From this source: http://www.bbc.com/sport/0/american-football/33167457

'The chairman of the National Football League's health and safety advisory commission believes American football could ban helmets in the future.'

The opposition I can see to this is twofold - one, how on earth is less safety equipment going to make the sport safer, and two, surely if there's no big hits because people are scared of smashing their own dome, it's not football any more.

The answer my friends is rugby. There are two key differences between rugby and football when it comes to tackling - padding and rules.  

In rugby, you cannot simply hit a player; you have to make an effort to wrap your arms around the player, otherwise you are penalised quite severely (a yellow card, which in rugby means you're off the pitch for 10 minutes and your team has to play 14v15 for that time). Similarly, high tackles (an arm at the shoulder or above is high) are also penalised heavily. You cannot hit a player while he is in the air under any circumstances, nor can you lift a player's waist above his shoulders so that he lands head first (a 'spear' tackle).

Because the padding that exists in rugby (they're not just wearing shirts, hasn't been that way for decades) is soft and minimal at best and helmets are not a factor (the scrum caps you see on some players are designed to stop their ears from being ripped off during scrums), there are no helmet-first tackles, no one is getting a hard plastic piece of armour propelled at them and as such, the issue of concussions in rugby is not one that is mentioned nearly as much as in football. It's the same theory as boxing gloves vs a bareknuckle fight - you can punch someone in the head all night long with 12oz gloves on, but if you land one good shot without them on you'll shatter your hand immediately - which is why in organised, professional bareknuckle fights, people are throwing palm strikes and wrestling.  

Now, I'm sure you're thinking well, if football had no helmets and you had to wrap up players to tackle, the big hits that we all love would go away. I am here to tell you that that's not the case. The following video should show you you can tackle people just as hard as you can hit them. Poor Nick Abendanon...