Should kids play tackle
football?
A great deal of concern has been expressed for the safety of high-school football athletes this
year. 11 athletes have died already in 2015, many more were seriously injured. Many parents are
now asking themselves, “should we be letting our kids play tackle football?”. I have to be fair
here. I don’t have kids, and I don’t express or feel the same cares and concerns that parents do
for the safety of their own kids. Football is a very physical sport. It would be easy for me to say,
“no pain, no gain”, or that “nothing you do worthwhile is ever a walk in the park.” Or, “maybe
you should rub some dirt on it and pick up the football.” We are in a time when the integrity of
football, and the safety of it has never been questioned more.
CTE is seen more and more in the media, and those suffering from CTE are pitied for what
they have to go through. The pile up of hits and concussions cascades into microscopic protein
deposits, known as TAU. The proteins wrap and tangle themselves around the blood vessels of
the brain. CTE destroys reason, it manipulates your mood, and hijacks your memory. Much like
alzheimer’s and parkinson’s disease, CTE does not give credence to your diet or exercise plan; It
is ruthless, and has no cure. As a progressive degenerative disease it only gets worse. Prevention
is the only solution.
Should kids be allowed to play tackle football? I think they should be allowed to. With proper
safety measures, better training, and better rule enforcement (when it comes to proper tackling);
injuries in football can be reduced. I think that football should be played the way that it has been
played, but I realize that the way it is played today (especially for kids), is hanging on a thread.
We can do something about it now. We take the small necessary steps to make the game safer or
we wait for something catastrophic to happen, and be forced to change the game in a much more
drastic way.
At least 11 high-school football players have died this year. That number is alarming,
