I agree with the idea that having adults identify with professional sports teams to the extent so many do, has reduced us to an audience of on-lookers, excitedly pretending the game's outcome has anything to do with their lives ..... unless there is a comorbidity with gambling addiction.
Professional sports help define a generation, in either good or bad ways. Let's consider the sport with the largest connection to politics. The horror that many white Americans experienced when the great Jack Johnson won the heavyweight title. Try as they might, they couldn't beat him for a long time. The great Joe Louis, who volunteered for the military in WW2. And the Greatest, Muhammad Ali, refusing to submit to Uncle Sam's draft.
(Being old, I am far more aware of the potential damage that boxers sustain. I no longer train fighters, as I did after I stopped fighting. But I will be watching Canelo vs Crawford later this week.)
Sports can be good for children and teens. There can be a downside for those not interested, or have a dense gym teacher or coach. Or parents who pressure their kids to win scholarships. When I was on the school board, we had to call the state police to remove a woman from the gym during a girls JV basketball game. Surely, that is not good.
However, exercise and a good diet beats candy and cell phones for young people's health. And we want a strong, healthy generation grow to remove every fecal stain that the felon leaves on the fabric of our society.
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