N.F.L., the brand that generates billions of dollars each year has been severely blemished by an ongoing scandal involving the use of violence by players of a very violent sport. The scandal whispered with a cry that was loud yet muted as the public eventually uncomfortably accepted the lenient sentence given to a man who so leniently dragged the legs of his unconscious fiancée from an elevator. The scandal screamed with a cry that roared through the buildings that house the commissioner of the N.F.L. as the people saw footage of that that they could not forgive. A man with a crest of the raven, a muscular man, a strong man who is bred for the sport of violence is seen violently punching a woman, and not just any woman. She is his wench, his hussy, his lass, and so the people are shocked to see an act from a time when wife was the name given to those who were the property of men, performed in a time where a wife is the elected leader of the land of Deutsch and a wife could be the elected leader of the free states of the Americas. The people were shocked when they saw a man knock out his fiancée with one punch. The people were shocked when they saw this same man nonchalantly staring at his unconscious fiancée before trying to pull her, feet first, out of an elevator in Atlantic City.

The N.F.L. reacted to this cry that roared SCANDAL in a manner similar to a cheating man who is accused of adultery by his wife. The N.F.L. lied and lied badly and continued to lie even though more scandals erupted as the public scrutinized the league by intently digging up and reading records that were already in the public domain, and pretty soon the emperor was seen without his clothes. The people were able to dig up domestic violence charges that are pending against two current players of the N.F.L. Then two other cases fell unto the lap of the people as a man who wore the logo 49 upon his chest was accused of domestic violence and a man who sails with the Vikings was accused of child abuse. Scandal surrounds the National Football League as the valuable N.F.L. brand wonders on how to answer the question being screamed by the people who demand to know how and why N.F.L. employees who are hired to act violently, act violently when outside the stadium of violence. The people ask the N.F.L. a good question for the act of domestic violence is a barbaric act that should be left to the forgotten history of the dark past. The people ask a good question of the N.F.L., but the people do not ask a good question of themselves, for if they did, then they would ask why an act as barbaric as domestic violence is still so prevalent in a society as modern and civilized as our society.

The people act like pundits who look upon a football team that is blessed with awful players and then snobbishly blame the quarter back for the team’s horrible record. The scandal of domestic violence is a scandal of society and not just a scandal of the N.F.L. The stadiums of violence that house the sport of football is a place for barbaric violence and not the proper forum in which to have an educated discussion about the embarrassing and uncomfortable issue of domestic violence. An issue that is uncomfortable because it is embarrassing, and it is embarrassing because it is unthinkable that in a civilized society that is the epitome of justice and democracy as these free states a barbaric thing like domestic violence still exists. But it does. Therefore, the people should use this scandal that has rocked the N.F.L. to ask important questions. People should wonder why many women and fewer men are the victims of physical assault by a partner each year. People should wonder about the children who are forever traumatized when they grow up in a home where domestic violence is present.

Domestic violence is a complicated issue and so cannot be solved by suspensions and fines. There is so much of this barbaric act that is hard for the modern mind to comprehend. Take for example the fact that there is a beautiful woman who still loves the man who punched her in the face. A beautiful woman who chose to marry the man who knocked her unconscious and then attempted to drag her unconscious body. A woman who says that we, the people, should allow her violent husband to play the violent sport he so very loves. This raises an uncomfortable question that asks what is this act that we, the people, call domestic violence? Put another way, if the victim says that she loves and still wants to be with the abuser, when should we, the people, step in and remove the abuser? Should we do so when the abuser kills the victim? Or should we intervene when the victim is not mentally competent? What should we, the people, do when the victim tells us that the act that was viewed as domestic violence was actually a spousal fight and that she loves her husband and wants him to keep playing his game of violence? The N.F.L. has offered the people a question to ponder and yet it is a question ignored. A player of the N.F.L. punched his fiancée for reasons unknown. The fiancée who was knocked unconscious then chose to marry him and now wants him to keep working. The people are asked if the abuser should be allowed to play football and the public screams no for he must be punished. The people want him punished and the N.F.L. so obliges and makes it impossible for the abuser to provide for his new family. The people are happy even though the people have not answered the real question offered to them by the N.F.L. Few who have seen the footage of the violence unleashed upon a fiancée in the elevator in Atlantic City can deny that the abuser needs to be punished. But the question that goes unanswered asks, “by whom?”

Who is it that should punish the abuser? Is it the N.F.L. or society? Put another way, why is it that the abuser in question did not spend any time in the communal hotel known as jail? We, the people, are disgusted by the heinous and barbaric act that we have all witnessed, but have we all asked ourselves how it is that the abuser did not go to jail. The N.F.L. has offered we, the people, an opportunity, a chance to talk about our society as is and as we want it to be. The lenient sentence offered by the free state of New Jersey should have caused the people to wonder how is it possible that a man serves no jail time when there’s footage of that man violently attacking a woman. This question should be posed to those who have the power to change the laws. This question should be asked of our elected officials, and as luck will have it, we are in an election season. The N.F.L. has offered us a question at the perfect time as we, the people, can demand an answer from those who we elect to represent us. The N.F.L. offers us this question for selfish reasons, as if the abuser in question was sent to jail, then the N.F.L. will not have had to deal with this issue. Players cannot play in the N.F.L. when they are in jail so those who truly believe that abusers should not play should confront their elected officials and demand that laws be passed. Justice calls for just laws.

