A New York Times Best Seller
“Powerful...an important read." —Publishers Weekly
New York Times bestselling author Steve Almond takes on America’s biggest sacred cow: football
In Against Football, Steve Almond details why, after forty years as a fan, he can no longer watch the game he still loves. Using a synthesis of memoir, reportage, and cultural critique, Almond asks a series of provocative questions:
• Does our addiction to football foster a tolerance for violence, greed, racism, and homophobia?
• What does it mean that our society has transmuted the intuitive physical joys of childhood—run, leap, throw, tackle—into a billion-dollar industry?
• How did a sport that causes brain damage become such an important emblem for our institutions of higher learning?
There has never been a book that exposes the dark underside of America’s favorite game with such searing candor.
“Powerful...an important read." —Publishers Weekly
New York Times bestselling author Steve Almond takes on America’s biggest sacred cow: football
In Against Football, Steve Almond details why, after forty years as a fan, he can no longer watch the game he still loves. Using a synthesis of memoir, reportage, and cultural critique, Almond asks a series of provocative questions:
• Does our addiction to football foster a tolerance for violence, greed, racism, and homophobia?
• What does it mean that our society has transmuted the intuitive physical joys of childhood—run, leap, throw, tackle—into a billion-dollar industry?
• How did a sport that causes brain damage become such an important emblem for our institutions of higher learning?
There has never been a book that exposes the dark underside of America’s favorite game with such searing candor.
