“FOOTBALL IS America,” proclaims a commercial highlighted in Dave Zirin’s 2022 documentary ‘Behind the Shield: The Power & Politics of the NFL.’
It is a statement that’s hard to argue with.
In the US, the sport’s popularity is unrivalled.
According to figures compiled by Nielsen, of the Top 20 list of most-watched telecasts ever by average viewership, 19 are various editions of the Super Bowl.
But Zirin’s documentary questions the larger cultural impact of the sport, given its immense power, highlighting its ties to Israel, militarisation, and racism.
“What I hope to enlighten people about is, first of all, to back it up and say: ‘Yes, football is America,’ says Zirin, sports editor of The Nation, who is visiting Ireland this week in an event hosted by Irish Sport for Palestine, Sport Against Racism Ireland (SARI), Dubs for Palestine, and Insaka Ireland.
“But we need to take a very hard look at what America is right now and what America is becoming. And I want to make the point that the NFL is not a bystander in this process of what’s happening to the United States, but an aggravator.”
What America is becoming is a deeply divided country, with President Donald Trump arguably the country’s most polarising figure, whose ideals the NFL has at times emulated, with its inherent racism, militarism and intolerance for those with alternative views.
Zirin’s visit from 15-18 September takes place shortly before the NFL itself makes the trip over — the Pittsburgh Steelers are set to play the Minnesota Vikings on 28 September in Croke Park.
“I heard about the NFL sending kits to all the schools to play flag football, equipment and the like,” he says. “And people need to understand that they’re not planting a tree in Ireland, they’re planting a flag.
“And that’s, of course, up to the free will of the people of Ireland, whether they want that in their country, but they also need to understand that the NFL never comes à la carte. It comes with a lot of baggage.”
Zirin reserves particular criticism for the billionaire owners of teams and NFL commissioner Roger Goodell for how the sport has been governed.
“They have been frustrated for generations that, unlike baseball and basketball, for example, this is not a sports commodity that naturally becomes a part of the culture and the fabric of other countries, and therefore, its growth potential is, at the end of the day, limited.
“And so, baseball and basketball have been picked up very naturally by people across the world, almost logically, and yet the NFL needs to send flag football kits to schools in Ireland.
“They are trying to force themselves in for more profits because the world has already rejected their product, but they have 25 billion reasons to think that they can overcome the will of the people to reject the sport.”
NFL commissioner Roger Goodell. Alamy Stock Photo
Alamy Stock Photo
Although it was released in 2022, the problems explored in Zirin’s documentary are just as pronounced today.
Despite a majority of black players in the league, the vast majority of owners and coaches are white.
The league’s partnerships with the military and security forces are growing, and Zirin says the values it espouses, including excessive patriotism and behaviours such as minimising or dismissing legitimate critiques, are inextricably linked with Donald Trump’s America.
“People have to realise that the NFL is not bringing the joys of sport. It’s bringing Trumpism, the Trumpism of 2025, and [Irish] people should protest on that basis.
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“There will be protests outside the stadium. And I strongly encourage people to join them as a mode of self-defence so their children’s children don’t end up crippled by head injuries, aren’t treated like gladiators and aren’t used to promote the growth of a militaristic society.”
The documentary also reminds people of just how dangerous the sport can be.
In 2013, it was announced that the NFL would pay $765 million to settle a lawsuit brought by more than 4,500 players and their families, who were suing as a result of the former athletes being diagnosed with CTE, dementia or other brain-related injuries.
Although a Washington Post investigation last year claimed the NFL still “routinely fails to deliver money and medical care to former players suffering from dementia and CTE”.
Moreover, exactly how the sport can become safer remains a topic of contention, even if some efforts have been made to address the problem.
“People need to look at the NFL and tackle football in general like a cigarette. And you can certainly make a cigarette safer, get a longer filter, lower tar, whatever you want to do, but you can’t make a cigarette safe.
“So I do believe that some of the reforms that the NFL put in, just because the publicity was so terrible, have made the sport [safer].
“It’s not like they were like, my goodness, we have a concussion problem. No, they had evidence they suppressed while more and more people dealt with horrible effects, and families were torn apart, and they didn’t have any idea why, and they have made this bed.
“It is a very good thing that this has been dragged into the light, and it’s a very good thing that there have been little changes that have legitimately made the game safer.
“But as the old union leader of the NFLPA [National Football League Players Association], DeMaurice Smith, always said to me: ‘It’s the only job with a 100% injury rate.’”
DeMaurice Smith (file pic). Alamy Stock Photo
Alamy Stock Photo
Zirin was inspired to undertake the project having become “deeply immersed in the collision of the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States with the NFL”.