However, the question of which laws are just is one that is not as easy to answer as it appears to be. For example, take the question of how to punish an abuser who is still loved by the victim of domestic violence. In a scenario like this, is the punishment meant to protect the victim or to torture the abuser? Put another way, imagine if a man was to assault another man and the victim refuses to press charges due to the fact that they are friends and the assault was the result of a dispute amongst friends. In this imagined situation should we, the people, punish the aggressor? Should the situation be different if the assault was on a loved one? And what happens if the loved ones are of the same sex, and a man attacks a man or a woman attacks a woman? Should the laws be different in that scenario? Tough questions that need to be answered before just laws can be written. After this is accomplished we, the people, have to listen to the just laws because for justice to survive, the just laws must be obeyed.

A legal principle that is woven into the fabric of the justice system of the free states of the Americas is one that states that an accused is innocent until proven guilty. If there is footage of guilt then a player should be punished by the N.F.L., but absent conclusive evidence, the N.F.L. should not be demanded to act before the legal system. This is what it means to obey just laws. For this reason, the decision on whether or not the accused should play is a decision that should be best left to each individual team to decide. There will always be fans who will greet disgraced players with boos and teams that will not want to deal with the bad publicity, but each team should be free to make that decision. Put it another way, if an ex-convict who did time for domestic violence is hired to flip burgers at Burger King, will we, the people, demand that the ex-convict be fired? If not, then why do the people demand that of an N.F.L. team? Is it because the people view football players, and other athletes, as role models? If this is the case, then an obvious question is why? Why do we not look to our parents, teachers, coaches, or religious leaders to be role models? Why do we insist that each and every athlete be a role model?

Athletes live lives that are easy to envy. All eyes are on them as they do things that we all wish we could but know we can’t. We, the people, should all dream of being athletes, but when it comes to football, we, the people, should push our children to become football players. Football is a sport of pain, a game played by men who suppress their physical pains as they inflict physical pain upon the bodies of their opponent. This is why men who are seen limping on Monday, are injected with needles on Tuesday, and by Sunday are seen violently playing with injured bodies. Pain exists before the games and the body is reminded of the pain by the constant hits upon hits that eventually follow players as they walk off the field and into their retirement that is ruined by pain and medical bills. We, the people, never dream of being the retired player who has lost his memories due to multiple concussions. We, the people, never dream of being the retired player who can barely walk down the stairs without assistance. Role models should be those who we, the people, aspire to be when we are adults. Football players spend but a short time of their adulthood in the N.F.L. with the remainder of their adulthood spent in pain, debt, and obscurity. Add to this that most football players, like most athletes, are young men who do not yet know how to live their lives and it becomes clear that football players are not suited to be role models. This is because football players, like most young athletes with money, tend to spend their time high off drugs or drunk off alcohol as they chase pretty women with their fast cars and fancy clothes. This is not to say that football players, or other athletes, could not be role models. An individual football player can choose to be a role model but football players should not be expected to be role models. That is unfair to them. Football players should be those that we envy, those we dream to be but should not be those that we, the people, strive to become.

Football players are entertainers who entertain we, the people, by inflicting pain upon their opponents. Domestic violence is a barbaric act that should not be tolerated, but the people should not be surprised to find a few abusers playing the violent and barbaric sport that is known as football. Put another way, imagine that a friend of yours is sent to jail for domestic violence. Upon his return, he professes to you that he wants to change and asks you where he can find work. What would you say to your friend? What profession would you suggest? What profession would you think would accept an ex-convict who did time for domestic violence? Accountant? Lawyer? Politician? Banker? Football player? Football player. Football is a violent sport and like other violent sports, it should not be surprising that some of the participants of the violent sport are violent people. That some football players display violence outside of the stadiums of violence should not cause the people to chastise the N.F.L. for it is because of the violence that football promises that we, the people, watch football. We watch football for the hits, which is why we love to watch replays of a linebacker or safety destroying a wide receiver who is foolish enough to run through the middle of the field. We love to watch a running back flip the switch to beast mode and run over linebackers and safeties who are foolish enough to try to tackle the beast with the ball. We love to watch a defensive end roar to the crowd after a sack and we, of the crowd, love to yell back in appreciation of the violent act we have all just witnessed. Football is a violent sport played best by violent people. This is a fact known by all, which is why if given the choice to recruit football players from either the church or the jail, we will all go to the jail.

We, the people, seek out entertainment. In times of old, we used to sit in stadiums and cheer gladiators who butchered each other. Now, we are spoiled as we have too many forms of entertainment. One of the many forms is sports and one of the many sports is called football. The N.F.L. offers a violent form of entertainment that feeds off the primordial parts of our modern, civilized brain. The N.F.L. offers a form of entertainment that we, the people, have grown to love, but the people need to never forget that all the N.F.L. offers is a sport. The N.F.L. offers entertainment, not education and so the N.F.L. cannot be the forum that we, the people, use to discuss morality. Morality is about doing the right thing even if that causes you to lose your job or life; whereas football is about winning at all cost even if you do something immoral like grabbing a jersey when the referee isn’t looking. Morality is about utilizing violence only as a last resort whereas football is about using violence as a first, second, third and last resort. The N.F.L. is a sport that we, the people, consume as entertainment. So, the stadiums of violence that house the games of the N.F.L. should not be the forums used to discuss the morality of society. The N.F.L. offers we, the people, an escape from our lives. The N.F.L. offers we, the people, an opportunity to congregate with others as we talk to each other and scream to the television. Football offers we, the people, violence in entertainment and so should not be the forum to discuss the violence within our society. Football is violence choreographed for our entertainment, and it is this entertainment that some use as an escape of the miseries and violence of our world. The concussions and injuries that are caused by the violence of football should be handled by the N.F.L., but the injuries and repercussions of the violence in our society should be handled through public discourse and the democratic process.