Do Sports Foster Criminal Behavior?

This past season has been a particularly poor one for the NFL and its athletes. And that’s putting it lightly. In 2014, there were 59 arrests, citations or charges among NFL players. In 2015 alone, there have been 22.

There are two ways to look at these numbers. Either we can say there are plenty of crimes that happen in society committed by non-athletes every day, and this is just an example of there inevitably being bad apples in every bunch, or we can look at these numbers and conclude that there is a problem in the NFL that results in so many of its players to be linked to criminal activity. A closer look at the issue shows that there is some validity to the latter and it isn’t just a problem confined to the NFL.

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There is always going to be some sort of flaw in data collected. The data looked at for the purposes of this article is based on the number of players arrested, cited and/or charged with a crime. It only includes those arrests, citations or charges reported in the media, so there are presumably a few that have gone unreported. It also includes those who have had charges dropped, so presumably there are people innocent of any wrong-doing included.

However, even accounting for this, there are problems so prevalent that it outshines the few who may potentially be innocent. One obvious way this is seen is in cases of domestic violence. Many players have been arrested and even charged with domestic violence against a partner, but due to the nature of the crime and very complicated reasons, often times victims don’t want to testify against their abusers, and so charges have to be dropped.

There are also many other ways for athletes to get out of being charged or found guilty of a crime. From being well-liked to having connections in law enforcement, players find ways to evade charges all the time. While there are flaws in the data presented, there are also inherent flaws in the way our society deals with athletes that have to be taken into account alongside any outlier cases that may exist.

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The problem of athletes committing crimes isn’t solely confined to the NFL, though that stage has had the most spotlight in past year and a half. College football is just as bad as, if not worse than, the NFL for many reasons.

College football is a much more expansive system than the NFL, with many more teams and players, an entirely different structure, and an entirely different mindset. It is only natural that with such a large scale there are going to be more offenders than in the NFL. However, the numbers still seem unsettling. In 2014, there were 245 arrests, citations or charges among college football players. In 2015, there have been 64.

Many arrests in both the NFL and college football have gone unheard of at the national level, however, there have been an alarming number of stories that have made it to the national media that highlight extensive problems with athletes. Most notably have been Ray Rice, Adrian Peterson, Jameis Winston, and Josh Shaw.  Though these are only a few instances, they have brought light to many issues that have plagued the athletic world.

According to The New York Times and USA Today, from 2000- September 2014 there are 713 instances of athletes facing criminal charges or arrests of some sort. The most common is Driving Under the Influence (DUI) with 202 players charged or cited. Given that only the primary crime is cited by these sources (i.e. the most serious if two or more crimes were noted in the same instance by the same player), it is safe to assume that these criminal acts didn’t result in any harm to others. However, the next two highest categories are very alarming because they deal directly with these players harming others. 88 players were charged or cited with assault and battery, and 85 were charged or cited with domestic violence.

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In a sport that is inherently violent, it is a wonder we expect non-violent behavior from these athletes. As a society, we expect these players to be trained to hit and knock down anything that is in their way, and to stop the other team from scoring at almost any cost, and then we expect them to turn around and be model citizens. We teach them to apply what they learn on the field to their everyday lives, but expect them to distinguish on their own which parts are acceptable to transition over and which parts are not. We take athletes and make their decisions for them for the majority of their lives, from when to go to practice, to what to eat, to what classes they can take and what majors they can declare, to when they can talk to their friends, whether it is by their parents and guardians or their college coaches and athletic administrators. Then we throw them out the door when they decide to go to the NFL and we wonder why they can’t make proper decisions for themselves; we wonder why they don’t know right from wrong.

They’ve never had to know right from wrong, unless it has to do with which route to take or which block to make. They’ve never had to make a decision for themselves. They’ve never been given autonomy and then suddenly they’re expected to act like they’ve been doing it their whole lives and have perfected decision making to a T, when most of society hasn’t even done that without these circumstances forced upon us. We can’t expect these players to know things they haven’t been taught or had the chance to learn. We certainly can’t teach these players violence their whole lives and not expect some of them to lash out at some point.

