OPINION: Should the American government step-in as violence towards women in the NFL continues to spiral out of control?

The NFL has a big problem. It needs to change, and instantly. The problem is there are far too many players in the sport, who have been violent towards women in the past.

They’re then charged, and for some reason allowed to return to the sport to prove themselves.

Now, first and foremost, I am all for second-chances. Everyone makes mistakes in life. But this is a problem which has been happening for many years now, with little being done about it within the company.

The NFL is one of the biggest sporting companies in the world, so why is it that some NFL players continue to break the rules. With some, as we have witnessed in the past, been involved with violence towards women — and is it ultimately the American Government’s duty to step in to prevent these sort of occurrences happening again in the future?

How has violence towards women become such a Monumental problem in the NFL, then?

There has been far too many cases over the past few seasons of these instances occurring, of course. Some argue that due to the NFL’s weak stance towards violence towards women — the players are more likely to take advantage of the system, and of course, on occasions, having the fame that they do playing in the National Football League, goes to their heads.

However, this is no excuse and something needs to be changed in order to put a stop to this violence towards women.

The most recent case which occurred was when former Kansas City Chiefs running-back Kareem Hunt — who was deemed to be the future of their running game, was involved in an assault on a woman, in Cleveland, Ohio and in a video, he was seen pushing a woman to the ground. The 23-year-old clearly has a reputation, as he was also accused of kicking a man in a nightclub.

There have, of course, been other cases with regards to NFL players being violent towards women, too. The incident came four years after Baltimore Ravens running-back Ray Rice knocked out his partner at an Atlantic City Casino. Then we have, of course, the fact that Reuben Foster, the former San Francisco 49ers line-backer, was arrested twice for attacking his ex-girlfriend, Elissa Ennis, allegedly leaving her with bruises and concussion.

This is all evidence that it is out of control. The NFL’s stance isn’t strong enough. They’re weak in their approach, and something desperately needs to be done in order to amend this — because it is only going to get worse, and this is clear evidence that this problem is huge in football right now.

If you were in a normal job, you would be sacked for this sort of behaviour. The NFL have let it get out of hand, simply because they aren’t taking the issue serious enough. It is something which shouldn’t happen in the first place of course but the NFL hasn’t helped the matter. It should be standing up to these sort of instances, but they clearly aren’t and this is not good enough.

These are innocent women being attacked for no reason; yet they aren’t receiving anything in the way of sympathy from the NFL. And they aren’t being protected. What is all that about, then?

Could the Government help the situation by standing up to the NFL?

There is the argument that the government could stand up to the NFL in order to stifle cases like this happening in the future, but they haven’t thus far, so why would they changed their mind?

There are of course plenty of reasons. One being the obvious — the problem is getting that severe that one day, due to an assault from an NFL player, a woman could be killed. The NFL certainly wouldn’t want that on the back, and this is why the government need to stand up to them and ensure they deal with situations like this in a coherent and professional manner and offer players who have been involved in domestic violence cases towards women, rehabilitation, at least. But not short term.

It has to be long-term because as we have seen recently, these players are being allowed back far too soon; and they’re often naive, and there is always a possibility it could happen again, as the Reuben Foster scenario has indicated, with regards to his ex-girlfriend.

This is why it might be ideal for the government to step-in, to sort this mess out once and for all; and give the NFL an incentive to take stronger action against players who are ultimately violent towards their partners.