Football, dogfighting and brain damage.
October 19, 2009 7:08 AM   Subscribe

Offensive play: how different are dogfighting and football? Former Pittsburgh Steeler lineman Mike Webster died after spiralling down into drug abuse and homelessness. Ex-Steeler Terry Long committed suicide by drinking antifreeze. Former Eagles defensive back Andre Waters shot himself. The link; all had suffered severe brain damage as a result of their professional football careers. Author Malcolm Gladwell examines the problem of head injuries in football and wonders if something is profoundly awry in the relationship between the players and the game.
posted by The Card Cheat (14 comments total)

This post was deleted for the following reason: posted previously -- vacapinta



 
On the Blue only a week ago.
posted by Mali at 7:11 AM on October 19, 2009


Ah, crap. All that showed up in preview was the link to Gladwell's homepage. Well, delete away!
posted by The Card Cheat at 7:13 AM on October 19, 2009


how different are dogfighting and football?

How 'bout the fact that in football, the participants are voluntary? In fact, people compete heavily in order to participate.

The consequence of making bad life choices shouldn't necessarily be death, but sometimes it is. Hopefully more people will learn this lesson because of the exposure these stories have gotten, but comparing it to dogfighting is a little iffy.
posted by hermitosis at 7:14 AM on October 19, 2009


Back when the Vick dogfighting story broke, I had a similar notion. Oughtn't a football player recognize himself in those sporting animals? Oughtn't that recognition inspire some empathy?

Maybe for some. Maybe not for others.
posted by notyou at 7:14 AM on October 19, 2009


RTFA before you shit all over it, people.
posted by brand-gnu at 7:17 AM on October 19, 2009


Rugby players have a lot of head collisions and don't, as a rule, tend to spiral down into depression and delinquency. Although professionialism has, anecdotally, seemed to have coincided with more, or more publicized, incidents of wrongdoing.

Football, that is the game the rest of the world call football, does have its fair share of problems even though head collisions are rare (and long term brain injuries from heading the ball less common now, with lighter footballs). There is a lot more money in football and the players typically come from lower class backgrounds. How or why or if these factors in any are related is an interesting research point.
posted by MuffinMan at 7:18 AM on October 19, 2009


The article does mention him, but for those who are interested Chris Nowinski has been working on this issue for quite some time. As a former Harvard football player and WWE wrestler, he suffered from concussions that forced him to end his career and since then seems to have pledged his life to being an advocate for discovering more about the effects of sports injuries on the brain.

I've heard from people who have met him that he's a really nice and intelligent guy (he did graduate from Harvard, after all). He was also involved with the coroner in the Chris Benoit case, who found that the wrestler suffered from significant brain damage from multiple concussions that theoretically could have caused him to commit such an atrocity as murdering his family. The research led to the creation of the Benoit Family Fund for Brain Injury Research, one of the only good things to come out of that awful situation.

Just a bit of extra information for those who are curious.
posted by HostBryan at 7:19 AM on October 19, 2009


I get the sense that a lot of guys who fight dogs see their dogs as a reflection of themselves. Sadly, the parallel tends to be "we're both man enough to take it" rather than "if you prick us do we not bleed?"
posted by nebulawindphone at 7:21 AM on October 19, 2009


Oh. Gladwell. ...
posted by Inspector.Gadget at 7:26 AM on October 19, 2009


How 'bout the fact that in football, the participants are voluntary? In fact, people compete heavily in order to participate.

Is it? Your second sentence is a red herring.

Consider: Football players are largely drawn from an economic underclass. In fact, they themselves often say they compete so heavily to escape the conditions. Is that really "voluntary"? Or is it coerced, the same way women are coerced to have sex with their bosses to keep their jobs, etc?
posted by DU at 7:27 AM on October 19, 2009


DU, wtf?
Go to any high school anywhere, any economic class, as diverse or not as you like. Find the (American) football players and ask them if they want to compete in the pros. The overwhelming majority, and I mean overwhelming, not only want to, they DREAM of it.
Now compare asking the same question about women and bosses and the responses you are likely to get.
I can't wrap my brain around what you were trying to say, because your analogy just doesn't compute to me.
posted by forforf at 7:35 AM on October 19, 2009


Football players are largely drawn from an economic underclass. In fact, they themselves often say they compete so heavily to escape the conditions. Is that really "voluntary"?

Your comparison of underprivileged men pursuing football pip-dreams to women being sexually coerced in the workplace makes me wonder if you've had a few head injuries yourself.
posted by hermitosis at 7:35 AM on October 19, 2009 [3 favorites]


The difference is I could care less if some steroid pig snaps his neck for the entertainment of lite beer drinkers.
posted by 2sheets at 7:38 AM on October 19, 2009


Consider: Football players are largely drawn from an economic underclass. In fact, they themselves often say they compete so heavily to escape the conditions. Is that really "voluntary"?

Yes.
posted by grubi at 7:40 AM on October 19, 2009


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