Every Friday night, thousands of high school students across the nation flood to their high school stadiums. Whether they are there to actually watch or just to get swept up in the energy of the stands, everyone comes to be a part of the action. Football is the main attraction. The lights come on, music fills the sky, and fans shake the bleachers with cheers as the football players come marching forth. They are ready to win, ready to defeat, and mostly ready to shove aside whatever gets in their way.
This is the life of football. Do not just come ready to win. It is a game of violence and aggression. Be prepared to hurt. Parents and coaches a like watch with joy as their boys lay others out. Stands go wild with the winning tackle. Hardly anyone stops to notice the player wincing as he walks off the field with a now broken wrist. This approval of violence without much remorse also says a lot about society. In everyday life it would be considered immoral to run up to someone and knock them flat off their feet, but everyone puts these rules aside for football games. Society accepts that people are allowed to hurt others as long as it’s in a controlled environment such as a football field. Everyone in the stands expects football players to run people over, and this shows how good society is at making exceptions to the rules.
I’m not saying that everyone should just stop playing football all together since that would go over about as well as bikini in a blizzard, but there should be different reactions when someone is hurt or looks like they’re hurt. The source of the problem is the football players themselves. They argue that getting hurt is expected. Some have would applaud taking someone else out for the season. It’s not their fault if the team isn’t strong enough to stand up to them. Is this the new goal of the game? Instead of touchdowns, broken bones? Field goals become concussions. Should hurting the other team seem to go hand in hand with scoring points? It’s all about attitude. Is winning worth the violence? Yes, it’s a contact sport, but it shouldn’t be about the contact. It’s about winning not hurting. This means not high-fiving one’s teammate when someone knocks someone else out.