Jonathan Stewart is not a fan of your fantasy football team.

“It’s not a fantasy, it’s real life,” Stewart, a Carolina Panthers running back, said in a telephone interview this week. “These are guys who have actual families. This is a job. It’s not fantasy.”

The regulation posse is taking a hard look at the two leading daily fantasy sports companies, FanDuel and DraftKings, over the central question of whether they offer games of skill or a way to circumvent laws against online gambling. We can debate the merits of their arguments endlessly, and on Wednesday that fight moved to a New York courtroom.

The more troubling issue about fantasy football to me, though, is that its increasing popularity is masking something darker: the desensitizing effect it is having on fans, numbing them to the pain and injuries that are the stock in trade of a violent game.

I’ve seen it time and again: An injury to a player evokes moans and sometimes profanity in the moment. But it is not out of concern for the athlete on the field. It is because the player — often a quarterback, a running back or a receiver — is central to someone’s fantasy team.