Are Contact Sports Destroying Our Youth’s Potential?

In the last 5 years there has been a huge enlightenment in the realm of contact sports. One of the biggest issues in our country, because of our intense love of competitiveness, is deciding whether or not it is ethical to let children play contact sports like football. I chose football as the blanket sport example for this because of the intense probing there has been in the last 5-10 years into the NFL and NCAA about trauma and head injuries to their athletes; even though these injuries are not just localized to these sports. Should parents let their kids participate in high-contact sports before the age of 15 (high school)? I have found some very convincing research that will open your eyes and give you a better answer to what will be safer for our children.

At birth, we have over 300 bones in our bodies, and by the time we reach adulthood they fuse together and we have a grand total of 206 bones. But what really happens during this period of about 18-20 years though? There is much more body growth and disproportion than anyone could imagine. According to doctors, “When you’re 5 years old, your head is about 90% its full size, and your mass is about 20%.” This means that your tiny body, with its tiny neck muscles, is supposed to support your enormous head in your everyday life. Now what happens when you add deliberate collisions and abnormal brute force to those areas that normal children do not normally see? There is no clear cut answer because we are still doing research on the matter, but it is definitely safe to say that it is potentially unsafe for the child…very unsafe. To put this into other terms: imagine sticking a toothpick into a lacrosse ball and supporting it with just that while hitting it will other toothpick-lacrosse balls. Do you see the problem now? Now, multiply that over 8+ years for the typical athlete that reaches high school and 20+ years for the elite that eventually turn pro. That is a HUGE window of probability for neck and head related complications and injuries to occur. There is no way I will let my children play high-contact sports like football before their bodies start to more fully mature.

It is safe to say that it is unsafe for a child to be involved in contact-related sports, but what about the adolescent whose body is a bit more developed? The adolescent years, from 13-18 years old, are the most pivotal years for our youth’s bodies to grow. They see the biggest spurts within this age range and this is when their bodies start developing from their late child stages into their matured adult bodies. It is key that the child’s body is able to grow unimpeded during these times. Anything that gets in the way of this process also has the possibility to adversely affect them for the rest of their lives. When I was thirteen, I played baseball very competitively and it took up most of my time and energy. During a tournament I stole and slid hard into second base and broke my right ankle on the growth plate. Luckily for me, my growth plate on my fibula had closed and I did not need to worry what could happen if they were not. Unfortunately, I had a friend whom broke his right head of his humorous on the growth plate during football practice. He was in a sling that they wanted strapped to his body, and they crossed their fingers that nothing bad would come of it. Their hopes were in vain, because the fracture happened to go directly through the growth plate and now, because of this injury, his right arm is shorter than his left. This has left him with an abnormality, but he somehow manages to keep it hidden to most people. I didn’t notice until a few years later because I had been away for a long time, but I know for a fact that he would not be living with this lifelong ailment if it wasn’t for his involvement in high-contact sports.

One huge argument that parents try to make is that these high-contact sports are good for developing character, building friendships, and molding the youth into the person that they will eventually become. There is much truth to this, because of the old adage: Adversity Builds Character. But why can’t we do that with activities that are not detrimental to our youth’s futures? In the same dissertation that the doctors talked about the size disproportion of the child’s head, they also talked about effective alternatives to these high-contact sports. Some would offer to limit the days that there is contact allowed in practice, to help reduce the risk over time, and others would say to drop the high-contact nature of the game completely. Their studies have shown that when children are taught proper form of any sort of activity that it colossally reduces the amount of major injuries they have when they are older. For example: regulating tackle-football down to flag-football and focusing on the technique and fine tuning other aspects of the game has 1) drastically reduced the risk of major head and knee injuries and 2) creates an environment where the children strengthen themselves to be more effective runners and eventually better players in the long run. Taking away the pads and turning tackle-football into flag-football does nothing to take away the cohesion that is made within players on the field. A good coach will know that it is possible for things to be tough without hurting his athletes.

It is possible for our children to gain the values taught through adversity and sport without it being dangerous and life-altering. The “macho-man” mentality of the past is slowly changing in the professional sports world today and it will eventually trickle down to our children. Even these last 10 years have shown us huge issues that have come up with ex-NFL players dying and their brains being offered to science. Their autopsies reported abnormalities from obvious years of trauma and damage to the scull, and even diagnoses of early onset dementia when they were alive. It is possible for my children to gain the benefits of sports without the agony and pain later in life, and that is why I choose to not allow them to subject their bodies to this punishment at that young of an age. Too much is at stake, and if nobody else stands up to defy the “macho-man” tendencies of our past, or our future does not look very bright for our children.

