With all the goings on in Charlottesville with the protests over confederate statues, a Nazi getting punched in Seattle, and a far right leaning president, I think it’s only fair to dedicate a story to the world's most hated group: The Nazis. It’s no coincidence that with the recent election, the members of far right came crawling out of the woodworks and into the political mainstream. According to a shocking CNN report, the number of total hate groups has risen by 17% since 2014. Even worse, anti-Muslim hate groups have tripled in the last year. Whether you call them “Alt-Right,” “KKK,” or simply “fascists,” these people have one simple message: to spread hate and bigotry and intimidate anyone who isn’t white. Now I know what you’re thinking dear reader: “But doesn’t everyone deserve the freedom to express their beliefs and opinions?” Well to you I say of course not. If your belief is to eradicate all other people and infringe their right to have an opinion, then you no longer get a say. This perpetual process of appeasing these hate groups by letting them hold rallies and give speeches is eerily similar to what Germany did back in the mid 1900s. Where they didn’t simply take power, they were democratically elected into power in a country not unlike our own. It is unfortunate that we live in such a time of hate and bigotry. One thing we could do is to add an Amendment to the constitution to disallow hate groups to spread hatred and bigotry. This idea isn't as crazy as it seems; it was once proposed unsuccessfully in 2014 to regulate political journalism. On a more realistic note, however, we can fight fascism with democracy. Get in touch with your local political group on social media and see when they are having a rally or a protest. If there isn’t one, create one, create fliers, make posters, send smoke signals, whatever. Show that you're a true American by supporting democracy in anyway to prevent the rise of Fascism and MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!
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Football, America's favorite pastime, affects the youth of today in more ways than you may think. Whether you're sitting down in front of the TV with your family on a Sunday night, or at the high school football game with your hot date, you don't necessarily think about the long term effects that smashing yourself into other people has on your brain. That's right, we're talking about CTE’S today.
This disease is commonly found in football players but is only diagnosable after death. Chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE for short) is a degenerative disease that causes the death of brain cells. In a recent study (Jesse Mez MD)^ 99% of NFL players were diagnosed with CTE’S; 21% suffered from a CTE during high school and 91% suffered them in college. As we all know, high school is a critical time for brain development, so what are the long term effects of CTE’s on high school players? Well, the facts are staggering. In high school football players with even a mild case of CTE, 67% had symptoms of depression, 52% had an anxiety disorder, 96% had symptoms of a behavioral and or mood disorder, and finally, a quarter of those in the study died from suicide. It’s clear to me that the most logical and safe approach would be to ban full contact sports. The risk of long term mental disorders would go down significantly. With these staggering facts in mind, I interviewed local football player Mark Mansfield about the possibility of banning full contact sports. Have you ever suffered a concussion? Yes I have. How has this affected your personal life? Well, football is my personal life. Well how about your home life then? I would never let an injury I suffered on the field affect the people I care about; I always try and tough it out. Have you ever missed school because of a concussion? No, but I’ve missed school because of of other injuries, my hip, my knee and chest. I don’t have much going on anyway, so I’m always willing to take the risk. Would you play flag football if we got rid of full contact? No, I wouldn’t. Kids need an outlet to get their anger, their aggression out, and for some people that means full contact sports. What would you do without football? I wouldn’t have an identity. Sports are my identity, I didn’t mean for it to be like that, but that's just how it is. It’s hard to find myself without it. Whenever I’m injured and I’m at home recovering, that’s when I find myself. Would you let your kids play full contact sports? Yes, but not when they’re like 6. I’d start them out playing flag football in elementary school so they can get the fundamentals down. You don’t want them to have to wear padding and worrying about the basics. You also don’t want them to start full contact too early; you don’t want to wear them out and get bored of it. Any final thoughts about removing full contact sports? Risk is everything; you can’t hold back. You can only do so much to prevent injury, and people get concussions in every sport. Injuries and concussions are part of football. |
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