Forum Post: Does the NFL hold the answer to how government should work for the people???
Posted 12 years ago on Feb. 3, 2012, 4:21 p.m. EST by Zebby
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Did anyone see the 60 Minutes piece on the NFL last Sunday. It was a high level view of how the NFL operates. It regulates the league by sharing the revenue across all teams to ensure the viability of all. It also arbitrates any disputes between owners and plays and basically plays the middle man that ensure the success of the league of a whole. They also have a congressional exemption to operate as a monopoly.
I found it interesting from the point of view that it represents capitalist interest the owners, employees and the public and thought that if we could bring the best feature of it's organizational model to bear on the public arena then we would all be the better for it.
Imagine what the NFL would look like without the player's union.
Buy American; join a union.
I didn't see the 60 mins piece. But, I've been aware of the sports/politics alliance for a long time. It's not just the NFL. I remember taking a sociology course in college many moons ago and studying the impact that sports has on just about everything in our society and economy. I'm not a sports fan so I found this to be very interesting and also very disturbing. I really never could understand how watching a game could have such a powerful effect on people but it does and it also affects how people relate to each other, how they work with others, how ego driven they are and affected by competition. Remember the gladiators of Rome? And remember too that Rome fell. The disturbing part is that so much money is invested in sports for a reason- a reason that your government helped to create and sustain and lately it seems that some folks are also attempting to make sports a sort of spiritual /religious experience ( just like the gladiators) which works well for the conservative agenda. I can't think of any religion on earth that condones competition. Most religions teach that we are to be without ego, never to consider ourselves better or worse than anyone else, not judge, not have pride ( gloating). Yet,athletes pray before games..for what? Safety? Winning? Seems rather shallow to me and certainly not Christian.
Over the years, sports has become so violent and the fans are just as violent. Americans love this violence. They have become so desensitized to crave even more violence. I can't believe how many deaths are attributed to fan fights each year. I couldn't help but notice Penn State fans crying when their coach was arrested. Did it ever occur to them once that this man was selfish and cruel and knowingly allowed boys to be abused by his assistant? If my child was there crying I would be absolutely appalled. I heard folks say that they didn't care about what Michael Vick did as long as he scores points for them. Have we no spine anymore? Since when does a score matter more to someone than the the athlete's character? I've noticed too that no matter how bad the weather is or how dangerous the roads are, the game will go on even if it puts others' lives at risk. It's all about money for the locality and it's all about making Americans competitive animals that will work even harder and send more money up to the 1%. War is more popular among sports fans because war really is a sport to a much larger degree. It's about who wins and who loses and we make the winners, heroes in sports just like we do our veterans. I wonder if the veterans of war feel insulted when Americans call Michael Vick their hero? It's also disturbing why and how many become athletes. I believe that most athletes are being used to promote competition in our culture. How is it that someone who can snowboard or kick or hit a ball can earn millions a year but a scientist or engineer only earns a fraction of that. Surely, folks realize that it's ludicrous for an athlete to earn so much money. Yet they have a profound value in our society because if it wasn't for these athletic animals out there stimulating the adrenaline surge in everyone then we may not be as competitively driven as we are as a nation. I think it's wonderful for folks to get outside and get exercise and learn to play on teams but I wonder how many parents would let their kids play on a school team that didn't keep score? Apparently this was tried a few times and the parents were outraged that their kids had no way to measure their success. Americans measure their success by comparing themselves to each other and this keeps the economy moving since they will keep pushing themselves to achieve greater success that equates with more money, more material things, bigger and better all the time. This works well for those at the top but ultimately, most americans wind up with a lot of stuff and very little happiness.
Even though they share revenue and all that, there are still teams that are much more successful than others. Just look at the upcoming Super Bowl which is a rematch from a few years ago. New England and New York have teams that are very good year in and year out while others have not even won a playoff game in years. Revenue sharing (in the NFL or otherwise) will not breed equality because some people are naturally smarter and stronger than others.
But they all have the same shot, same quality helmets, equipment, etc.
And I don't think the NFL really cares which team wins as much as it cares whether the teams bring in fans. A good example is my state's team, the Carolina Panthers. I think they went something like 2-15 this season, yet I still saw fans tailgating outside near the stadium at 8am in Charlotte in near-freezing temperatures.
As long as those die-hard fans keep showing up, the NFL is happy. The teams are doing their part to provide an exciting entertainment experience to millions of people every week, and they are compensated for that performance.
But they have different coordinators, different scouting departments, different training facilities, etc. Even though their revenue is equal, some people are a lot smarter and able to do more with their revenue.
True. But the fact remains that they all have essentially the same shot. Its not like the Atlanta Falcons starts each season with an automatic 0-3. They have to win or lose each game, just like every other team.
Compare the relative equality of the NFL teams to say, a couple of Computer Programmers. If programmer A graduated from MIT, and programmer B couldn't afford to go to anything better than his local community college that taught COBOL, which one has the best shot at landing a good job in the field? Did they both have the same opportunity to achieve the same goal, OR was one of these people fortunate enough to have the funds/parents/good credit to attend the better school?
p.s. COBOL is an outdated language used in the 80s on mainly mainframe machines. Programmers who use this language are referred to as "dinosaurs."
Post-college, obviously the MIT grad has a better shot at a good job.
I don't agree though that people need funds/parents/good credit to go to a better school. Expensive schools usually give out more financial aid and loans can always make up the rest. I went to one of the better dental schools in the nation without any of those 3 things.
That being said, I feel like it is too easy to get student loans. Nevertheless, almost everyone that wants one can get one.
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