Why do we worship football?
I love Ames High. I highly appreciate everything about the students, teachers and resources at our school. If I could choose to redo high school anywhere in the world, I would decide to go here. But that doesn’t mean I think our school is perfect. And what bothers me most about my school is our fanatical obsession with football.
Football is extremely, undeniably, dangerous. The concussion rate for high school football is by far the highest of any sport. Concussions, along with the small head injuries that football players endure, lead to serious neurological disorders
Chronic traumatic encephalopathy is one such progressive degenerative disease brought about by repeated head trauma. The disease can lead to memory loss, dementia, aggression, and depression, and it’s relatively common in football compared to other sports.
When Brett Favre stated a month ago in a radio interview that he will not be returning to the NFL with the St. Louis Rams, he also revealed that he now has serious memory problems. Favre did have a very long career in the NFL, but he also is a quarterback, which is one of the most protected positions in the sport. Linebackers and other players who take a lot of hits are usually more susceptible to these sorts of diseases.
Cross-sectional studies reveal other facts about football that most people would rather not know. About 40,000 concussions are suffered yearly among high school football players. A University of Northern Carolina study has shown that pro players contract Alzheimer’s disease at a rate 37% higher than normal. That study, along with multiple others, reports that their average life expectancy has been shown to be less than sixty years.
Football is the most dangerous sport played in high school. And yet, for some reason, it is the sport that we choose to cheer for the most.
Part of the lack of attention to other sports may because people enjoy watching football more than other sports, but that is not the whole case. When was the last time we had an assembly to get people excited for a track meet, or covered the school with posters to raise awareness about tennis? There used to be a rule limiting the number of posters a club could have up over the school to seven, but this fall you could see at least as many football signs without having to walk halfway down any hallway.
This amount of advertising might be more acceptable if we didn’t go on to give winter sports much less attention than fall sports, and spring sports barely any attention at all. It seems hypocritical to me that the leadership of our school can chide us for not backing football, and then gradually support other sports less and less throughout the year.
The administration has mostly done a great job with their stated goal of “helping students prepare for life after high school”. But football doesn’t prepare students for life any more than other sports, so it shouldn’t be such a disproportionately large deal here at Ames High. An extremely impressive 93% of the student body goes on to enroll in college, so scholarship should always be the first and foremost target to aim for.
I think the best way to increase school spirit is to show equal amounts of support for everything that we do. This means showing interest in all sports as well as other non-athletic activities and events.
Don’t mistake me for someone who doesn’t care about what people do in our school. l encourage most endeavors that students of Ames High take on, and I enjoy doing so. I just think that when we solely focus on football when attempting to bolster school spirit, we sacrifice the integrity of our school.
Congratulations to Connor for actually taking a step forward in writing what should be written about. Football has become such a touchy subject in everyones mind. You won 13 games or whatever in a row, great! There are other things that are just as important going on and why aren’t those brought to light? We are obsessed with football as a school, as a state, and as a nation. No offense to anyone who enjoys it, or plays it, just an opinion article on THE OTHER SIDE of the obsession. Props to you. Freedom of speech. Keep it up WEB.
Concussions are a serious injury and should be treated as such. Comparing HS football and Pro Football health issue is like comparing apples to oranges, Brett Farve played football until he was 40 years old, missed very few games and did unspeakable things to his body to recover from week to week. The players are significantly bigger, faster, and stronger in the NFL than they are in HS and the collisions are much more violent. What activities students choose to follow is up to them. Different cultures all have their most popular sports, in the most places in America that sport is football. Conner I appreciate your opinion, I just wanted to share mine.
Here is a link to a study that suggests there is no correlation between CTE, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, Dementia or any other brain deteriorating disease and playing HS football.
http://www.momsteam.com/health-safety/cte-what-risk-athletes-who-stop-playing-football-after-high-school
I remember when I paid an outrageous amount for the 2006 school yearbook only to find out that boys swimming had been completely left out of it. They were third in the state that year. In order to accomplish that several of the boys had to have qualifying times to even get there. There wasn’t even get an apology. My son was a varsity football player in addition to being a varsity swimmer so he was still in the book. Swimming is a year round sport however that takes a lot of dedication and stamina to stick it out. For many of those boys it was their only sport because it requires so much. The fact that they only participated in the one sport does not mean they are slackers by any stretch of the imagination but they were completely forgotten that year. I’m having trouble picturing that happening to football, anywhere, ever.
There is team spirit and there is school spirit. Perhaps it would be a good practice to have the football players attend and cheer some of the less visible sports and activities to bring it up to a whole new level? You know, a kind of lead by example thing. I think that would encourage a very positive atmosphere for everyone.
I think that this is completely true, and that we do worship Football to a certain degree. In my opinion, as an Ames High Soccer player, I was appalled at the lack of attention that was payed to all of the other sports last year, and during this years fall season. Only a few times was our Marching Band, which I am a member of, recognized for our hard work. We practice well into our own lunch time, in the cold and the heat to learn those performances for the people of Ames, and what for, getting recognized one time over the intercom and the so-called privilege to play at an assembly? If you ask me they should let us play at every assembly rather than planning to use that disgusting twenty year old recording of our band from when half of us weren’t even alive. Just because the football team had an amazing season of 13 straight wins and has a few of the best players in the state doesn’t mean that they need all of our attention. While I am proud of this school and the great season that the teams had, I am also inclined to say that I am disappointed in the way we flaunt Football and not Soccer, Track or Cheer. There are students who put in so much work when they practice and play, and unfortunately due to the extreme bias in this school, they are never recognized for it. Contrary to what seems to be the popular belief in this school, every other sport requires just as much effort and work, even Marching Band, and it infuriates me that the effort I put in both this year and last year, was recognized with only half-page or less, with the only picture or me in the yearbook for marching band was the large picture where nobody can even see their own face. I, honestly, am appalled at the way other student athletes are treated in comparison to the football players. Kudos to you for writing this article, Connor, and I hope that everyone sees just how correct you are.