The “Sex Offender” Campaign: Is the NFL Being Scammed?

This year the trouble started early. Normally the NFL and the Super Bowl sponsors get to hear gripes and snipes about half-time after the show. Maybe there was some kind of wardrobe malfunction, or maybe the band wasn’t very exciting, but considering what all could go wrong, half-time is generally a masterpiece of planning and execution that keeps the audience on the sofa and up for the second half. The show needs a solid, big-name act to carry it off, and this year’s choice for the slot was the classic hard-rock band The Who.

Right after this was announced on Thanksgiving Day, the NFL started to get letters from what was represented as child protection “groups” complaining that Pete Townshend was a “sex offender” and that he shouldn’t be allowed to play. The “groups” exchanged letters with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, and then posted copies of the exchange on to CBS executives, the mayor of Miami, the governor of Florida, and to the media.

All this gives the NFL and the Super Bowl a real black eye, as it looks like they didn’t check this out up front, or that they’re not in favor of protecting America’s children--but what’s really going on here? It turns out that Townshend was given a police warning for researching child pornography for an anti-porn essay (no charges, no conviction), and Evin Daly, the guy that’s really pushing this “sex offender” campaign is registered at Associated Content, an Internet content site to get paid for articles that use his content. Also, he’s got a website funded by a South Florida foundation in his wife’s name, where she, or maybe both of them, might draw a salary from the donations. We can’t tell because the foundation’s records don’t seem to be available online.

So what if this guy is just harassing the NFL to promote himself? What if he’s just doing it so he can make money from his articles, and from donations to his wife’s foundation? Should the NFL stand for this?

References:
http://www.associatedcontent.com/user/187999/evin_daly.html
http://edition.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/europe/05/07/uk.townshend/index.html