Imagine a pill was invented that cured all sedentary-related diseases (high blood pressure, obesity, etc.) In such a world, would humans still value play, games, and sport? What does that answer tell us about their ultimate value?

Human beings are known as being one of the most complex and diverse beings on the planet. We communicate in many different ways: verbally and non-verbally; and know more about ourselves than any other species could ever imagine. Our bodies are extraordinary structures that are designed to perform and adapt to every little thing we do over our lifetime. If the human race lived in such a world that invented a pill to “cure all sedentary- related diseases” we would be in more trouble than we thought we were saving ourselves from. Our skills and accomplishments did not come from somebody who sat their existence on the couch. Curing all sedentary-related diseases would not only kill us, but it would change the very fabric in which we built our lives. Valuing movement, of any kind, is what led us to where we are as a species, and here’s why…

If we take a look back into history a few thousand years ago, in Olympia, Greece, the most elite specimen of the human race were brought forth in a controlled environment to make a display of their movement, power, and grace. This even is now known around the world as the Olympic Games. The elite physical shape that these people were in was a spectacle for all to see. Their accomplishments through movement and sport helped other athletes to challenge themselves to become stronger and hone in on harder skill sets. As a result, we see their bodies changed and varied greatly compared to those whom did not compete in such activities. Now we know there is not necessarily much historical reference to whether these games contributed to a healthy or longer lifespan, but we know today through research that it is a very viable outcome to these events.

Modern medicine has advanced exponentially even over the last twenty years. We have researched into the infinite possibilities that could better ourselves as individuals and as a race. Research shows that living a “healthy and active lifestyle” can promote great health benefits. So, what happens if we cure what we are searching for in those health benefits? What are we left with? At a very young age we are told by our parents to go play outside, and to run around and make friends with our neighbors and kids that are our ages. A huge contributing factor to our parents forcing us to do this as a child is the health benefits involved in being active. I was told by my parents when I was young that I needed to be outside and run around and starting living an active healthy lifestyle now so that I am not as sick when I am older. I of course did not understand this at the age of 8, but I stayed outside and listened to them anyways. When other like-minded parents did the same with their children, I was able to socialize with them and make bonds of friendship. It is engrained in us as children to go outside and have fun by parents whom are hoping something totally different come out of it. For me, it was so that I didn’t become “weird,” and for others I learned that their parents were afraid they would turn out to have the same heart conditions and sedentary diseases that they have. Now, there are subliminally two different messages that are being conveyed into our “play” as children; One is for health benefits that only the parent truly understands and is the motivation to get them off the couch, and the other is to make friends. Our social networking has engrained that we value movement with benefits as children, but if we take out the contributing motivation (sedentary diseases that are obtained by the parents), then who will motivated them to go outside in the first place? What becomes the point of play and sports? I’ll tell you.

Now, this won’t be an immediate “doomsday” problem that people will see instantly, but it will be a cancer that spreads through generations to come. Without our parents pushing play on the children, why even socialize with people at all when we can do it from the comfort of our own homes without health consequences now? There are people that even do this today. I have friends that buy a new videogame and I LITERALLY don’t see them for 4 days straight because that is all they did in that time span. This “lazy cure” would only create more problems, but on a social level. People would become zombies to their technology and never need to converse or go anywhere with anyone. If we create the “lazy cure” I would also see that as a cure for hunger too. Why not? I’m hungry right now. What if I no longer had to be mobile and just needed to take a pill to cure that? Sport would become obsolete, and a complete joke to future generations. It wouldn’t be anything more than a TV show, or a historical documentary (depending the perspective you into it). Movement, socialization, migration, integration, and even information would eventually come to a halt. If no one needs to move, then there doesn’t need to be any news because literally nothing is going on in the outside world.

I may have blown this “lazy cure” a little bit out of proportion, but what is there to stop my thought process of this? George Orwell explained this in a different way in his book 1984. When someone controls your thoughts or actions, what is the purpose for what you do anymore? The same concept can be applied to the cure. If someone gives me the choice to continue what I’m doing and am perfectly content with, what’s the point in changing? The human drive is lost. The value of sports and games is multifaceted and complex. There are many little factors that add to its importance in everyday life that are just as equally necessary as the next. People need sport and games as children to help them grow physically and emotionally. Without the risk of death, we would not push ourselves to where we are today. Death is the motivator that drives us towards seeking better health benefits and accomplishments. Our will and drive to survive is what lights the fire under our loins, and to take that away would be like extinguishing the light in our flashlight in the dark. 

