Public Heroes, Private Felons: Athletes and Crimes Against Women - Hardcover

Benedict, Jeff

3.33

21 ratings by Goodreads

9781555533168: Public Heroes, Private Felons: Athletes and Crimes Against Women

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1555533167 ISBN 13: 9781555533168

Publisher: Northeastern University Press, 1997

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Making use of extensive interviews with athletes, victims, attorneys, coaches, and others, the author offers evidence that college and professional male athletes are more violent toward women than their peers and attempts to explain why. UP.

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About the Author:

Jeff Benedict, former Director of Research at the Center for the Study of Sport in Society at Northeastern University, is currently attending the New England School of Law. He has published numerous newspaper and journal articles on the role of athletes in society, and has appeared on several network and cable television shows as a expert on athletes and crime.

From Kirkus Reviews:

A sports sociologist's provocative, sometimes sensationalistic study of a phenomenon that's gaining increasing public attention. Observes Benedict, ``Because of the physical nature of athletics; the aggressive, confrontational, supermacho attitudes surrounding them; and the social approval afforded to celebrity athletes, the sports industry has in effect embraced those men who demonstrated a disdain for women through repeated acts of criminal violence.'' To see the phenomenon of athletes who rape and batter from all angles, Benedict interviewed nearly 300 subjects, including groupies, victims, prosecutors, university administrators, and athletes. His findings reveal many disturbing facts and trends: how the small minority of women who make themselves available to jocks help ``to exacerbate the derogatory attitudes held by athletes''; how peer pressure creates an environment for conduct most individuals would find reprehensible; and how even when they are held accountable for their actions, athletes too often get off with minimal sentences, the matter soon forgotten by the public. More alarming still is how some women are doubly victimized--brutalized and later humiliated, as was the case with one woman who brought suit against members of the Cincinnati Bengals football team. After a court verdict favorable to the players, one of the defendants did a celebratory ``touchdown dance'' for the press. Benedict occasionally strays from his area of expertise, particularly when analyzing the psychology of individuals. However, he is dead-on when describing the group dynamics of athletes and how this camaraderie and shared sense of privilege can lead to trouble. A troubling look at how societies create and then turn a blind eye to a class of citizens who, in the words of one retired player, can't ``tell the difference [between force and consent] anymore.'' -- Copyright �1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

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