Violent Athletes

[cheerfulgreek]

Originally Posted by srmom

cheerfulgreek, I live in a house of male athletes, all football and/or other "helmet sports" players; not one of them is violent or an a**hole.

I only responded to the post because, honestly, I get tired of hearing about a**hole football players or athletes. It is a pretty common theme on message boards. So, I guess my toes did get stepped on.

I didn't say all, and I've already apologized ahead of time if I was stepping on anyones toes. In other words, if my comments and opinions are going to bother you, then don't read them.

Also, I think it's great that the male athletes you know aren't violent, but MY own experiences with them have all been bad ones.

And I didn't say all, because scientifically research about testosterone and aggression finds only a weak connection between the two, and when aggression is more narrowly defined as simple physical violence, the connection all but disappears. I do think that testosterone has a facilitative effect on aggression in some cases. Also, in some cases, testosterone may be necessary for enabling violent behavior, but even that, is not on it's own sufficient.

Look at the men and womens prisons. It's been proven through research, that the most violent inmates have higher levels of testosterone than their less violent peers. Scientist hypothesize that this violence is just one manifestation of the more biologically and reproductively goal of dominance. I think testosterone is generated to prepare the body to respond to competition and challenges to a man/woman's status, and any stimulus or event that signals either of these things can trigger an increase in testosterone levels, which can turn into violence and certainly dominance.

[fantASTic]

Originally Posted by cheerfulgreek

Look at the men and womens prisons. It's been proven through research, that the most violent inmates have higher levels of testosterone than their less violent peers. Scientist hypothesize that this violence is just one manifestation of the more biologically and reproductively goal of dominance. I think testosterone is generated to prepare the body to respond to competition and challenges to a man/woman's status, and any stimulus or event that signals either of these things can trigger an increase in testosterone levels, which can turn into violence and certainly dominance.

While this is a common train of thought, you have to remember that we can't test the entire population. It's entirely possible that the prisons have a completely average level of testosterone. We haven't really done the research to prove it.

srmom: I agree that athletes are certainly not more violent than non-athletes, in my experience.