The article “Poor Students More Likely to Play Football, Despite Brain Injury Concerns”

Amanda Morrris and Michel Martin, in their ayticle “Poor Students More Likely to Play Football, Despite Brain Injury Concerns,” argue that students from low-income families are more likely to engage in football despite the sport’s health risks like chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). According to Amanda Morris and Michel, Martin football is still popular among low-income students because the game offers more scholarships opportunities than any other sports in the country. The authors also note that football has relatively low entry barriers. That is, football, unlike other sports, does not require the students to be of a specific size, height, or weight. Also, other than football being the most popular sport in America, most poor students view football as their way out of poverty and other societal risks like crime and drug abuse. Amanda Morris and Michel Martin conclude their article by calling for the American government to consider the ethical implications of the sport broadly.

Claire Cain Miller and Jonah Engel Bromwich, in their article “How Parents Are Robbing Their Children of Adulthood,” comprehensively explores how parents coined as “snowplow parents” are willing to cross ethical and legal boundaries just to see their children succeed in life. According to Claire Cain Miller and Jonah Engel Bromwich, snowplow parents are engaged in intensive parenting that involves close monitoring of their Childs activities with the intent of preventing something happening that could jeopardize their future success. The authors’ notes that these parents have gone to the extreme extend of bribing teachers and coaches in order to give their children good grades and recommendation. However, these parents fail to understand that their actions are posing a considerable risk to their children’s future at a time when they get to interact with the real world. The authors end their article by calling for parents to prepare the kids for the road, instead of preparing the road for the kids.

Part two

From these articles, I believe that parents of this generation have failed in their parenting roles. Citing from Amanda Morris and Michel Martin’s article, parents have allowed their children to engage in dangerous sports like football despite the numerous health risk like chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) associated with the sport. Similarly, citing the work of Claire Cain Miller and Jonah Engel Bromwich, parents are posing a considerable risk to their children’s future interactions in the real world through their snowplow mode of parenting.

Brainstorm Questions

Question 1

I can personally relate to Claire Cain Miller and Jonah Engel Bromwich‘s essay “How Parents Are Robbing Their Children of Adulthood.”I have a cousin called Smith, whose parents always did everything for him. They even went to the extreme of bribing his former high school teachers to give him good grades in order to have the required threshold to join college. However, when Smith joined college, he had problems coping with other students and dropped out, arguing that he was being given too much work in college. He is currently at the rehab battling with drugs and alcohol addiction.

Question 2

Athletic head injuries & parental decisions are of great concern to me because all these activities are putting our future generation at risk.  I cannot imagine a country with significant percentages of the population having mental health problems and an incompetent workforce. We have to take measures today in order to save not only ourselves but our country as well.