Football – A political issue?

from The Gray Area:

Foot is now a political issue. The President made it so with this proclamation that if he had a son he would think long and hard about allowing him to play football. But in reality Football has been a political issue. Progressives have had it in their sights for 100 years. Now they have new ammunition for the battle, chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a progressive degenerative disease, which can only be definitively diagnosed postmortem in individuals with a history of multiple concussions and other forms of head injury.

Any parent, and for that matter any child knows that football is a physical sport that is dangerous. A kid will get bruised and battered, could break a bone, could get a concussion, concussion could cause brain damage, could get paralyzed and could even die. Most put the last two in a category of possible, but not likely. Now add CTE appears to add the third serious to the category of possible, but not likely. And, of course, the balance here is that you could get physically fit.

So what is different? Certainly the emotion of former NFL players and families describing in great detail on TV in PBS Frontline’s documentary, League of Denial, is enough to get anyone to stop and pay attention. But is the list of possible injuries the news? No. The news is that the NFL possibly covered up the new CTE findings. And, we all know that the cover up is worse than the crime.