I am going to separate this into an all-star then high school response. There is no question in my mind that all-star cheer is a sport. I don't know of many people that wouldn't consider it a sport. Because all-star cheer is a private/club sport, an official designation as such doesn't hold the meaning that it does for high school cheer. Parents who have a child on an all-star team already pay immense amounts of money to have their child participate in this sport. Let's face it, this sport has already priced out those who can't afford it. There are very few gyms that can afford to give scholarships or tuition discounts to more than one or 2 kids. Therefore, if your child is desperate to cheer (outside of school) and you cannot afford all-star, your child is most likely on a rec team. I already pay $1,000's of dollars for CP to participate in this sport, I won't blink at a extra couple hundred if it means an improvement in safety (not extra padding in the Varsity wallet).
Safety regulations require teams to practice on certain surfaces. This rule is disregarded at Worlds not only by coaches and athletes, but by the official sanctioning body of the event. I have never been to Worlds, but it sounds like teams are actually encouraged to practice on the fields if their team doesn't pay for the practice floor. As far as the competition floor goes, I don't think people figured out there was something wrong with the floor until after there were several injuries. I probably wouldn't notice if a team competed on a floor with an entire panel missing before CP's team.
So what are my options for resistance? Moving gyms only means I am sucking from the same Varsity power teet in a different uniform. Pull my kid from the sport? I have a feeling that the only person who will feel that punishment is CP.
There are no other options within this sport. Varsity has a monopoly on cheerleading.
As far as high school cheer goes: I am not okay with looking the other way when it comes to safety. Safety costs money. To say we shouldn't designate cheer as a sport because it will cost more money to implement safety standards sounds ridiculous to me, no matter who makes the argument. Even without the official "sport" designation, safety standards need to be raised for high school cheerleading. Yes, designating cheer as a sport will cost schools more money. Some schools will not be able to afford to have a competition cheer team and will have to "ground" their teams to just sideline cheerleading. And that is okay.