The point is, it is a game that is played overwhelmingly by black guys, not a bunch of soft suburbanites. The real question is how is youth participation in the black community and have they seen a similar drop? I have a feeling that the drop in youth participation is largely among soft, white suburbanites who were never going to get a sniff at the NFL in the first place, so it means nothing. BTW, the racial breakdown is going to be a key component of the attempted take down of football. Look for the line of argumentation to be as such, there are a bunch of rich, white owners who are leaving these poor black guys out to dry. Mark my words. The end result is the left will help out these black guys by denying them the chance to go to college and make millions of dollars. It always seems like the people who the left tries to help always end up suffering the most. In the eyes of the left, the NFL makes too much money and they will try to destroy it, because that's what they do.
Somewhere I saw a cigarettes analogy used. Football is smoking and the NFL is big tobacco. And smoking has not been banned.
Since the time of the gladiators in Rome (and earlier), mankind has always had a thirst for violent "blood sports" (football, boxing, MMA, etc.). Usually some type of team "blood sport" is included in the mix. I don't think that NFL football is going away - unless it is replaced by some team sport that is more of a spectacle - Rugby? Australian Rules Football? Lacrosse? What's next?
Baseball has essentially disappeared in some communities over the past 20-30 years...MLB came up with a novel solution: import foreign players...I wouldn't be surprised if the NFL starts to create some foreign "farms" for players in the years ahead...After all, there are plenty of impoverished third world nations that would bite at the chance to make it big in the NFL.
I have to say, I thought the demise was going to come from regulation, as it turns out, the demise is strictly self inflicted. They had a nice run while it lasted I suppose.