I just listened to an Intelligence Squared Debate about whether college football should be banned. The debaters for the ban were Malcolm Gladwell (author of The Tipping Point and NY Times staff writer) and Buzz Bissinger (author of Friday Night Lights). Those against were Tim Green (former player for Syracuse and the Atlanta Falcons also a lawyer and high school football coach) and Jason Whitlock (writer for Fox Sports and former player at Ball State) Some very interesting and passionate arguments on both sides and worth checking out if you are interested in the topic. http://intelligencesquaredus.org/index.php/past-debates/ban-college-football/ To sum up the arguments: For the ban. Football is very dangerous due the amount of repeated hits to the head that players are subjected too. This is likely leading to long term neurological damage and psychological problems of the kind that drove Junior Seiau to kill himself. Football is also a distraction to colleges and takes up an inordinate amount of money and resources. The benefits of football could be met by other means. Against. Football funds a lot of other college sports and teaches important life lessons to students while providing academic opportunities to poor students. Football players graduate at a higher rate than other students. Football is no more dangerous than other sports. Football provides a unifying aspect to schools. This is America where dangerous sports like football should be allowed.
Ban college football? No... I'd be pleased as punch if college football were to break away from the NCAA/Academic circle altogether and become semi-pro league of its own, though. Seems like a lot of people would benefit from that.
That was one of the suggestions brought up by the side for the proposition. They even stated the schools could have some licensing system and just license their names to a new organization. This wasn't brought up specifically by the against side but a couple of issues I can see with doing that is that it would remove the funds that football brings to college and also would then deny the educational opportunity that football scholarships bring in.
Most college football programs lose money, IIRC. Some, significant amounts. The UT's and Ohio State's of the world are the exception, not the rule. And the "educational opportunity" thing... as heartless as this sounds, I really don't care about. Most of those kids are underqualified students to begin with, it would suck for those that aren't, but not everybody is going to win in any scenario that it put forth. Although I'm sure kids that aren't academic underachievers would be less apt to take up football in high school (which might be a good thing to dissuade them from) if it wasn't going to land them a scholly. Unless of course they wanted to play professionally, in which case, more power to them and go knock yourself out in the new semi-pro league. The counterpoint to the "lack of educational opportunity" thing is the "greater earning potential/opportunity" that a semi-pro league would open up. I'm sure lots of guys who would've otherwise fallen through the cracks (screwed up in school, not good enough to go pro, etc) would love the opportunity to earn a living on the field or in the front office of a semi-professional football team. Point is, most kids suffer and are exploited under the current system we have running. This system would empower them and give them actual choices. Of course, there's nothing saying that college football couldn't exist right alongside this semi-pro league. Giving those who are actually concerned about getting an education the chance to play football and earn a degree at the same time.
I think some football programs lose money, but unless I'm mistaken, that's actually the exception. Most *athletic departments* lose money, but they tend to have profitable football programs (and occasionally men's basketball) and lose money in most other sports. With UT and others, the football profits more than overcome the other losses. But with other programs, football doesn't make enough to cover all the other sports.
You're right, it's ADs. http://californiawatch.org/dailyrep...e-college-athletic-programs-losing-money-4121 It's more like half for football.
if the argument is safety, then I guess high school football should be banned first. And the NFL too. And if we're worried about things that are a distraction to colleges and take up an inordinate amount of money and resources, then we're going to have to ban girls .
THe argument is a lot more sophisticated then that - but the obvious answer is that NFL football players are compensated for the tremendous risks they take; whereas college football players are banned from being compensated.
- There's two sides to that coin however. Under Title IX, when you have 85 scholarships devoted to football, that means you are legally obligated to have 85 additional, usually non-revenue generating scholarships in womens sports...unless there's a real possibility of title IX's repeal I don't think it's fair to divorce that from the cost equation.
That's certainly true - but I think the football finances aspect just means that getting rid of football would hurt the other sports that aren't considered so dangerous. It would do it by taking away important revenues, or it could do it by eliminating 85 scholarships in those other sports. Either way, banning football would eliminate lots of other sports.
Might as well. Partial allowance just seems delaying the inevitable of disallowing all levels of tackle football completely
It definitely would. Or else maybe those other sports would be put back down to the club level - not really sure if that's such a bad thing? I mean gender equity in colleges in universities as a whole is pretty good in current state, even outside of athletics. I can't think of that many compelling reasons why a girl who plays lacrosse or whatever needs extra help subsidizing her costs over any other student. I think overall with the skyrocketing costs of college educations, the unbundling of costs is probably desirable, to some extent. Another somewhat tangential point - the "studies" - and I use that term loosely since it was done by the fools at Forbes based on limited data, IIRC - have tended to focus on football's profitability at BCS conferences. When you add in the rest of FBS (let alone FCS and the rest....) I'm going to assume the amount of profitable football programs drops precipitously. So for every Texas etc that's killing it, there's a bunch of schools like UTSA or Rice or whatever that are spending huge amounts chasing the impossible dream....