He describes the NFL as “a behemoth culturally” but argues that they don’t use their power responsibly.
“I love every aspect of this film, but I clearly got the end of the film wrong, if only because I end on a note of hope that the racial justice protests that we’ve been seeing could be the start of something and not only has it not been a start of something, but there’s been a hellacious backlash in every aspect of our society.
“The fact that Roger Goodell would pose with his thumbs up with Donald Trump in the Oval Office, when Donald Trump has never so much as feinted an apology for how he trashed the league during his first term, and called for people to boycott the league. I mean, it’s really stunning to me how craven the NFL is in scraping towards this autocrat.
“But taking it back, I am very proud now of that last part of the film, even though it is wrong, because it does act as a time capsule, and it’s been really shocking to me how quickly the NFL and the sports media culture have thrown down the memory hole everything that took place those seasons. So if nothing else, it’s a record of a period of struggle that they are trying to [make] us forget.”
One figure integral to the racial justice fight was Colin Kaepernick.
The former San Francisco 49ers quarterback attracted global attention in 2016 when he decided to kneel during the national anthem before games in reference to police brutality and racial inequality in the United States.
In response, President Donald Trump said NFL owners should “fire” players who protest, after others joined Kaepernick in taking a knee.
Kaepernick became a free agent at the end of the season and has not been signed by an NFL team since, with many fans and pundits believing his absence to be politically motivated.
In November 2017, the star filed a grievance against the NFL and its owners, accusing them of collusion, and reached a confidential settlement with the organisation in 2019.
By ostracising Kaepernick, Zirin says the NFL was sending a message to other players tempted to express their political beliefs, or at least those that don’t involve celebrating the military and Trump.
“[The Kaepernick saga tells us] they can get away with making you disappear for your political beliefs. And I can tell you as somebody who is a sports writer, who does talk to NFL players, that message has been received.
“He’s gone from a Super Bowl quarterback to a ghost story to scare young players, to shut their mouths — get a podcast, maybe, where they talk about absolutely nothing.
“Become an influencer, where you don’t influence people to do anything important or that matters. I mean, that’s really the legacy.”
From left, The San Francisco 49ers' Eli Harold (58), Colin Kaepernick (7) and Eric Reid (35) kneel during the national anthem before their a game against the Dallas Cowboys on October 2, 2016. Alamy Stock Photo
Alamy Stock Photo
Consequently, the majority of NFL players have stayed silent on issues such as the Israel-Palestine conflict, with some notable exceptions.
“There were a nice group of NFL players who refused a trip sponsored by an NFL owner that they do every year, in conjunction with the State of Israel, to go over there and be propagandists when they return,” Zirin explains.
“And these players refused after first agreeing, because of the Black Lives Matter movement, and the connections that were being made between, say, people in Ferguson, Missouri and people in Gaza.
“And it’s going to start with the Black struggle in the United States, but the Black struggle has never been more closely tied and intertwined with the Palestinian struggle than it is now.
“There are certainly several ex-players who have come forward to stand with the people of Palestine at this moment of dire need.
“But if we’re talking about current players. I mean, they’re not guaranteed contracts for a reason.”
Zirin, who himself is Jewish, cites the example of Robert Kraft. In 2019, the CEO of the New England Patriots established The Foundation To Combat Antisemitism. Zirin argues that the organisation conflates antisemitism with antizionism and criticises their support for the war in Gaza.
He adds that the power and influence wielded by figures such as Kraft is one reason why NFL players are reluctant to speak out.
The author of 11 books has also been paying close attention to some recent developments and controversies in Ireland, particularly those relating to Israel and Palestine.
Zirin encourages the Irish basketball players set to face Israel in a qualifier next November “to walk out onto the court for that first game and then walk off. Let all the people there sit with the reality that they’re playing games while miles away, children are starving to death.”
Zirin concludes our conversation by warning Irish people against embracing the politics of the far right, as espoused by MMA star Conor McGregor, whom he likens to the US president, believing it’s hard to reason with their extreme views.
“They have to be legally and peacefully defeated,” he adds.
“What’s the middle ground that you would possibly have? We hate people less, but we still hate them?
“Tragically, the kind of opinions of somebody like a McGregor or a Trump [holds], they exist in the land of absolutes, not in the land of: ‘Let us try to find common ground.’”
An Evening with Dave Zirin
Tuesday 16th September, 6pm, Joly Theatre, Hamilton Building, 16 Westland Row, Trinity College Dublin (D02YY50)
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Why the NFL is bringing ‘Trumpism’ to Ireland
“FOOTBALL IS America,” proclaims a commercial highlighted in Dave Zirin’s 2022 documentary ‘Behind the Shield: The Power & Politics of the NFL.’
