• UnironicWarCriminal [any]
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    4 years ago

    This harkens back to that press conference Cuomo did sometime over the summer where it was revealed that the majority of Covid deaths had not left home and were complying with social distancing and lockdown orders.

    If NFL players actually went on strike and didn’t back down, that would probably get us somewhere, but I doubt it happens.

    Football is extremely hostile to labor - the entire system, from the quasi-military aesthetic that high school coaches love to use to the forced servitude of college football to the rampant safety issues that get ignored for as long as possible at the pro-level - so lol at that one

    • OhWell [he/him]
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      4 years ago

      This harkens back to that press conference Cuomo did sometime over the summer where it was revealed that the majority of Covid deaths had not left home and were complying with social distancing and lockdown orders.

      I've had 3 friends die from COVID, and my best friend just got out of the hospital with it. I can't talk to my friends who are gone, but the one I can speak with, he swears he was wearing a mask when he caught it. Swears by this. It's down right dehumanizing when liberals say that the victims were just stupid for not wearing masks. Not all of them are chuds denying the existence of this virus. Most of the deaths are exploited poor people to begin with.

      Football is extremely hostile to labor - the entire system, from the quasi-military aesthetic that high school coaches love to use to the forced servitude of college football to the rampant safety issues that get ignored for as long as possible at the pro-level - so lol at that one

      After all the moaning and whining over black players kneeling during the stupid anthem (something that wasn't even a deal for every game until 2010-2011) I can already see it, if players did go on strike over COVID. It would make NFL fans lose their collective minds.

      • UnironicWarCriminal [any]
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        4 years ago

        It's weird to talk about people who make hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars as "hyperexploited", but compared to every other pro sport, 2020 NFL players are like dehumanized robots. They literally fatten up 16 year old kids to weigh 300+ pounds so that they can repeatedly smash into other 300 pound kids for a 1% chance at doing the same thing for free for 3-4 years in order to get a 0.1% chance of maybe making some decent money for 2-3 years before they get dropped like a bad habit. The number of 40 year olds playing in the NBA, MLB, NHL, any soccer league vs the NFL really tells the tale.

        • OhWell [he/him]
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          4 years ago

          I noticed that years ago when I used to dig into NFL history. I grew up in the south and football is basically a religion down here. If you ever live in Alabama, the annual Alabama/Auburn Iron Bowl game is pretty much the most important event in the state to most people. Even when those teams are having down years, people follow them religiously.

          My dad got me into football as a kid through card collecting. It's one of the good memories I have from my childhood with my parents, cause my mom was into it as well. My dad had an impressive collection dating back decades with so many classic players. He had all the greats of the 70s, 80s and 90s. Plenty of John Elway; Dan Marino, Ronnie Lott, Ken Stabler, Earl Campbell, Warren Moon, all the stars for the 90s Cowboys dynasty teams and the Buffalo Bills teams that lost 4 consecutive Super Bowls, Brett Favre, Steve Young, etc etc.

          Some time in my teen years, I got curious looking at these old cards and started doing research on the old players. Earl Campbell is crippled now and can barely walk. It's a wonder he's still alive after a short NFL career and how it completely destroyed his body. The 1994 Chargers Super Bowl team is often considered a cursed team due to how many deaths they've had. Junior Seau committed suicide back in 2012 due to concussions he had suffered, and several of their deceased players had health problems as a result of weight and injuries sustained from football.

          You'll see this time and time again with former players. One player I had tons of cards of was Thurman Thomas, running back for the SB loser Buffalo teams. Thurman Thomas is in really bad shape today with Parkinsons and from suffering CTE. It's really sad to see him in the state he's in and there are hundreds, if not thousands of former players like this. Football chews them up, destroys their bodies and spits them back out.

          • UnironicWarCriminal [any]
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            4 years ago

            And the scary thing is that conditions were better in someways for players 40-50 years ago then they are now. Bigger hits and more people playing through concussions, but also less repeated trauma and smaller players (325lbs smashing into you does a lot more damage than 250lbs). The college system also wasn't as exploitative back then.

            There's probably ways to make the game safer, if players actually had some sort of consciousness and power like they do in the other major leagues (to an extent anyway), but the entire culture needs to be completley overhauled imo. Getting rid of the NCAA would be a big step.