Violence in any context isn’t permissible. These athletes can’t be given a pass because they didn’t know better. The law is the law, and what they did is still wrong. However, it does show society the role we plays in this cycle of violence, and it is time we stepped up and took responsibility for that role.

Why I Might Stop Watching Football

Anyone that knows me knows how much I love sports. I’ve always said baseball is my religion and football is my political ideology. Given the events that have taken place this year, I’ve never thought that to be more true.

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The sport of football has seen a very tumultuous year. We started off on a great note when a Raven’s player wanted to use the Super Bowl to promote gay rights. That, however, led to a 49ers player saying a lot of not so nice things about gay people. While many football players (and athletes in general) came out and said they disagreed with him, it still exposed this football culture that has been cultivating, and that, as fans, we largely have ignored. In hindsight, this story was really the match that started the forest fire as it were.

In November, we learned that the NFL had plans for a gay player to come out and remain active, a first for professional football, but it fell apart. There are many different reasons attributed to why, but none of them really matter. The fact is no NFL players came out, even after Jason Collins, an NBA player wrote an article for Sports Illustrated stating he was gay, and there was relatively little backlash.

Of course, in all fairness, we should consider the fact that he isn’t playing for any team this year. Him being past his prime and not playing well last season only further muddies whether he hasn’t been signed because of his sexual orientation or because of he just doesn’t play basketball at an elite level anymore. Still, most would say at least progress has been made in basketball, whereas we have yet to see any in football.

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Though it happened at the end of 2012, Jovan Belcher killing his girlfriend and himself in a murder-suicide no one could have seen coming was a big story. It seemed to be an isolated incident, until people started saying that he had a problem with concussions. Though the team came out and said he didn’t have a history of concussions, it still opened up talk about the impact the sport has on the lives of players after their finished with their careers. People immediately pointed to the suicides of past players, like Junior Seau and Dave Duerson, that have been blamed on concussions they suffered from football. All of this led to a documentary that was being made, titled “League of Denial“, that focused on the NFL’s mishandling of concussions. However, in August ESPN pulled out of the documentary, and many said Roger Goodell and the NFL played a large part in pressuring them to do so. Naturally, he and the league denied those claims. Regardless, this incident still highlighted a health problem running rampant in the NFL.

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Next we turn our attention to Steubenville, Ohio. In March, two high school football players were convicted of raping a 16-year-old girl at a party. The incident immediately grabbed the nations attention, thanks to it being tweeted and put on various other social media platforms by attendees of the party. Recently, four more people have been charged in the rape case, but this time those being charged are school employees. It has also been underreported that some of the charges being brought against these employees have to do with an entirely separate rape of a 14-year-old girl from April 2012. While it is clear people are being punished for what happened, it still brought to light some grotesque things and opened the discussion on the privileges football players and even coaches think they have just because they play, or are involved with, the sport of football.

We follow that discussion to the Vanderbilt rape case from earlier this year. I previously wrote an article about it, in which I discussed why everyone calling for the banishment of football due to this rape case was wrong. I stand by my point that football should not be done away with just because some people think it allows them certain privileges that they most definitely do not have.

However, if we look at this case within the narrative of football privilege we have seen this year, even specifically concerning solely rape, it’s hard to ignore the fact that the culture in football creates boys and men who think it is okay to do things like this, and who think they can get away with it, just because they play football. All of this is tied up in a larger discussion of why that is, and it comes back to football being a large-scale perpetuator of gender stereotypes, specifically “masculinity”. While this is an important discussion to have, for now, we will just focus on the fact that football does create this culture, and that both the Steubenville and the Vanderbilt case show that.

We can also see that in the Jameis Winston case. While he was not charged with anything due to lack of evidence, it is hard to believe that if a proper investigation had taken place the same result would have occurred. I would like to make one thing clear right now. No one ever said Jameis Winston did not rape that girl. It was simply determined they could not prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he did it. In our legal system, everyone is innocent until proven guilty, even if we aren’t given the chance to prove them guilty.

Now, onto the problematic issues with this case. It took almost an entire year for the case to brought to the State Attorney, and that only happened after the press made the story public. I am not shocked that after eleven months it was hard to find enough evidence to charge anyone of rape.

