My soon to be 10 year old step-son wants to play football. I guess this should not come as a surprise. He has watched me get entertained by the sport for as long as he can remember. I taught him how to throw a football, run a crisp stop and go, and had many discussions with him about the history of the game and the players I respected for their gutsy performances on the field. But should we (my wife and I) allow him to play this dangerous sport?
It is often assumed, and for good reason, that children are not in a position to give consent because they cannot properly weigh the costs and benefits that certain actions or procedures would have on their lives, both at the moment of action and in the future. Because of this parents are looked to for consent under the assumption that most parents can properly weigh the costs and benefits. Consider a minor taking a job (in film for example), or when a child needs surgery or an invasive medical procedure. Parents must weigh the risk of the job or procedure and deem if the benefits outweigh the harm. In weighing the risks and rewards of playing organized American football I cannot, in good taste, feel comfortable claiming that children should be afforded the opportunity to play. In fact, I do not think children should be allowed to play. The more I think about it the more apparent this conclusion becomes. In what follows I will offer some of the considerations that have pushed me to believe this.
Injuries : Concussions are serious! Especially for an undeveloped brain. Children’s heads are 90% that of their adult size by the age of 4 yet the muscles in their neck take longer to develop (see here). Because of this, children are not very good protectors of their brain. They cannot brace themselves for the hits they receive which makes it easier for them to get a concussion, an injury that is already prevalent within the sport. Not to mention the unnecessary wear and tear on their joints. This puts them at a higher risk for arthritis later in life.
Availability of Alternatives : With so many other sports offering up a great way to get outside and be active (with far less chance of injury) it becomes difficult to justify the need to allow my children to play.
These points aside you might ask what ever happened to letting kids be kids. I hear this phrase a lot and I feel its intuitive pull. But the phrase is not an argument in and of itself for why it is permissible for parents to let children play organized tackle football.
Could someone who thinks it is morally permissible to let their child play tackle football (some children begin playing at age 5) engage with me in an open discussion about why we should or should not allow children to play tackle football? Thanks in advance.
Also, another great question that arises from the discussion tends to be this, if we agree that we should not let them play football are we sending the wrong message by watching the sport with them?
Here is a link to some research done as to why children should not play until the age of 14, however, the reasoning by the authors could, or so I think, be extended a bit further to college age (see here for problems with high school football).
What do you think? Does the claim that we should not allow kids to play football open the door to the charge that we are over-parenting or being over-protective? Is that charge warranted?
What’s your take?
A Philosopher's Take 
Daniel Goldberg (@prof_goldberg)
June 10, 2013
I come to the same conclusion as you (that children should not be permitted to play American football). Of course, saying as such in terms of policy is quite different from a family policy, i.e., your own considered judgment as to whether to permit your own progeny to play the sport. (Although I suppose one could invoke parens patriae to argue for an analogy, but the scope is so different between the state making a population-wide decision and your decision that impacts exclusively your own family).
However, a colleague of mine pointed out that we permit children to do all sorts of dangerous things aside from playing football, e.g., skiing, hockey, motocross riding, soccer, and/or driving a car in adolescence, etc. Should we ban children from participating in these activities as well?
One other interesting tidbit here is a National Public Radio story I heard regarding a Delaware physician who is urging the municipality to adopt such a ban. One of the important facts here is the idea that learning how to play football at a high level does not require years of training at a very young level. The argument is that just a few years of play and practice can prepare one sufficiently (so, say, starting at 14 rather than 7 or 8). This latter does not solve the problem, of course, since 14-year-olds are almost certainly of elevated risk of 1) experiencing mTBI 2) of greater severity than, say, 25-year-olds, but if there is no reason to expose younger children to such risks even internal to the ends of the sport and its industry, whatever ethical justification could we divine for doing so?
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Justin Caouette
June 10, 2013
Great points! I am hoping someone will chime in to provide some ethical justification for allowing children to play.
Your question about banning other dangerous sports is a tough one. I think one who claims we should ban children from playing American football must also be committed to banning sports with similar levels regarding risk of injuries. I’m not familiar with the rate of injury or in general the types of injuries associated with many of the sports you mentioned but at first glance I think hockey would have to go, but soccer would not. I am not in a position to compare as I haven’t researched the the risks but given both my experience with soccer and the nature of the sport I would think that the risks of severe brain injuries were far less than in American football. I was not nervous when he asked to play soccer but I was quite uncomfortable when he asked to play American football. This may be unjustified but for now I’ll stand by it.
Point well taken regarding the risky things we often allow our children to do though. I do not want to suggest we bubble wrap our kids, I just think we should minimize their ability to be severely harmed by directing their energy toward sports that are less risky. I’m all for “kids being kids” as long as the venue and activity is reasonably safe.
