WAG NY Times article about abuse at Everest

[profmom]

Let me be more explicit. I'm aware that immigrants are receiving a lot of scrutiny in the US at the current time. It is a mistake to think about the problems of abusive coaching in the United States as primarily or predominantly one of coaches from a different culture where harsher treatment is the norm coming over and imposing "their culture."

Take a good hard look at USAG's list of permanently ineligible members at https://usagym.org/pages/aboutus/pages/permanently_ineligible_members.html. The problems in the United States are very much home grown, and blaming immigrants is a cheap cop out.

 

[Madden3]

Let me be more explicit. I'm aware that immigrants are receiving a lot of scrutiny in the US at the current time. It is a mistake to think about the problems of abusive coaching in the United States as primarily or predominantly one of coaches from a different culture where harsher treatment is the norm coming over and imposing "their culture."

Take a good hard look at USAG's list of permanently ineligible members at https://usagym.org/pages/aboutus/pages/permanently_ineligible_members.html. The problems in the United States are very much home grown, and blaming immigrants is a cheap cop out.

I respectfully disagree . By your reasoning the Karoli’s history in Romania is a irrelevant. I think that is a mistake .
It is not just about the people who commit specific kinds of abuse and get caught. It is about the creation of a culture of abuse that attracts and enables predators and allows those who are abused to believe what is happening to them is normal or necessary .

The long and well documented history of abuse of athletes in state sponsored Athletic programs must to be part of what we examine if we are going to have a serious conversation about abuse in Athletics in the United States or anywhere else.

It is not about assigning or avoiding blame it is about being able to understand and consequently fight abuse.

 

[coachmolly]

I respectfully disagree . By your reasoning the Karoli’s history in Romania is a irrelevant. I think that is a mistake .
It is not just about the people who commit specific kinds of abuse and get caught. It is about the creation of a culture of abuse that attracts and enables predators and allows those who are abused to believe what is happening to them is normal or necessary .

The long and well documented history of abuse of athletes in state sponsored Athletic programs must to be part of what we examine if we are going to have a serious conversation about abuse in Athletics in the United States or anywhere else.

It is not about assigning or avoiding blame it is about being able to understand and consequently fight abuse.

I don't think she is saying their history is irrelevant, I think Profmom is speaking to the fact that too often we place blame on coaches from other places as being the abusive ones because of their upbringing in a different culture. "It's just how the Russians were brought up" or "That's how they do it in China," when really, we have plenty of home grown coaches born and raised in the US who are also responsible for abusive behaviors and practices. In fact, 2 of the most aggressive coaches I have ever seen (bordering on emotionally abusive tactics) are women born and raised in the US.

 

[Madden3]

I certainly could be wrong but my impression was that profmom was responding to this post :

New to the forum! Hi! This is in our city. One of the girls, not in the article, is at our gym now. It's pretty disgraceful to know he is still coaching. I pretty sure that's how he was trained too. We have many foreign coaches at our gym and although extremely firm, they also love and nurture the girls. I just think training is different and more intense in Europe and Asia and they bring those styles to their coaching. I am just glad we didn't pick that gym.

And my impression was that she was reading this post as somehow negative towards immigrants in general rather than specifically speaking about the abusive training culture that did not come from any ethnic or indigenous or traditional culture, but rather was imposed in the 20th century in some statist societies - the extremely restrictive on individuals, centrally controlled governments that were heavily invested in very visible National success in international athletics as a way to promote their ideology to the rest of the world. Specifically I hope it is understood I am talking about communist totalitarian countries.

Systemic abuse in some of those specific athletic programs is well documented. Pointing out the fact of that history of abuse is not anti-immigrant.

We know that abuse can be a “hereditary” - not genetically of course - I mean, one learns it from somewhere. Not only might abusers learn to abuse from what they witness or endure, but those who are abused learn to accept abuse the same way. Abuse becomes normalized in other words- and this gets carried on generation to generation, unless or until The individuals of one generation stops it, by recognizing the abuse and actively adopting non- abusive practices and attitudes.

Additionally in an international sport success is looked upon as something to emulate, so if a country is particularly successful in a sport, it is reasonable to assume those practices might be adopted by other countries and other coaches as a result.

I hope I do not have to say but perhaps I do that I am not suggesting that all coaches from former Soviet bloc countries and China are abusive. Not at all. My sons once had a coach who trained in the Soviet union who was wonderful.

Nor of course am I saying that every abuser comes from a country or was influenced by someone from a country aside America.

Abuse is a large subject and abuse comes from many different things.

So I am not talking about individual coaches at all, I am talking about cultures of abuse and how they form.

I think it is a mistake to minimize the impact those several decades of systemic abusive training practices under some communist regimes have had on many sports.

