Self-Head Punchers - Is it morally permissible to watch (and enjoy watching) sports that cause "severe" brain damage?

Let's pretend we're Judith Jarvis Thomson for a moment (merely in spirit, not in body or experience, of course):

Imagine you enjoy watching people punch themselves in the head.  Repeatedly.  About 40 to 60 times in a three hour period, once a week.  Those who successfully recite the alphabet after three hours of self-head punching are lavished with gifts.  And imagine that this exercise, namely punching yourself in the head and watching others punch themselves in the head, was social acceptable in your historically situated time and place.

Now imagine that people who have the honor and privilege to freely participate in this exercise have transparent skulls.  (Why?  Well why does Thomson asks us to imagine that we are magically hooked up to a violinist to make a point about abortion?  Just read on, will you?)  The great thing about the transparent skull is that you can see the individual self-head puncher's brain.  Each punch the person delivers to his head is not sufficiently strong so as to incapacitate him.  However, after the second hour, you notice a tiny, tiny bruise forming on one of the participant's brain (though not all of them, at least, not that you can tell).  At first, just a small purple-blue-black mark.  So small, in fact, that you dismiss it as totally unimportant.

Now every week, you watch your favorite self-head punchers with greater zeal than the week before.  But every week that you watch, you notice that the bruise keeps growing.  And growing.  And growing.  Just to wrap things up, assume that the human body in our thought experiment is the same, and functions in the same way, as our actual human bodies.  Thus, safe to say, the long-term effects of brain bruises on the brains of our participants is not good for their long-term health.

Clearly I have (at least) two sports in mind with this thought experiment: football and boxing.  And let me be frank - I love watching both sports.  The question of whether it is morally permissible to watch football and boxing, and enjoy it, is very important to me (e.g. I'm still waiting for Mayweather to accept a fight against Pacquiao - epic!)

With regard to the thought experiment, the question is would it be acceptable to watch this activity, self-head punching, whereby a person bruises his brain even though it is (i) voluntary and (ii) he or she receives gifts.  The reason it's important to specify the voluntariness and compensation vis-a-vis the activity in question is to remove two of the easier objections against the activity itself, namely, it being involuntary with no compensation.  I'm granting these two conditions in order to get the argument of whether it is permissible to watch the self-head punchers off the ground.  In turn, this eliminates drawing the analogy to college football or amateur boxing.  Having said that, one could very well question the voluntariness of sports (e.g. sports are often a means to better socioeconomic status, as in the case of black youth in Florida, among other places, or question what it means to volunteer for an activity in which you may not understand the repercussions) and whether there is any amount of compensation that can make up for harming oneself.

In addition, the thought experiment does not necessarily extend to other contact sports, namely hockey and futbol, aka, soccer.  One could easily conceive of soccer without allowing players to head the ball, and maybe even hockey with no toleration of any kind of head shots.  In these cases, these sports could still be considered soccer and hockey.  However, removing the type of contact that is required in football may very well change the sport so fundamentally so that it is no longer football; boxing would be in a similar boat (e.g. what would boxing be if you only allowed body shots?)  Without getting caught up with this point, it seems at least intuitively plausible to argue that head contact is more fundamental to football and boxing but less so for hockey and almost not at all for futbol.

So then the self-head punchers, it seems, are most like professional football players and boxers.  The participate voluntarily in their activities and they're well compensated (at least in the NFL... 'poor' CFLers).  The only difference is that we can see the bruises on the brains of the self-head punchers but not the football players and boxers.

Since we're playing intuitionist-casuistry, it would seem that whether you can see someone's brain get bruised versus not being able to see a person's brain get bruised is not morally relevant.  In both cases, a person's brain is bruised and bruised brains are prima facie bad for one's health.

So I'll end the post with a final question (the one you all saw coming): are you okay with watching a self-head puncher bruise his brain knowing what are the likely long-term repercussions for him?  If not, how is watching football and boxing any different?

By the way, I really want to be wrong.  I really want to see if the Patriots can go for 19-0 next year.

Diego

What do the Raptors' need?

Okay, so if I'm reading things correctly, here's the Raptors' lineup for the 2011-2012 season:

Bigs - Bargnani, Amir Johnson, Davis
Wings - Demar Derozan, James Johnson, Kleiza (but who know's when he's back)
Guards - Calderon, Bayless, Barbosa

Free agent Raps include Reggie Evans, Dorsey, Weems, Ajinca, Julien Wright

I'd like to think I'm not delusional, so unless something huge happens, the Raptors will still be hard pressed to make the playoffs next year.  So what do the Raptors need to begin to compete next season?

Let's pretend that we're the GM and we can make some trades or sign free agents (and let's assume the trades or signings would have to be plausible, e.g. no there will be no Durant here next year, though one could dream).  Conventional wisdom would say they need a legit big and another rotation-worthy wing player (possibly even a starter, fingers-crossed).  Possibly also an upgrade at point guard (though I'm not as down on Calderon as many other in the blogsphere).  So who should Colangelo trade for?  Who should they target in free agency?  (Assuming the rules stay the same in the new CBA, which they won't, but no point in trying to predict the NBA future for our purposes today.)

Here's the list of free agents this summer.  Also, here's ESPN's trade machine.