How do you balance risk taking, wellbeing, and living the good life when it comes to physical activity? How much risk is too much? How much does the enjoyment outweigh the risk?

When you ask someone to reflect on their life and to tell you what they enjoyed most about it, or to tell you about the most amazing memory they have, it is something extraordinary. Nobody wants to hear about the mediocre things you do day-to-day because it’s nothing that we couldn’t do ourselves. We like hearing people tell about their extraordinary stories because no two people are alike; which means no two stories are alike. People find comfort and meaning in the random and crazy things that they do and it is their way of balancing good from bad. So, how does one balance all the crazy risk-taking with their well-being and living a good life when it comes to physical activity? I would say it depends on the individual, so here’s some insight to how I would balance risks, well-being, and living the good life in my physically active life.

I believe that risk-taking is a MUST in order to contribute to a healthy life. It seems ironic at first though right? Risk is defined by Wikipedia as, “Risk: is the potential of loss (an undesirable outcome, however not necessarily so) resulting from a given action, activity and/or inaction. The notion implies that a choice having an influence on the outcome sometimes exists (or existed). Potential losses themselves may also be called “risks”. Any human endeavor carries some risk, but some are much riskier than others” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk). But I am the type of person that believes there must be risk involved to achieve a reward. Now, this risk doesn’t have to be something insane and death-defying, but when you go about things you do, you should quantify a risk that is involved with the benefit that you want. For example: Something simple, like wanting an aesthetically pleasing body, comes with the risk of training and muscle fatigue. A bigger risk would be something like waiting until the last possible moment to write this blog so you can still get your A in your Philosophy class ;). The reward however, would be intrinsic and gratify my internal accomplishment goals of doing a project well under pressure, and the A that I get from finishing it. Either way, in order to have value added to your life, there needs to be some sort of risk involved.

Promoting wellbeing is an essential balance to the risk taking you take in your life. Well-being is defined as, “Well-being or welfare: is a general term for the condition of an individual or group, for example their social, economic, psychological, spiritual or medical state; high well-being means that, in some sense, the individual or group’s experience is positive, while low well-being is associated with negative happenings” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Well-being). Since there technically is a little risk in everything that we do, well-being should be something that is low-risk with a high reward value. For example, something that I would qualify as promoting to my healthy well-being would be getting a full body massage. There is a slight risk of me being sore the next day and possibly sick from the toxins released by my muscles, but the overall benefits outweigh the risks involved.

Now, in the grand scheme of things, my risk and rewards principles coincide with one another. I used both to help gratify my physical needs to be healthy. The big question that people wonder now is: How much risk is too much? When does my enjoyment outweigh the detrimental consequences involved with every action? Newton stated that every action has an equal and opposite reaction, and just like in business, my body can relate to a Risk/Reward Ratio for business modeling as described in investopidea.com’s article for beginning investors. They define it in their terms of stocks and money as, “This ratio is calculated mathematically by dividing the amount he or she stands to lose if the price moves in the unexpected direction (i.e. the risk) by the amount of profit the trader expects to have made when the position is closed (i.e. the reward)” (http://www.investopedia.com/terms/r/riskrewardratio.asp). So what does this all even mean? In the beginning of my blog I stated that I like to do things extraordinary. I find pleasure in taking risks and see them as accomplishments that I can notch to my belt. So, I would find adrenaline-junkie types of activities exciting and gratifying to my well-being. Yes, there is a high risk involved in these activities, but I love the feeling of that rush of energy surging through my body, and all my senses firing on all cylinders telling me something could be wrong, but trusting that it isn’t. I plan to skydive someday. It is a very dangerous sport and I think it is just awesome. The completion of a skydive would trigger an incredibly beneficial emotional response to me, but there is a way to up the ante on the risk to a point where I would draw a line. That line is skydiving without a parachute and catching it in mid-air. I saw this done once by Travis Pastrana and I immediately knew that would be too much for me. He finds incredible joy in doing those things, I do not. I value my life and I need a little bit more protection and fail-safes to make the jump beneficial to my health and well-being.

In conclusion, I feel that it is necessary to have a little bit of everything present in your life. The monotonous days are there for you to push you to explore and move outside of your physical box; and those crazy adrenaline-junkie days are there to put you back into line, and to also reward yourself for just being awesome. After all, life is what you make of it, right? I want to be the grandpa that has all the amazing stories to tell his grandchildren when he is old and they are crowded around him at the dinner table at night. We all learn from mistakes, so make them while you’re young and learn from them; but don’t ever fail to take necessary risks, because if no one did we would not be where we all are today.

