As an inveterate National Football League fan who not only regularly attends games, but watches a significant amount of NFL competition on television, I am deeply saddened and angered by the recent plethora of domestic and child abuse charges on the part of some players in the NFL.
Domestic and child abuse are not only abhorrent, but inexcusable. These crimes against women and children are intolerable, especially when modern sciences clearly demonstrate both the negative psychological and physical effects of human abuse.
More profoundly, I am truly perplexed that the NFL chose to select all white women as advisors who are placed in the role of “fixing” this problem as it exists within the NFL.
We should all note that approximately 66-2⁄3 percent — two thirds — of NFL players are black. The four players recently suspended are black. Fifty years after the enactment of the Civil Rights Act, we are compelled to ask ourselves: “What is wrong with America?”
While I was impressed that women were chosen by Commissioner Roger Goodell to play a role in the investigation of these instances of abuse and design the new NFL policies that relate to abuse within families, I was appalled at how monolithic this new team was. Diversity should have played a major role in the selection process, allowing women of color a role and a voice during a process that seems — to date — to disproportionately impact black families in the NFL.
Black women can advise, judge and evaluate just as cogently as anyone. Black women are extraordinarily capable of handling any of the advisory duties which the commissioner has accorded to white women.
I am especially embarrassed by The National Organization of Women, who — instead of rising to the occasion — failed abysmally by not insisting on diversity in the appointment of women as advisors.
To date, the NFL missed the mark in favor of bad social policy, family policy, and, ultimately, legal policy. The NFL is a not for profit organization. Congress, where is your oversight?
So where do we go from here?
- The NFL must recognize that black women must be at the table — not only as experts in domestic violence and child abuse, but sports specialists, mediators, lawyers and experts in relations with the many constituent communities, including policy-making roles in articulating the NFL’s social responsibility obligations.
- Counselors must be available to the players, their immediate families and significant others.
- Penalties must be clear and rational, particularly after court findings.
- Interdisciplinary programs should be made available for spouses and children of NFL players to provide needed support and counsel. In particular, advice provided to such families should not be contrary to law nor encourage these family victims not to seek the assistance of law enforcement, as the public has heard has occurred in some news reports.
These recommendations are in no way dispositive of the myriad recommendations which need to be proposed and implemented by the NFL. They are merely a beginning in what will be a tough process.
Hon. Joyce London Alexander Ford is the retired Chief U.S. Magistrate Judge, District of Massachusetts.
