"Does football cause brain damage" is relevant to discussions of whether I should play football, whether my friends or family should play football, whether anyone should play football, whether it's ethical to watch football, whether it's more fun to watch football than golf, whether it's appropriate for educational institutions to promote or participate in football...

I'll also suggest that if it turned out that football promoted the better functioning of your brain, outrage at the NFL for covering up research suggesting the opposite would be pretty muted. If you believe that, you should also believe that what everyone sees as "the big issue" is the brain damage, not the coverup.

It was much more interesting to hear how much the NFL had covered up, and the degree to which they directly lied about the evidence of the effects of playing the game.

The cover-up is the scandalous part, so of course that's the part that people are going to focus on.

It's possible that you can't play football (or soccer) at a professional level without accepting that risk.