(HOST) Commentator Bill Mares recently toured an ancient site that dates back to Roman times – and he found himself thinking some surprisingly modern thoughts.
(MARES) The city of Pula, Croatia has one of the best preserved Roman coliseums in the Mediterranean region. As I sat in the 2000-year old stone grandstands of this three-tiered marvel and gazed across the shimmering Adriatic Sea, it was possible to imagine myself back in the first century, among 20,000 raucous fans.
I could almost hear the roar of lions and the screams of gladiators and Christians dying on the sand below, as the spectators around me cried for more gore. Doubtless my imagination was boosted by film images of Kirk Douglas in "Spartacus" and Russell Crowe in "Gladiator."
The Roman poet Juvenal famously satirized these spectacles when he wrote that "People who once upon a time handed out military command, high civil office, legions – everything, (in other words, the Roman public) now restrains itself and anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses.
Ironically, as I sat there, 4500 miles away in Washington a Congressional committee was hearing testimony about the brain injuries from repeated concussions. to some of our modern-day gladiators – National Football League players .
The daughter of the owner of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, excoriated the league for doing so little to help these players whose rate of brain damage is five times that of the general population. For years the League has brushed off pleas for independent examinations of players’ health.
According to New York Times writer George Vescey – quote – "We are… now getting a sense of what we were watching for decades when the broadcasters gave pro football the old biff-bam-pow seal of approval. We were watching people be maimed. For our enjoyment. It was a good deal all around. They got paid. We howled at the screen when their heads collided."
Even the players themselves push to return to the field. Listen to Ben Roethlisberger, the Pittsburgh quarterback after his fourth concussion in four years, "It’s part of the nature of the beast of playing this game. It’s a violent physical contact sport and there’s a chance you’re going to get hit."
And I know what he’s talking about. I can remember the same macho exhilaration of "playing hurt", when to "be a man", I played through one season of high school football that resulted in three broken noses and more than 30 stitches my face – unprotected by a mask.
Gratefully, there were no concussions. Nor, was I being paid millions.
Now, perhaps the NFL is having its "tobacco moment." In a stunning reversal the League has agreed to send concussion victims to be evaluated by independent doctors and to take actions to help current athletes and protect future ones, especially the young.
Fifteen years ago, the French debated whether to ban bull-fights, some of which had been held in other former Roman coliseums, in Arles and Nimes.
Said one supporter of the ban, "Civilization is learning not to do bad things."
Now, with the help of Congressional scrutiny, the NFL may be learning the same lesson.
(TAG) You can find more commentaries by Bill Mares on-line at VPR-dot-net.