Penn & Teller: Bullshit!

Hi, I'm Penn Jilette and this is my partner, Teller.

High school can be a dangerous time,

and high school sports are certainly dangerous.

Think about it: Teenagers slamming at full speed against each other,

and against the ground...

You wouldn't even consider to do that without

protection for their elbows and arms.

Or without hip pads and rib protectors.

And they'd never get on the field

without knee pads and thigh pads,

and without a helmet or shoulder pads?

No fucking way!

Unless, of course, you're a cheerleader.

Fuck football!

The toughest high school athletes are cheerleaders

and we're letting them get seriously fucked up every day

and that's bullshit!

Ho-ho-ho-- Hold it!

We're not doing the title sequence yet!

Did you forget what show this is?

Go bullshit!

"Cheerleaders"

Welcome to the world of modern cheerleading.

With its gravity-defying flips, three-story basket tosses,

and multiple back handsprings.

Cheerleading sure has changed since the old days.

Now it's flipping every fucking flying direction.

And, as a result, more and more cheerleaders

are suffering catastrophic injuries,

from brain hematomas to broken backs, and worse.

Give me an M! Give me an R! Give me an I!

What the hell is going on?

Oh!

Tonight, we're gonna find out,

with a little help from...

A doctor who's on a crusade to save the cheerleaders...

A feminist who fought stereotypes

with government regulation...

A former cheerleader who thinks she knows

who's profiting from it all...

And cheerleaders.

Buttloads and buttloads of cheerleaders!

Tonight, we're gonna bring it on!

Rah! Rah! Sis boom fucking bah!

Teller and I have invented a cheerleader training device

built to the latest cheerleader safety standards.

Listen, honey,

you make eye contact with everybody.

Not just the folks here on the fifty yard line,

but send a smile to the end zone,

Look at the front again,

and send a smile to this end zone.

And then don't forget the people in the bleachers--

They're back there, they love you, too.

And over here in the end zone again.

And, oh, your boyfriend's out on the field, ok?

Now you're getting the idea.

Look over here, look back there.

Look over here, keep smiling, keep happy.

Remember you're cheering, cheering, cheering, everything's fine...

Perfect! Absolutely perfect!

Get her out of there, would you, Teller?

Oh, you're ok, just... Shake it off.

Let's go!

We wanted to take a closer look at cheerleaders.

Oh, shit.

That doesn't sound right. Um, ok, this is Bullshit...

But these are high school girls,

we gotta keep it clean.

We wanted to expose cheer--

Oh, fuckin' Christ on a pom-pom stick!

Ok, we wanted to get a behind-the-scenes look.

Is that ok? Oh, fuck it--

We asked our camera crew to go out

and find some basic high school cheerleaders.

Hey! Basic High School! Wow, they're good!

We are the Basic Varsity cheer team!

Yeah, they're psyched up.

Basic's got a big game against Generic this weekend.

Turns out Basic cheerleaders are just a bunch of cute,

friendly, all-American girls.

Like most teenagers, they talk about their phones, boys,

and the Mormon vampire "Twilight" series.

It made me-- It made me a total Jacob fan.

Really?

That's Ashley and Shayla.

The really hot topic at the cheerleader table?

Bryanna's big ankle injury at practice yesterday.

Wow! A girl gets hurt the day before we show up

to talk about cheerleading injuries.

How lucky is that? I mean, poor thing.

Oh, get better soon, Bryanna.

But while we're on the subject,

can I ask you cheerleaders a question?

How many of you have ever had a cheerleading injury?

Oh, my!

That's, uh, 16 out of 19.

That's 16/19ths.

And exactly what kind of injuries are we talking about, girls?

I came down wrong and hit my head.

Ow.

I caught an elbow to the temple.

That'll hurt.

Dislocated and shattered my elbow,

and I've had a lot of concussions.

- I hit my head on the floor. - I rolled my ankle.

- I hurt my wrist. - I got a concussion.

I got a hairline fracture in my wrist.

- I hurt my lower back. - I cracked my growth plate,

from tumbling.

Cracked your growth plate?

I don't even know what the fuck that is,

but it sounds excruciating.

So, uh, what about you?

I've pulled my hamstring.

Ok, well, that was kind of a weak one to end on.

Maybe she pulled it really hard.

I think we should ramp things up

with a couple of people

with some really fucking scary stats.

Underscored with scary music...

There were 30,000 emergency room visits

last year alone in cheerleading--

Girls who are dropped and break their neck.

Girls who are dropped that fracture their skull.

Head injuries and neck injuries.

Serious concussions,

brain damage,

subdural hematomas,

bleeding in the brain.

And that's more than double all other ten sports combined.

More than women's soccer,

softball, basketball,

gymnastics, volleyball, track, swimming,

lacrosse, field hockey, and ice hockey.

More than ice hockey, for fuck's sake.

Did you ever watch ice hockey?

Yeah, me, neither. But I've heard it's fucking brutal.

Consider shit ramped up.

My ass is bummed.

Can we just please cut to a cheerleader? Any cheerleader?

Ah, that's better. Thank you.

I started cheerleading back when I was in seventh and eighth grade.

I loved it. It was competitive.

It was hard.

It was a big commitment but I always liked it.

Jenna Jackson, former Varsity cheer captain.

Jenna's feelings about cheerleading abruptly changed the day

she went with her younger sister Laura

to her first cheerleading tryouts.

I see people all coming out of the room

kind of whispering,

kind of, you know, looking in the window.

And I was waiting to see Laura.

So I got nervous when I didn't.

And sure enough I went in there.

And she was...

She was the one on the floor.

Saying she couldn't breathe and that she couldn't move.

The school called Laura's parents

and they raced to the hospital.

And they took us to a private room

and they said that Laura had broken her neck.

- I'm Daryl Jackson. - And I'm Melody Jackson.

We're Laura's parents.

We saw her; she had a tube down her throat.

She couldn't speak. But she could blink her eyes.

No, she couldn't even do that.

She was out. She was in bad shape.

This is Laura.

Her accident fractured her neck

and damaged her spinal cord causing her to be paralyzed.

She will never walk again, and can only breathe

with the help of a ventilator.

Our hearts go out to Laura and her family.

Looking back, do you see anything

that could have prevented this?

Yes, I think it would help if it was a sport--

Declared a sport everywhere.

You see, most state governments have gone out of their way

to rule that high school cheerleading is not a sport.

That's right.

They don't think these girls competing

in these national competitions, sometimes televised

on sports networks, are in any way athletes.

Why does being designated a sport matter?

We're gonna talk about that in a bit,

but for now, you should know

this seemingly small bureaucratic distinction

has led to a series of heartbreaking accidents like Laura Jackson's.

So how can a government ruling cause cheerleaders to get hurt?

It begins with this woman.

Uh, is cheerleading a sport?

There are a lot of people, or some people,

who would like to say that it is a sport.

But under Title 9, and to me it does not appear to be a sport.

I'm Dr. Bernice Sandler,

and I'm the godmother of Title 9.

Title 9-- the root of this whole cheerleading injury shitstorm.

Title 9 is probably the most important law passed