It is a statement that’s hard to argue with.
In the US, the sport’s popularity is unrivalled.
According to figures compiled by Nielsen, of the Top 20 list of most-watched telecasts ever by average viewership, 19 are various editions of the Super Bowl.
Last February, the 2025 Super Bowl set an all-time ratings record for a second straight year.
But Zirin’s documentary questions the larger cultural impact of the sport, given its immense power, highlighting its ties to Israel, militarisation, and racism.
“What I hope to enlighten people about is, first of all, to back it up and say: ‘Yes, football is America,’ says Zirin, sports editor of The Nation, who is visiting Ireland this week in an event hosted by Irish Sport for Palestine, Sport Against Racism Ireland (SARI), Dubs for Palestine, and Insaka Ireland.
“But we need to take a very hard look at what America is right now and what America is becoming. And I want to make the point that the NFL is not a bystander in this process of what’s happening to the United States, but an aggravator.”
What America is becoming is a deeply divided country, with President Donald Trump arguably the country’s most polarising figure, whose ideals the NFL has at times emulated, with its inherent racism, militarism and intolerance for those with alternative views.
Zirin’s visit from 15-18 September takes place shortly before the NFL itself makes the trip over — the Pittsburgh Steelers are set to play the Minnesota Vikings on 28 September in Croke Park.
“I heard about the NFL sending kits to all the schools to play flag football, equipment and the like,” he says. “And people need to understand that they’re not planting a tree in Ireland, they’re planting a flag.
“And that’s, of course, up to the free will of the people of Ireland, whether they want that in their country, but they also need to understand that the NFL never comes à la carte. It comes with a lot of baggage.”
Zirin reserves particular criticism for the billionaire owners of teams and NFL commissioner Roger Goodell for how the sport has been governed.
“They have been frustrated for generations that, unlike baseball and basketball, for example, this is not a sports commodity that naturally becomes a part of the culture and the fabric of other countries, and therefore, its growth potential is, at the end of the day, limited.
“And so, baseball and basketball have been picked up very naturally by people across the world, almost logically, and yet the NFL needs to send flag football kits to schools in Ireland.
“They are trying to force themselves in for more profits because the world has already rejected their product, but they have 25 billion reasons to think that they can overcome the will of the people to reject the sport.”
Although it was released in 2022, the problems explored in Zirin’s documentary are just as pronounced today.
Despite a majority of black players in the league, the vast majority of owners and coaches are white.
The league’s partnerships with the military and security forces are growing, and Zirin says the values it espouses, including excessive patriotism and behaviours such as minimising or dismissing legitimate critiques, are inextricably linked with Donald Trump’s America.
“People have to realise that the NFL is not bringing the joys of sport. It’s bringing Trumpism, the Trumpism of 2025, and [Irish] people should protest on that basis.
“There will be protests outside the stadium. And I strongly encourage people to join them as a mode of self-defence so their children’s children don’t end up crippled by head injuries, aren’t treated like gladiators and aren’t used to promote the growth of a militaristic society.”
The documentary also reminds people of just how dangerous the sport can be.
In 2013, it was announced that the NFL would pay $765 million to settle a lawsuit brought by more than 4,500 players and their families, who were suing as a result of the former athletes being diagnosed with CTE, dementia or other brain-related injuries.
Although a Washington Post investigation last year claimed the NFL still “routinely fails to deliver money and medical care to former players suffering from dementia and CTE”.
Moreover, exactly how the sport can become safer remains a topic of contention, even if some efforts have been made to address the problem.
“People need to look at the NFL and tackle football in general like a cigarette. And you can certainly make a cigarette safer, get a longer filter, lower tar, whatever you want to do, but you can’t make a cigarette safe.
“So I do believe that some of the reforms that the NFL put in, just because the publicity was so terrible, have made the sport [safer].
“It’s not like they were like, my goodness, we have a concussion problem. No, they had evidence they suppressed while more and more people dealt with horrible effects, and families were torn apart, and they didn’t have any idea why, and they have made this bed.
“It is a very good thing that this has been dragged into the light, and it’s a very good thing that there have been little changes that have legitimately made the game safer.
“But as the old union leader of the NFLPA [National Football League Players Association], DeMaurice Smith, always said to me: ‘It’s the only job with a 100% injury rate.’”
Zirin was inspired to undertake the project having become “deeply immersed in the collision of the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States with the NFL”.
He describes the NFL as “a behemoth culturally” but argues that they don’t use their power responsibly.