For whatever reason, I am also not shocked that during investigations:

A Tallahassee detective told an accuser’s attorney that Tallahassee is a “big football town” and her client’s life could “be made miserable” if she pursued a sexual assault case against Florida State quarterback Jameis Winston.

It almost seems straight from the script of a movie, a little too unreal. All of this stems from that great “football privilege” we see all too often.

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Next we look to the infamous Richie Incognito/Jonathan Martin scandal. I also wrote about this when it was happening, and all of the points I made still ring true. Bullying is a problem, but the way society views bullying is an even bigger problem. This is also a talk that comes back to the culture of “masculinity” perpetuated by football. When I read about the Incognito/Martin story, I can’t help but be reminded of this discussion that I have been a part of all too often this year.

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One final point I have to bring up is the attitude that fans have towards football. While we are so quick to condemn players, coaches, the NFL, the NCAA, and anyone else who may be involved in the sport, we hardly ever take a step back to look at ourselves and the way we both effect and are affected by the sport. When that gay NFL player was considering coming out, he said the one thing he was most scared of was not fellow player’s reactions, but the fans’ reactions.

After the Iron Bowl, a woman was shot and killed, because, as one witness reports, she wasn’t a big enough Alabama fan, and wasn’t disappointed enough when they lost.

That is crazy. That is the single most insane thing I’ve heard since I learned about H.H. Holmes.

Fans never cease to amaze me. They can be the most supportive people for their team, but they can also be the most destructive. More than in any other sport, fans of football tend to take their fandom to the extreme, getting mad when other fans aren’t as dedicated as they are, rioting when their teams don’t do well, and even sending death threats when a player does something they don’t agree with. While we see examples of this in any sport, it is much more exaggerated in football, and that ties back into the idea of football being the most aggressive and “masculine” sport in our society.

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I have been a football fan since the day I was born. It’s in my blood and it’s a large part of the way I identify myself. However, as I have made very clear, football is going through a rough time. Society is changing, and parts of the sport are attempting to change, but it is so rooted in antiquated notions and practices, that it seems almost impossible for it to keep up with society. Unless the very way we go about looking at football changes, the sport and all of the bad things that come with it are never going to change.

For that reason, my interest in the sport has been quickly dwindling. As I stated before, I always say baseball is my religion and football is my political ideology. I say this, because much like religion, baseball is something that just is in my life. Just like how people go to church every Sunday and celebrate Christmas and Easter, starting in March I watch baseball every day I can, and I celebrate Opening Day and the World Series.

Much like politics, football is something I just get and something I fell in love with from the second I discovered it. However, also like politics, football is something that I have grown to dislike the more bureaucratic it becomes, and the more isolated from reality it remains. While I’m not ready to completely give it up yet, each week I find myself asking the same question: is it even worth it anymore?

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Update:  It has been announced that the rights to “League of Denial” have been purchased and it may be turned into a feature film.

Throwing A Punch Does Not Make You A Man

As is the case with any breaking story, no one knows all of the details right away. Over time, new information has been brought to light, and we inevitably learn shocking new things about the severity of this situation. When I first heard the Jonathan Martin/Richie Incognito story, my initial reaction was shock. Not shock that this had occurred, but shock that a grown man playing for a professional football team stormed out of team facilities because he was being bullied. It seemed like something that would happen on a school playground, not in the NFL. Then I thought about it a little more. It must have taken an insane amount of courage to finally stand up and say “enough is enough” and remove yourself from the situation, especially as a male in a profession that requires you to be one of the toughest, strongest people in society. He would be seen as a wimp and a coward when all he wanted to do was play the sport he loved without fear of being harassed every single day.

Like I said, no one knew most of the details we know now when the story first broke. There are still many things we do not yet know. However, I was a little disturbed when I watched this video clip of ex-NFL players and commentators discussing this issue on TV. How could they possibly be blaming Martin? Not only were commentators finding fault in Martin, but his own teammates cast doubt on his credibility, and openly and overwhelmingly supported his aggressor. They’re not sure if they want him back on the team. His own coach told him to be more aggressive and physical about the situation.

Clearly there is something wrong with the way society is viewing this situation, and it speaks to a much larger issue. There are many problems with the way we view victims of bullying in this society, but the way we view and discuss adult and/or male victims of bullying is abhorrent.

