The NFL says it will halt the use of “race-norming” — which assumed Black players started out with lower cognitive functioning — in a $1 billion settlement of brain injury claims. The practice had made it harder for Black players to qualify.https://t.co/OQpzSD88xM
— The Associated Press (@AP) June 2, 2021
After all, ‘those people’ just don’t have as much to lose.
Imagine how bad things would be, she said piously, if racial bias was a pervasive condition in America…
… The practice made it harder for Black retirees to show a deficit and qualify for an award. The standards were created in the 1990s in hopes of offering more appropriate treatment to dementia patients, but critics faulted the way they were used to determine payouts in the NFL concussion case.
Wednesday’s announcement comes after a pair of Black players filed a civil rights lawsuit over the practice, medical experts raised concerns and a group of NFL families last month dropped 50,000 petitions at the federal courthouse in Philadelphia — where the lawsuit had been thrown out by the judge overseeing the settlement.
Senior U.S. District Judge Anita B. Brody later took the unusual step of asking for a report on the issue. Black retirees hope it will include a breakdown of the nearly $800 million in payouts so far by race. They fear the data will never come to light…
“The replacement norms will be applied prospectively and retrospectively for those players who otherwise would have qualified for an award but for the application of race-based norms,” the NFL said in a statement issued Wednesday by spokesman Brian McCarthy.
Earnest / condescending BBC explainer on ‘race norming’ here.
Fuck playing, make Kaep the Commish.
— Pfizedd (@Zeddary) June 2, 2021