The Gridiron’s Ethical Striping: Threads of Tackle Football’s Moral Permissibility

In this paper, I examine the ethical landscape surrounding tackle football, exploring the moral permissibility of the sport and the myriad ethical considerations it entails. This examination comprises the use of an ethical decision-making framework to analyze four key aspects: relevant empirical facts, affected parties, salient moral values/disvalues, and potential options. In pondering these aspects, I identify the ethical conflicts arising from factual disagreements, conflicting interests, and divergent values/disvalues concerning players’ decision to partake in gridiron football. In addition to emphasizing the importance of understanding and addressing such aspects and conflicts to devise potential solutions, I contend that ethical issues related to the permissibility of football ultimately stem from value-related conflicts, highlighting the necessity of examining and reconciling conflicting moral principles.