was in football.
I said, “Have you seen the movie “Concussion”?”
She hesitated, to think I guess, then said she had.
I said, “Man, you need to get those boys out of football!”
She got defensive and said there was no way they would quit playing. They love the game too much.
All I can think of is that she didn’t really see the movie. Maybe she saw something else, but it wasn’t that movie. Couldn’t have. If she had, and she cared about those kids, she’d be moving mountains to get them out of that sport.

I have two friends whose sons (both have two sons each) play football and baseball. I wouldn’t even say anything to them because I, too, know they love the games too much. For me to nag them would be interfering and would probably piss them off.

Wow. Well. OK. 28% of pro players go insane. Mostly they just kill themselves, but sometimes they kill other people too. But I can understand a parent’s willingness to take that chance, if their child loves the game so much.

“An autopsy performed one year after Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher fatally shot his 22-year-old girlfriend and killed himself found signs of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), the degenerative brain disease found in athletes and others with a history of repetitive brain injuries.” This was in 2012

Here is a list of former players who had CTE. However, you can only diagnose it after death, by an autopsy of the brain, so that list will be much, much, much longer as players start dying off.
Also in that link you’ll find a big, huge list of “Former players listed as plaintiffs in lawsuits against the NFL for concussion-related injuries received after playing.
This list is incomplete. The NFL reportedly reached a settlement in 2013 with around 4,500 former players (or their estates). This list currently contains fewer than half that number.”

The NFL has spent millions trying to cover it all up.

Watch the movie @jca. You might find yourself willing to take the risk of being called a “nag” afterward. Or not.

I am going to watch it, @Dutchess_III. As for hounding my friends, no, that I’m not willing to do. No different than that I am not hounding my friends who smoke. Do you hound your friends who smoke? I don’t.

You didn’t say “hound.” Neither did I. I mentioned it to my daughter. I’m done.

After watching the movie, and learning about CTE, to me it’s like looking the other way when a parent gives into a kid’s whining for a tablespoon of antifreeze everyday, because he likes it so much.
Any parent who knowingly puts their sons at such a great risk for brain damage is insane, IMO. However, it’s not illegal so follow the money.

@Dutchess_III: Perhaps I misunderstood what you meant when you referred to “moving mountains to get the kids out of the sport” when you wrote ”All I can think of is that she didn’t really see the movie. Maybe she saw something else, but it wasn’t that movie. Couldn’t have. If she had, and she cared about those kids, she’d be moving mountains to get them out of that sport.” I took that to mean “hound them.” If you meant something else, I’m sorry for misunderstanding. To me, mentioning it once does not equate to moving mountains.

If I was as close to a couple of kids as she says she is with those, I would be moving mountains to convince the parents to get them out of the sport. If that meant hounding, nagging, whatever, I would do it.
Your friend’s kids are a different story. You aren’t that close to them.

My tentative plan is to watch this movie tonight. Wild Saturday night with the concussion movie. Yaay!

Let me know what you think of it.

So did you watch it @jca?

Not yet. I think I looked for it two weeks ago (around the time we discussed it) and I think if I remember correctly it wasn’t on On Demand. I have to check Netflix and Amazon. The hard part for me is finding a time when my daughter isn’t home (so I can concentrate) and when I’m home and I’m not tired, at night.

I’m going to try this weekend by looking at Amazon and Netflix and seeing if it’s there.

@Dutchess_III: I just watched it. I was thinking it was a documentary, and I even came back on here to see if I had the correct movie, and I googled it, too, just to make sure.

I like it. Not the best movie in the world, somewhat predictable with the romance with the woman, but very interesting all in all. Good acting. I love Alec Baldwin.

I still don’t think the NFL is going anywhere or American football is going to disappear. As they said in the movie, they used a statistic (20 million?) people in this country watch football. When I was talking previously about all the money and jobs that are tied up in football, I forgot about gambling. So many people and so much money is involved in people gambling on football, too.

Still and all, even though I don’t think the industry or sport is going away, if I had a kid who wanted to play football, I’d try to discourage it or minimize it.

I would flat out forbid my kid to play it. I’d direct him to soccer instead. I see soccer taking over the #1 spot in the next 20 years.