“I love every aspect of this film, but I clearly got the end of the film wrong, if only because I end on a note of hope that the racial justice protests that we’ve been seeing could be the start of something and not only has it not been a start of something, but there’s been a hellacious backlash in every aspect of our society.
“The fact that Roger Goodell would pose with his thumbs up with Donald Trump in the Oval Office, when Donald Trump has never so much as feinted an apology for how he trashed the league during his first term, and called for people to boycott the league. I mean, it’s really stunning to me how craven the NFL is in scraping towards this autocrat.
“But taking it back, I am very proud now of that last part of the film, even though it is wrong, because it does act as a time capsule, and it’s been really shocking to me how quickly the NFL and the sports media culture have thrown down the memory hole everything that took place those seasons. So if nothing else, it’s a record of a period of struggle that they are trying to [make] us forget.”
One figure integral to the racial justice fight was Colin Kaepernick.
The former San Francisco 49ers quarterback attracted global attention in 2016 when he decided to kneel during the national anthem before games in reference to police brutality and racial inequality in the United States.
In response, President Donald Trump said NFL owners should “fire” players who protest, after others joined Kaepernick in taking a knee.
Kaepernick became a free agent at the end of the season and has not been signed by an NFL team since, with many fans and pundits believing his absence to be politically motivated.
In November 2017, the star filed a grievance against the NFL and its owners, accusing them of collusion, and reached a confidential settlement with the organisation in 2019.
By ostracising Kaepernick, Zirin says the NFL was sending a message to other players tempted to express their political beliefs, or at least those that don’t involve celebrating the military and Trump.
“[The Kaepernick saga tells us] they can get away with making you disappear for your political beliefs. And I can tell you as somebody who is a sports writer, who does talk to NFL players, that message has been received.
“He’s gone from a Super Bowl quarterback to a ghost story to scare young players, to shut their mouths — get a podcast, maybe, where they talk about absolutely nothing.
“Become an influencer, where you don’t influence people to do anything important or that matters. I mean, that’s really the legacy.”
Consequently, the majority of NFL players have stayed silent on issues such as the Israel-Palestine conflict, with some notable exceptions.
“There were a nice group of NFL players who refused a trip sponsored by an NFL owner that they do every year, in conjunction with the State of Israel, to go over there and be propagandists when they return,” Zirin explains.
“And these players refused after first agreeing, because of the Black Lives Matter movement, and the connections that were being made between, say, people in Ferguson, Missouri and people in Gaza.
“And it’s going to start with the Black struggle in the United States, but the Black struggle has never been more closely tied and intertwined with the Palestinian struggle than it is now.
“There are certainly several ex-players who have come forward to stand with the people of Palestine at this moment of dire need.
“But if we’re talking about current players. I mean, they’re not guaranteed contracts for a reason.”
Zirin, who himself is Jewish, cites the example of Robert Kraft. In 2019, the CEO of the New England Patriots established The Foundation To Combat Antisemitism. Zirin argues that the organisation conflates antisemitism with antizionism and criticises their support for the war in Gaza.
He adds that the power and influence wielded by figures such as Kraft is one reason why NFL players are reluctant to speak out.
The author of 11 books has also been paying close attention to some recent developments and controversies in Ireland, particularly those relating to Israel and Palestine.
He was moved by how the Palestinian women’s team were welcomed in Dublin last year ahead of their historic friendly with Bohemians.
Zirin encourages the Irish basketball players set to face Israel in a qualifier next November “to walk out onto the court for that first game and then walk off. Let all the people there sit with the reality that they’re playing games while miles away, children are starving to death.”
And the author has been impressed by the 800 current and former GAA players encouraging their association to drop Allianz as a sponsor over its links to Israel, in stark contrast to the silence of most American athletes.
Zirin concludes our conversation by warning Irish people against embracing the politics of the far right, as espoused by MMA star Conor McGregor, whom he likens to the US president, believing it’s hard to reason with their extreme views.
“They have to be legally and peacefully defeated,” he adds.
“What’s the middle ground that you would possibly have? We hate people less, but we still hate them?
“Tragically, the kind of opinions of somebody like a McGregor or a Trump [holds], they exist in the land of absolutes, not in the land of: ‘Let us try to find common ground.’”
An Evening with Dave Zirin
Tuesday 16th September, 6pm, Joly Theatre, Hamilton Building, 16 Westland Row, Trinity College Dublin (D02YY50)
Wednesday 17th September, 6pm, Belfast (location tbd)
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Allianz Conor McGregor dave zirin GAA Interview NFL Palestine strange bedfellows