How Does Dualism Influence my Future Professional Behavior?

Over the course of the last few weeks I have been studying 3 different behavioral theories: Materialism, Dualism, and Holism. After much thought, I would classify myself as to having a Dualistic approach to things in life, and would use this approach in my professional future to help someone recover from their injuries. I want to be a physical therapist once I graduate and get my doctorate in physical therapy. I feel that once someone is in tune with their mind and body, they can reach a point of self-actualization that helps them do things more effectively and will push them farther as a person than any other theory would. One would ask, “How is that even possible? There are so many problems you encounter.” Let me explain…

In order to know why you believe something, you must do your homework and study the other theories and what they have against you. In my case: Materialism and Holism. Materialism is great, if you are an extreme science nut and only care about raw data. There are 3 different types of Materialism that Kretchmar explains for us in his book: Measurement, which explains that a person can be explained through empirical quantification; Monistic, which believes that a person is JUST atoms; and Reductive, which explains the person through its smallest parts. Now all of these are great, if you’re just looking to describe the outer shell of a person and their physical make-up. I’m sorry, but telling someone that they are just a collection of atoms and synapses firing that make up their entire being. They’re going to be wanting more than that, it’s just human nature to want more of an explanation of the things we can see and find. This thought process ultimately leads to the belief of Physicism, which treats the person as a collection of cells without any meaning. Philosophers know that there is always more than what meets the eye, and THAT is where Dualism comes into play.

Dualism comes from the Latin word duo meaning “two” and denotes a state of two parts, that is preserved in Metaphysical and Physical duality that work together as a whole with two parts (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dualism). Now what does any of that philosophically endowed explanation even mean? It’s saying that Dualism can account for that little voice you hear inside your head when you do something wrong. Dualism means that your mind and body are separate at the core, but work and communicate together as one effective team. Now this can’t be the end-all/be-all theoretical idea that explains how behavior comes about, but I feel that it gives us a very accurate lens of behavioral knowledge.

When you dumb down human behavior, two major things are prevalent when we initiate an action: our thoughts, and our actions. Dualism is the explanation that our body sees something, our mind thinks of the proper response, and suggests our body to respond to it. I personally would not value one action over another. I feel that each is necessary in their own place to do what they do best. I feel that when you are running a marathon and your body is physically beaten on the 20^th mile that being in tune with that little voice inside your head (the mind) will get you to your end destination at the finish line. The mind can be a great motivator for the body, and the body can also be a great motivator to the mind. When one sees themselves in the mirror at their physical fitness shape, is it the body’s fault for not meeting the world’s expectations? No, it is the person as a whole. That person needs to realize with their mind that they are not in the physical shape that they want to be and, from the mind, motivate the body to move in a way that would increase their fitness. Now let’s take a step back. If a physically unhealthy and overweight person were to come to me and ask me how to get their body to look like an elite athlete, as a dualist, I would instruct them to go learn. Your mind is the sharpest tool you have; and an unhealthy person cannot become physically fit if they have no idea how. The idea behind a Dualistic approach to fitness is caring about what they LEARN. Once the body knows how to do something, it can then go out and do it. It’s like inputting a programming code into a computer. It cannot do what it does not have or know.

A question that might be burning inside of you right now would be, “Now why not Holism?” Well, here’s why…Holism comes from the Greek word meaning all, entire, total and is the idea that natural systems (physical, biological, chemical, social, economic, mental, linguistic, etc.) and their properties should be viewed as wholes, not as collections of parts (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holism). My only problem with Holism is that it is great in theory but not in practice. Controversially, our economic crisis can be used as a great picture-explanation of Holism. Our economy runs on a capitalist principle that forces one body of people to be of higher status that another. However, at any point in time, one can rise up and become more important when situation allows it. The distinguishing between two different classes that work as one economical unit would be a Dualist perspective, the Holist perspective would be where wealth is spread evenly over the spectrum of people, deeming everyone and every process as equal. I find this idea flawed because there are certain times where I feel the mind should have more control than the body, and vice versa. I feel that when someone takes away study time to better themselves in sports so they can be a “better” person as a whole, is a bad choice.

How do all of these explanations come together to explain Dualism over Holism and Materialism? Dualism’s biggest flaw comes from the question that asks, “Where does the body stop and the mind begin?” I would say this post from C.B. on his blog http://consciousnessandthebrain.com/property-dualism/ could help explain. In short, he goes into detail on how all the properties of the mind coincide with feelings in the brain; effectively explaining how a physical and metaphysical unit communicates as an effective team. As a therapist I would take the approach of Dualism because I feel it is more realistic to tell someone that their mind can help control what they do. People say “mind over matter” because they know their body is tired, but the human body is amazing and can do way more than we think it can. Sometimes the body needs a push or help from something that it doesn’t know, like the metaphysical world, to push past its limits and expectations. Marines have partners because two people working together is much more powerful than one whom tries to do everything themselves. The mind and body are a group of two marines working together for a common goal: life. 

