With the increase in society taking a stance against violence by many people, sports has become an area where some feel that the violent acts such as the hitting and fighting that occurs should be eliminated. You can not change something that has been around forso long becuse it would change the aspect of the game to something completly different.The elimination of violence should not be done in sport because the violence is a part ofthe game which would only hurt its popularity. The reasons that the violence is occurring in sport is due to six theories accordingto John Schneider. "The violence in sport mirrors the violence found in society, violenceas the result of economic incentives, the influence of crowd behaviour on player violence,genetic causation for player aggression, learning theory and player aggression, andpsychological stress and player violence" (Lapchick 230). The theories of sport mirroring society, violence as a result of economic incentive,and the influence of the crowd behaviour are the theories that I feel are responsible for theincreasing violence in sports. Most people when involved in a highly stressful situationwhere violence is around would probably resort to a fight to resolve their differences. Insport, why should we expect any difference. In events such as hockey games, wherepeople are expected to hit and make body contact, sooner or later a fight will break outand the fans will yell and scream for their favourite player involved. Like anything, ifpeople around us are applauding us for a certain act we have done, we will try to do itover so that we will continue to be praised. In sports, there are some players whose onlyrole on the team is to protect and enforce the unwritten rules of the game such as inhockey where it is not right to fight or hit a Wayne Gretezy or Mario Lemieux type of starplayer. His economic incentive is to protect the team and if he does not, a new line ofwork might be in t...
