While people that aren't fans of the Minnesota Vikings like to wring their hands and point at the Vikings' "arrest record" over the past decade or so, the team is at least making an effort to do something about it. For the second time in three years, the Vikings have brought in a person to warn the team (and particularly the younger players) about the perils of being a player in the NFL.
Sean Bishop, the. . .ahem. . ."director of advertising" for Lollipops, a. . .ahem. . ."gentlemen's club" in Daytona Beach, Florida, has been asked to come and speak to the team.
"I don't need their money," Bishop recently told Brian Murphy of Twincities.com. "I tell them I am a scumbag club owner who will use and abuse you. I just don't want to see any of them ruin their lives. They need to be protected from themselves."
The man is exactly right. To be honest, I've never seen the big deal/benefit of "gentlemen's clubs" or "strip clubs" or whatever vernacular you'd like to apply to them. To borrow from a stand-up routine I heard somewhere once (from someone whose name escapes me), going to one of these places is like going to a restaurant where they make really great food. . .and they let you sit at the table and look at the food and smell the food. . .but you can't actually eat anything. I mean, seriously. . .why bother?
Yes, I get that these are grown men and that it's their money and all this other sort of thing. And I realize that none of them (in all likelihood) are going to read this. But I do wish they could police themselves slightly better than they apparently have been. And I hope that, if the Vikings are bringing this guy in, that at least a few of them will listen to him.