The NFL: National Football League or Narrating Future Life?
Before getting married, I was what you would call a casual sports fan. With the exception of the Olympics, sports were an occasion not a way of life. However, in marriage things change and compromise is the goal. So I traded CSPAN and morning news for ESPN and Mike and Mike. Needless to say sports news is a part of daily life now. However, in recent years it has become the action of athletes off the field of play that has dominated the headlines as much as their accomplishments on the field. Names like Rice, Pistorius, Peterson, Hardy, and Hernandez have become synonymous with violence. But are these isolated incidents? Are they a result of on field competitiveness spilling over off the field? Or have the actions of society over the last several decades finally manifested themselves in the microcosms of professional sports for all to see?
In the cases currently tormenting the NFL, I believe we are reaping what we have sewn. Professional athletes are idealized. Here we have a profession where you essentially work half the year and make more money in one season than most people will earn in their entire life. This was not always the case. When Joe Namath was drafted his contract was for $427,000. This year’s first draft pick, Jadeveon Clowney, has a contract worth $22.3 million. Almost every male athlete I have taught believed he would go pro; none have.
Coupled with the idolization of athletes, the business aspect of sports has created a culture in which: regardless of your actions off the field, your talent is needed so much we can look the other way. This is currently evident by the actions of the Carolina Panthers. Nevertheless, this is not simply a pro sports issue. It exists at both the collegiate and high school level as well. At one high school I have been in, the football team had numerous players that 15 to 20 years ago would never have been allowed to tryout due to discipline infractions, let alone play. Today their behavior is excused away and they play on; teaching them that their talent is more important than their character.
We can’t simply blame the culture of pro sports though. We have to look deeper, and the news regarding Adrianne Peterson is a good place to start.
Reports differ as to the true nature of this incident, so let’s set aside specifics and focus on the issue—a parent disciplining his child ends up facing child abuse charges. No one should beat his/her child. That is not a debatable issue. That said, the government has no right to tell a parent how to discipline his/her child. Since the ‘80s government agencies have been stepping in anytime they feel a parent is in the wrong. The consequence of this has been parents failing to parent. This is evident in schools across the country. The biggest problem educators face is discipline; the lack of discipline on the part of students, and the inability of administrators to enforce discipline and these students are the ones entering pro sports today. They grew up, and are growing up, lacking discipline, idolizing athletes and have been trained to believe their “talent” will get them an easy ride.
We can blame the NFL all day. We can blame the mainstream media for placing these images in front of impressionable minds. We can even blame government for stepping in to where it does not belong. But until we hold ourselves, families, friends, and neighbors accountable for the parenting of their own children all the blame in world will do no good. Pro sports and the NFL are not isolated areas of incidents; they are simply the world stage in which future society is being showcased. Unless, of course, we change it.
Image courtesy of 27inarow.com
