Okay, I admit that I might be a bit of a dick when it comes to the whole Dystonia Cheerleader argument. However, that’s because she’s wrong and promoting an untruth that can have drastic effects on public health.
I read this article over at Science Dailytoday, and I have to admit it made me giggle. The basic gist of it is that something like 60% of all cheerleading injuries come from stunts. Personally, I would have thought it would be a much higher number. I would imagine that there are much less pulled hamstrings from high kicks than dislocated shoulders from being flipped like an uncooked¬†pizza crust in the hands of a pimply-faced teen boy. But I’ll take the number as writ.
What I find interesting about this, though, is the leap I made in my mind. When I read the title alone, all I thought was, “Well duh.” Of course stunts that are flashy and exciting and involve spinning a human being as they fall unrestrained to the earth results in injury sometimes. But these are the obvious risks that cheerleaders elect to take for the good of cheering. I’m sure no cheerleader is surprised to hear that there are risks to these behaviors, but they choose to take those risks for a variety of reasons, and good on ‘em for doing so.
But the more I thought about it, the more I saw how strange we are as people. We’re totally prepared to risk life and limb to cheer, snowboard, cycle, play contact football, eat at a Jack In The Box, drive a car, talk back to the bully, profess our love, profess our derision, and any of the billions of things we do. All human activities have some degree of risk, and they are risks that we accept because we understand the relationship between these risks and the perceived rewards. A cheerleader learns how to do a¬†star basket toss because it looks cool, garners respect, wows the crowd, and riles everyone up for the home team. The benefits, and her own confidence in her abilities, outweigh the risks.
So why do we not listen to this advice when it comes to medicine? Someone recently told me that 28 people who died from the HPV vaccine is 28 too many, and that medicine should never have side effects.¬†It is of course patently ridiculous to assume that we could create any medicine (natural or otherwise) that simply could not kill you, but more to the point, the risk of this is insanely low. Do the math. 28 deaths out of 24 million doses. It’s a friggin small number.
If you look at the total number of injuries compared to the total number of attempts made on a given move in a given year by all cheerleaders, I’m pretty sure the numbers wouldn’t be huge. And no, I don’t have that data handy so I’m just speculating, but if I’m right they’d be much more statistically significant than HPV deaths to doses. So why are we so freaked out about the vaccine?
Jim
“VOLUNTARY ASSUMPTION OF RISK”… defined as: the notional acceptance of the hazard or danger associated with an activity by accepting, following or otherwise doing or attempting to do such activities.
VOLUNTARY!!!!! No one is twisting their cheerleading arms behind their backs, although I believe they could do that with little force… flexible little buggers they are…. !!!!
One note about the HPV vaccine tho… let’s first teach our young daughters about unsafe sex… would cut the horrible occurences of cervical cancer drastically… and the vaccine couldn’t hurt either… unless they flip them up in the air like pizza dough first before they innoculated them! Love ya Jimbo! ‚ô•
That’s exactly my point about assumption of risk. I just find it strange that we accept so many risks every day, and then look at the brutally insignificant risks of vaccination and reject them outright.
As far as it goes, I agree very much with teaching about unsafe sex. I’m horrified when people claim that abstinence will prevent disease. Study after study shows that people who are raised with the abstinence teachings in no way have less sex than people raised with an understanding of contraception, but they are dramatically more likely to have unprotected sex. I have four children, and I want them all to understand the importance of protection both from the perspective of preventing unwanted pregnancies and from the perspective of preventing infection. But if I had my druthers, I’d partner that with the vaccine. We all make mistakes, and dying for them when it’s needless seems foolish.