Is it time to retire 
American Football?

Today is the Day! Football fans across the country will be glued to their TV sets if they are not already in the city or the stadium to watch in person the greatest spectacle of the year in American sports.

At what cost, one might ask? And why this fascination with football?

Let's cut to the chase. Despite all the strategy and art that is associated with football, the primary attraction of football is the violence inherent in the game. Yes, violence. Fascination with violence has been a human weakness, perhaps forever. Violence may have a purpose of last resort. But violence for entertainment has no seeming purpose.  Today the Philadelphia Eagles and Kansas City Chiefs will entertain some 60,000 fans in the Glendale, AZ stadium and millions upon millions on TV screens across the country, just as gladiators entertained massive crowds in ancient Rome, until the first Christian emperor of Rome banned the gladiator fights because there was no place for it in times of peace.

Now all this may seem to be an exaggeration. Is it? Gladiators fought sometimes in choreographed fights, but often in fights to death. Costs to society didn't matter a whole lot way back then. Consider the costs today. 

Various studies show that the short term cost of concussions and other contact injuries run up into billions of dollars, and the long term cost keep rising. Guess who pays for this healthcare and other expenses? Not the promoters of the game, for sure. The average citizen is stuck with the bill.

Competitive sports have undeniable value in building one's character. Contact sports where violent contact is an undeniable feature of the game has more downsides than a society should tolerate. The cost for this entertainment is too much to pay.

It is time to change American football in a meaningful way, so that character not entertainment is the primary driver of the game, perhaps to the dislike of the game's promoters.

Why not just play soccer? Much of the world does.