Competitive Contact Sports—
Spawning Fields for Violence

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SPORTS LINKED TO VIOLENCE

The beating death of a homeless man in Chico,
California by two college football players may be the latest example of
athletes' violent behavior off the playing field, some experts say. Several
psychologists and other experts say the allegations underscore that some
athletes -- trained to be aggressive -- fail to block such behavior when
they leave the sports stadium and return to everyday life.

"The average sports contact athlete is more apt to have violence in his private life than
the average citizen," said Thomas Tuttko, a San Jose State Universtiy
professor who has studied sports psychology for 30 years. "When we see
violent behavior by players, the athletic associations and the athletes
need to be held accountable," said Esta Soler, executive director of the
SF-based Family Vilence Prevention Fund. "Teams too often ignore the
fact they have criminals in their midst, and I think that sends a bad role
model message to young people," Soler said.

In the Chico case, police say on November 5 two Butte Community College
football players used a fence board to beat Lloyd Brown, 47, after he complained
when one of them urinated near where he was sleeping in an alley. The two students
will face murder-by-torture charges in Butte County Superior Court.
Ironically, the players' coach, Craig Rigsbee, said he had just lectured the
team on staying out of fights. Tutko said that an incident such as Brown's
beating occurs in a society that has become increasingly tolerant of
violence -- both in an out of the sports arena. "I think in hockey, football
and more and more in basketball, there is a greater degree of freedom
allowed touse violence as the means of getting your way," Tutko said. He
added that some athletes in violent contact sports "take it out on their
families because of a loss or disappointing performance."

One recent book detailing stories of athletes and violence is "Pros and Cons: The
Criminals Who Play in the NFL." The authors, Jeff Benedict and Don
Yaeger, say 21 percent of the National Football League players whose
records they obtained have committed serious crimes. Looking at the 509
athletes who were on the 1996-97 NFL rosters, the authors found that
109 players had been arrested a total of 264 times. Myriam Miedzian, who
wrote the 1991 book "Boys Will Be Boys: Breaking the Link between
Masculinity and Violence," said her interviews with athletes taught her
"What is valued in the game is unfettered aggression. You only get
punished if you let too much empathy get in the way." She added that
while the majority of athletes don't commit acts of violence, "the
statistics show that they are over-represented when it comes to sexual
assaults on campus." Whatever the reasons for their actions, the list of
athletes linked to violence is long.

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