What is the ideal relationship between philosophy and science in 21st century kinesiology?

Science and philosophy are like set of twins with intense personalities. They are obviously related to one another and work extremely well when one is not too overpowering. Like any healthy relationship, each twin needs to apply their strengths where one might be lacking, to be an efficient and useful team. It is not possible for one to stand without the other. Things would just not be there same. Some people would feel that science would need to take the lead role in most things, and I would agree. I do not believe it is any more important that philosophy though. I look at science more as a base– an example for philosophy to work with to achieve the knowledge that we have today. Kretchmar forces us in his readings to make a choice to either emphasize Philosophy or Science, in the history of activity, and points out that people would choose Science over Philosophy, because they feel it is more “liable” or “important.” But is it really? I feel that science is the base that philosophy needs to stand on to go higher and to dig and explore what we already “know” in the world. We once were CONVINCED that the world was flat, until people questioned that truth; just like we once thought the earth was the center of the universe. There is always an older twin, and in my experience, that older sibling tends to be the solid grounded figure of the two.

The word “science” originates from the Latin root-word, sientia, which means “knowledge” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science). Science is used to obtain knowledge by systematic research and defined by empirical data. Science is cold cut and to the point. Facts define facts, and that is how you know something is real within science. Philosophy is the twin that questions everything his brother is doing. He listens, hears, sees, and loves what his brother, science, knows; then rebels against his “facts”, his “solidarity”, and questions his validity. He digs a little deeper into science and his knowledge; just like every little twin brother, he lovingly questions for the sake of deduction so he can either help and confirm, or throw in a wrench and confuse. He sees what his brother is doing, respects it, and wants to take it to another level. So, fittingly, philosophy is directly translated from Greek as, “a lover of wisdom” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy)

The nature if philosophy is not to disprove, but to assign meaning to what we know. We can use science to provide insight on the creation of our world. There are many differing views floating around that give insight to how people think the world was made; but scientifically there are also ways to physically measure the decay rates of certain organic materials and conclude that a rock is thousands or millions of years old. What is the point in all of this? A philosopher would say, “Exactly.” …Jokes aside, it is their duty as a “lover of knowledge” to abstractly think of and infinite amount of ways to approach either conclusion of the world being “young” or “old.” He would be the one injecting reasoning and skillful deduction as to why things are the way they are. Each situation would each be given a set value and each would be weighed by the mind and stretched far beyond any “belief system” that some simple number-cruncher could conjure. A philosopher’s goal is to distort your simple way of thinking, in essence, “thinking outside the proverbial box,” and stretching your mind’s capacity for reason– for seeing beyond the cold hard facts and actually applying a useful “what-if” situation to your answers. Asking yourself, “what-if,” and questioning the things around you is an effective way to learn. Melissa Karnaze tells us in her online blog that its always healthy to know and hear both sides of a story because, “The most immediate outcome of hearing both sides of any story is that you get a bigger picture of the issue” (http://mindfulconstruct.com/2010/07/14/10-reasons-to-listen-to-both-sides-of-any-story/). Which brings me to why I feel that they should be respected and used as equally important to gaining knowledge in any field of life.

So how does all of this scientific and philosophical nonsense tie into 21st century kinesiology? The scientific study of human movement could not be what it is today if people did not challenge their beliefs long ago. Science as we know it would not be the same if philosophers like Socrates did not question the authoritative rule of the establishment’s “truths” concluded from science. It’s not that people should discredit the answers they are physically given, but question them. Question the possibilities of them. Question the meanings of them. Question what that truth means– inside and out, because without those questions, we do not have any of the answers that we have today. Without sailors questioning the “flattness” of the earth, without medieval medicine men questioning healing tactics, without SOMEONE pushing and striving for something than we already have now, there will be no growth in knowledge. “Philosophy tries to say something where empiricism can’t, and it is an integral part in the expansion of scientific explanation” (http://www.browndailyherald.com/2013/09/16/powers-15-philosophical-scientific-explanation/). Kinesiology needs Philosophy JUST as much as Philosophy needs Kinesiology, because without each other, those brothers do not grow.

TEST ENTRY

Jonathan Marshall: KNES 380-04 Philosophy of Human Movement