Why is it so unfathomable that being made fun of and taken advantage of to no end, even as an adult, can be detrimental to a person? Why does a person have to have something mentally wrong with them if they’re bullied? Why does a man have to physically fight an aggressor to prove himself and his worth, when we teach children to not physically fight back when bullied?

A number of people have started speaking up about the way we look at bullying in this culture, but this is only the beginning. In order to effectively address bullying, we need to address the ways in which we allow, even encourage, bullying to happen. Part of that includes addressing the differences in our treatment of adult and child bullies and bullying victims. If we teach our children to handle situations in a certain manner, then we should not turn around and expect adults to act in the complete opposite manner. It should not be expected that Martin fight back or hit his bully, just because he’s an adult, just because he’s a man, or just because he’s a football player. Jonathan Martin did the right thing when he walked out of that facility, and we can only hope he set an example for others to follow.

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Update: For context, here is a great timeline of the events surrounding this situation.

Playing Football Does Not Make You A Rapist

Recently, I found out about a rather scary news story. Five football players were arrested this summer for the rape of an undergraduate student at Vanderbilt University. Then I found out something even scarier: I knew one of the football players.

In my research of this story, I had many questions, but more-so, I was in shock. I knew a rapist. I spent time with a rapist. I took classes with a rapist. I was facebook friends with a rapist. Oh, I’m sorry, “alleged” rapist. Sadly enough, I’m sure Brandon Vandenburg is not the only alleged rapist I’ll ever be able to say these things about, but that doesn’t make it any less scary or shocking.

Despite all my confusion, there was one thing that stood out to me on many of the articles I read: the comment section. Now I’m not one for reading internet comments, for very obvious reasons, but sometimes I scroll too far after I finish an article and get sucked in. This time, I did just that and was a little bit put off by some of the things I read. That’s not to say I’m not usually put off by the comments I read, because I am, but these didn’t seem like people just trolling YouTube videos. These people had serious problems with the sport of football and claimed it should be gotten rid of because obviously it was the reason these boys allegedly raped this girl.

I have a very big problem with that claim. I am a vocal advocate of getting rid of the rape culture this country is undoubtedly immersed in. I am also a big football fan. Thus, I found myself at a crossroads when reading these comments.

It does seem like we always hear about some athlete committing some act of sexual misconduct or some athletic department getting into some kind of trouble that involves inappropriate sexual actions (see: Penn State, Oklahoma State, Brett Favre, Ben Roethlisberger etc.). It also seems like we hear a lot more about athletes in general than the average joe. The logical conclusion would then be that we hear about more athletic sex scandals, because we hear more about athletic programs and athletes in general, not necessarily because they do more heinous things.

Rape is an extremely touchy subject, and for good reason. It’s not something to make light of or make excuses for. That being said, football is not the reason this girl was allegedly raped. Football did not turn those boys into monsters. A perpetuation of rape culture and the need for hegemonic masculinity in a patriarchal society did. The notion that men need to be dominant over women and the fact that that notion is spoon-fed to both boys and girl almost from infancy is what made those boys think this was an okay thing to do.

If we wanted to discuss why it took so long for these boys to face charges, or why they all didn’t immediately get arrested, then we could talk about the effect being an athlete, specifically a football player, has on not only the public’s perception of a person, but that person’s perception of themselves. If we wanted to discuss why this news story has not received much more national media attention than the miniscule amount it has, then we could talk about how football and being an athlete comes with certain privileges and preferential treatment not afforded to the average citizen. However these are not the most prominent issues I saw raised among the general public who were made aware that this incident had allegedly transpired. I saw an outcry for football to be banished, because five boys, who just happened to be football players, allegedly made an egregious mistake.

Football, and every sport for that matter, is a great part of our culture, each contributing to society in its own way and in turn being affected by that same society. Sports are a rich part of our history and culture and calling for the complete extermination of one of them is crossing a line that I wasn’t even aware existed. If we really want to solve the problem that is rape culture in our society, getting rid of sports is not the way to do it. Getting away from our inherently patriarchal society and changing the way people instinctively think about gender roles is a step towards solving the problem. It may be the most difficult step, but if a solution is to be reached, it is the only realistic step.