First, in terms of centres, it might be best that the Raptors go after a free agent (seems to be some decent ones there that make sense).  High on that list are Chandler (not gonna happen), Nene, DeAndre Jordan, and Marc Gasol.  Raptorsrepublic argues that the Raptors should go after Gred Oden - I'm thinking he's a bit too injured, as in, he's always injured.  I think another name worth considering, and someone who might come at a relatively cheap price, is Samuel Dalembert.  He won't score, but he's solid defensively and gets rebounds and blocks.

As for the wing spot, how about the Raps go after Andre Iguodala for Bargnani, Kleiza and Alabi.  It would give Bargnani a fresh start, give the Raptors an athletic, defensive wing (which Casey would like) that could fly along side Derozan.  The 76ers would open up more playing time for Evan Turner and have Kleiza as a backup whenever he's ready to return.  Alabi just makes the deal work number wise.

What says you?

Diego

Sports Writers: Our Heros' Poets

I love reading about sports and in particular, about the great historical feats in sports.  Ken Dryden’s description of being a Montreal Canadiens in the 70s is enthralling, while Bill Simmon's argument in favor of Russell as a better player than Chamberlain is insightful and comical (if a little hysterical, but then again, that's partly what makes it comical).

Despite the many books written about sports, few are well written. Despite the fact that I am not an English major, nor a literary critic (and, let’s face it, I’m not particularly eloquent), I will say that for generations of sports fans who did not witness an important sporting event, a storyteller is critical in ensuring that the exploit in question is not forgotten.  And that, in-and-of-itself, is the standard (well, my standard) for a well-written historical sports book: not forgetting the stories and details *because* of the writing.

A great example: Seth Davis' When March Went Mad is a wonderful description of the 1979 National Championship in college basketball that featured Magic Johnson for the Michigan State Spartans versus Larry Bird and the Indiana State Sycamores.  In fact, it's about how Johnson and Bird entered college, about a pivotal turning point in the business of men's collegiate basketball, about race in late 1970s America, about the marketing of athletes, and so on.  I've read that book a while ago, but still the stories within the book, the little anecdotes, persist in my brain.  Davis is just a really great writer.

Other sports books I've read, the stories disappear.  I don't think it's necessarily because the exploits described were less enthralling or less important or less impressive.  Certainly, I could have been in a particular head space when I read Davis' book such that I was particularly receptive to his writing style and subject matter, or that *any* sports book would have left a lasting impression at that moment in time.  Perhaps, but I think that a large measure of its resonance is due to Davis' wonderful writing.  

Eduardo Galeano's Futbol a Sol y Sombra (Soccer in Sun and Shadow) is another great example.  What's interesting about this book is that Galeano retells the important historical moments of soccer in a very personal and romanticized manner.  The line between what actually occurred and what he remembers is blurred and as a reader, it is difficult to decipher where fact ends and fiction, or subjective recollection, begins.  But the truth is, it doesn't matter.  There's a certain texture to his words that leave an impression and helps solidify the stories in your brain.  

And it's not just written stories.  Other forms of story telling can be equally poignant.  Sports documentaries, for example, can have a similar effect.  One of my favorite sports documentary is When We Were Kings by Leon Gast.  It tells the story of the 1974 fight in Zaire between Ali and Foreman and to this day, that fight is probably one of the moments in sports that I wish I could have witnessed.  Songs can also have this type of emotional effect (e.g. "50 Mission Cap" by the Tragically Hip)

All of this reminds me of the following passage from Kierkegaard's Fear and Trembling:

The poet cannot do what that other does, he can only admire, love and rejoice in the hero. Yet he too is happy, and not less so, for the hero is as it were his better nature, with which he is in love, rejoicing in the fact that this after all is not himself, that his love can be admiration. He is the genius of recollection, can do nothing except call to mind what has been done, do nothing but admire what has been done; he contributes nothing of his own, but is jealous of the intrusted treasure. He follows the option of his heart, but when he has found what he sought, he wanders before every man’s door with his song and with his oration, that all may admire the hero as he does, be proud of the hero as he is. This is his achievement, his humble work, this is his faithful service in the house of the hero. If he thus remains true to his love, he strives day and night against the cunning of oblivion which would trick him out of his hero, then he has completed his work, then he is gathered to the hero, who has loved him just as faithfully, for the poet is as it were the hero’s better nature, powerless it may be as a memory is, but also transfigured as a memory is. Hence no one shall be forgotten who was great, and though time tarries long, though a cloud of misunderstanding takes the hero away, his lover comes nevertheless, and the longer the time that has passed, the more faithfully will he cling to him.

The sports writer needs the athlete; the athlete needs the sports writer.

Diego

And so it begins...

I love sports.  I really love sports.

I love talking about sports, arguing about sports, even discussing the very notion of what constitutes a sport.

So this blog is intended as a means to discuss all types of sports by exploring them in a variety of ways: by philosophical argument, statistical analysis, and brute emotive reaction to current issues.  We can write about specific teams or sports, or wax more abstractly about broader themes related to sports.

But here's the thing: for this blog to work, I need everyone to post their thoughts and mastications on the subject matter at hand.  I'll write frequently because... well... it's my blog.  But I invite you to be an author on this blog.  If you're interested in writing, let me know and I'll add you to the roster.  Also, if you'd like, add your name to the email list to the left-hand side of this post.  You can even choose to "follow" this blog (again, click on the follow-thingy to the left).  This way, I hope to build a community of folks who are willing to share their love and analytic powers on the all-consuming, sometimes infuriating, but thoroughly fulfilling obsession that is sports.

Diego