the one thing that needs to be stated by the sports fanatics is:
how many deaths do you deem acceptable for you to satisfy your ‘need’
a number or a % - what is it?
will you feel that way if/when it strikes home? (it surely will)
ultimately, no home will go unaffected
You won’t get an answer to that question. EVER.
First, no one here would admit to that kind of mercenary thinking. Would some ACCEPT some mortality rate though never declare it? I’d like to think not, but I have no idea.
Second, and perhaps more likely, is that many are DENYING that seriously negative health outcomes – and, of course, most of all, mortality – could ever even occur. It’s too inconvenient a concept for many who’ve narrowed their focus to a sports fixation.
While science more than allows for the possibility of seriously negative outcomes, sports-bubble thinking does not.
Some things I’m following today:
1. All viruses in the SARS family, thus far, have produced long-term respiratory complications. COVID-19 is a member of that family. Proof of nothing so far, yet a potentially significant indicator of PLENTY.
2. Fauci fears we could hit 100,000 new cases a day. I can't wait for the spin claiming that that’s not a catastrophe.
3. As of today, only two states – Connecticut and Rhode Island – had a declining case rate. Twelve were holding steady; while the remaining 38 had rising case rates. No such discrepancies exist in formerly hard-hit places, such as Italy, Spain, France, Germany, etc. All, I might add, devised uniform, centralized responses.
I’m attaching a link to an article that comprehensively lists all college athletics teams cut; sports suspended; and schools closing. It’s a long list. What’s handy is that it’s regularly updated.
https://hoopdirt.com/the-list-update-7-college-athletics-teams-cut-sports-suspended-schools-closing/
One comment:
I don’t imagine that the ethical standards at Williams and ND would be viewed as different. When Williams decided to suspend all fall sports, it emphasized that that decision plus the one to restrict in-person classes were made with the health of its students and community FOREMOST IN MIND.
Do ND and other schools that are continuing fall sports and planning to host large numbers of on-campus students feel that in doing so, they are ALSO acting with the interests of their students and communities FOREMOST IN MIND? Or do they have a significant MONETARY NUT to deal with?
And if there IS that consideration – as many claim there is – does it mean there's an acceptable threshold for student illness and, God forbid, fatalities? Because if there were, might that not indicate some ethical daylight between, on the one hand, Williams and schools that are barring sports and ND and other schools that are moving ahead?
If I were a journalist with access to ND’s Admin, there’s no other question I’d ask.
You see, d-10, it’s not only fans who may be playing your "acceptable threshold" game. Fans have as NOTHING compared to the investment the institutions, themselves, have in football going forward.
There is considerable RISK here. Are these administrators willing to take those risks while accepting the potential of catastrophic outcomes -- which raises the ethics question -- or are they merely too naive to know what they're getting into?