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Daniel Goldberg (@prof_goldberg)
June 10, 2013
Well, I’m a public health guy through and through, so I am mostly unsympathetic to concerns of paternalism when it comes to population health. Gostin & Gostin have an elegant take on this here: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19249800
But again, the justification for paternalism in the name of population health might diverge from that required for paternalism in the name of one’s own family (lesser or greater justification, even).
Re soccer, I played the sport my entire life (South African by birth), and my understanding is that the risk of mTBI is actually quite high given aerial play (so in many leagues they are increasingly prohibiting headers, etc. Imagine!) See, e.g.: http://ajs.sagepub.com/content/26/2/238.short
(Although for obvious reasons we do not have good prevalence estimates in youth and adolescent soccer).
That said, I share your sense that American football is riskier both in terms of the likelihood of mTBI and of the severity, but only a comparative study can tell us for certain.
Your last sentence is fascinating, since the devil of course is in the extension for the predicate “is reasonably safe.” I find it increasingly difficult to accept the plausibility of an argument that American football could satisfy whatever criteria we might develop.
Great post!
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Paul F. Lenzi
June 10, 2013
First, I’m surprised you conflate morality with ethics. Second, parental responsibility for the “safety” of children is routinely abrogated in countless ways that are more egregious and certainly unethical. I wouldn’t judge a parent for either granting or denying their football permission. Life is a risk and every endeavor, every one, has danger. IMHO, the overprotection of children, not to mention citizens, is already quite out of hand,
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Justin Caouette
June 10, 2013
Paul, could you explain where you find the conflation and what you understand the main difference to be between the concepts of morality and ethics?
To be clear I’m concerned in this post with 2 things. First, I’m concerned with what I ought to do regarding allowing my own child to play this sport. Secondly, and piggy-backing on my first concern is that more generally, I’m concerned with this question; should the practice of parents consenting to their children playing such dangerous sports be permissible? It seems to me, in the absence of good reason to believe otherwise, that allowing one’s child to play is not the best idea, or at least that’s what I hinted it in my piece. I only offered considerations as to why we should not consent to our children playing. I have not judged the parent that does (my own parents allowed me to play), I see this more as an open invitation for those that believe allowing the youth to play such dangerous sports is permissible to offer reasons why.
I agree that their are more egregious and more unethical examples where parental responsibility is dismissed. However, I do not think that point affects the considerations presented here with regards to parents allowing their children to play American football.
Regarding your last point: could you refer to some examples of the “over-protection of children” that you claim is “out of hand”? Specifically, physical protection which is what I am appealing to in this piece.
Lastly, I agree that almost everything presents risk, and as I mentioned in the comments to Dan Goldberg I do not think we should have our kids running around in bubble wrap. That being said I’m sure you will find some things too risky for kids. And, the point of this post was to try and better understand the position of those that think the risk of playing football outweighs the seemingly high risk of serious injury. The post was not intended as a direct condemnation of those that believe allowing their kids to play at a very young age is morally permissible. Though I suppose I can see how one could take it that way.
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amy
June 10, 2013
I don’t think I ever thought of it that way. I also was unaware of tackle football even being an option at age 5! That, I will agree, is way too young. 14, however, is a good age as long as the emphasis is put on safety and not “win at any cost.” Before the age of 14 I believe kids should get the background, if they want to and if their parents allow it, to the sport by playing flag football. That way they get the fundamentals down without the dangers of concussions or broken bones. You definitely brought up some good points, and I will admit that I was thinking you were mean by not allowing your kids to partake. But I get it. Afterall that’s why I was in marching band LOL =)
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samkhan13
June 11, 2013
ah yes u talk like a parent instead of a philosopher 🙂 that is actually a good thing 😛 i highly advocate that u listen to ur emotions because they are far more evolved than the analytical skills of all of us put together. when thinking inhibits thinking, feelings come to the rescue.
now, how old were u when U first played full contact football? when u got into ur first brawl? when u broke something in urself by falling from somewhere? when u smoked ur first joint… well, it’s all going to happen to us if we are lucky 😉
ur parents and society got to experiment with u and now it’s ur turn… just take ur best guess in being a good example to ur kid(s) like ur parents and teachers did. they couldn’t have been so wrong. in the end u still turned out to be a morally contentious dad, didn’t u? u definitely have the important questions even if u don’t immediately have the veridical answers.
none of us r born with a preprogrammed mind or skill set. our genetical build only pushes us so far as to help us gain resources from our environment. things develop in due course of time, especially answers to fundamental questions.
i don’t have children but if i did i would only ask of them to learn how to learn and excavate the “first principles”. i don’t think i could design their lives, restrict or permit things or somehow influence them in a manner that wasn’t already granted unto them. at best, i might be a compendium of hints to my kin and kith. but, one who does not know how to learn won’t be able to make anything out of hints or anything else. even the sky above, the earth below and the horizon afar can be a teacher to the one who wishes to learn.
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