 

[Aussie_coach]

I don't think she is saying their history is irrelevant, I think Profmom is speaking to the fact that too often we place blame on coaches from other places as being the abusive ones because of their upbringing in a different culture. "It's just how the Russians were brought up" or "That's how they do it in China," when really, we have plenty of home grown coaches born and raised in the US who are also responsible for abusive behaviors and practices. In fact, 2 of the most aggressive coaches I have ever seen (bordering on emotionally abusive tactics) are women born and raised in the US.

And who coached these American coaches? If a culture is brought in, it is passed on from coach to gymnast, the gymnast grows up and becomes a coach and the cycle perpetuates.

 

[profmom]

I don't think we can attribute the problems in US gymnastics to the Karolyis. That's an excuse, not an explanation.

Let's take for example one of the oldest cases to come to light in the current set of revelations. This case was one that USAG did not turn over to SafeSport but chose to address internally, and only just recently determined warranted the banning of the coach involved. The athlete is Marcia Fredericks, the first American woman to win a world title. The coach is Richard Carlson. The abuse occurred in 1979. I'm sure that's just the tip of a very ugly iceberg. The Karolyis defected in 1981.

If you read Jennifer Sey's account of her life as an elite gymnast in the 1980s, you'll see lots of discussion of the abusive coaching she observed. Some of the worst incidents she describes did not involve immigrant coaches. I will certainly agree that coaches from other countries who believed that the best ways to get results involved terrorizing their athletes have all too often readily found US gymnastics culture to be supportive of and welcoming to their methods, and that these methods have been incorporated by some folks at the top. But that's not a causal argument.

I also think it's problematic to draw lines from political regimes in the 1970s and 1980s to the culture of sport now. If we wish to concede the communist influence argument, we must also concede the capitalist influence argument, which goes along these lines: "Those Americans are so desperate for wins that their athletes and coaches will do anything. Look at the steroid abuse scandal in baseball. Look at the carnage wrought by American football. Beyond that, Americans have a bizarre system in which they only develop children who can afford to pay their exorbitant training fees. Lots of poor kids in America could be great at soccer, but they don't get any chance to play because the only way to make a national team in America is if your parents are rich." There may be grains of truth in both sides of this debate, but by my read, neither argument involves the careful kind of process tracing and evidence that would show causality as opposed to a just so story that posits somewhat plausible links between large-scale economic and political arrangements on the one hand and problematic features of youth sports on the other.

The problem with blaming immigrant coaches (aside from feeding into anti-immigrant hostility, which is a separate issue) is that it absolves the leaders in the American gymnastics community of taking responsibility for fixing the culture that they/we have built. It also fosters a false sense of security for those who can say to themselves, "ah, my child is coached by a native-born American who understands the difference between hard work and abuse." I'm sure many parents thought and continue to think that John Geddert is a great guy. Those of us in the United States don't think of him first and foremost as an American or as a natural product of American culture. If you're going to make that argument with respect to Chinese, Russian, or Eastern European coaches, I think you're logically bound to entertain it with respect to John Geddert, Don Boger, Ray Adams, Marvin Sharp, and Don Peters. And maybe that is what you want to do.

 

[profmom]

Oh, two short clarifications: first, the "you" above is not directed at Madden, who is drawing a really important distinction between culture and individuals that I endorse completely. Second, it's important to keep in mind that there are a lot of good people in this sport. I posted elsewhere, but it's worth reposting: http://officialmissval.com/together-well-rise/

 

[Madden3]

I’ve written about abusive cultures on this website many times. I believe I have always tried to address with care the complexity of abusive cultures rather than easily assigning blame or attempting to avoid the same.

I honestly do not see how recognizing the influence the Karoli’s (and perhaps more importantly, the system of training that they represent) have clearly had on women’s gymnastics in America possibly eliminates the responsibility of others to protect athletes. Certainly I have never made such an argument.

What I have seen over and over again is a vast failure to recognize abuse when it is happening and a lack of understanding about what to do about it when it is recognized. This is a massive failure of understanding and the responsibility is shared by the leadership of the sport as well as coaches, parents and adult athletes alike.

I have also seen a propensity to look to USAG or safe sport as if they are going to solve every abuse issue or somehow magically prevent abusers from having access to children. Who I have seen shirking responsibility are the parents - that includes you and I and every other parent - I am not speaking only of parents of children have been abused but all parents. Our children’s health and well-being is our responsibility and no one else is going to meet that responsibility as well as we can. This is why we need to understand abuse better.

If you believe that a training system in a free market where families of athletes have to pay for training themselves and are consequently free to choose different options in the sport, another sport or an option that involves something aside sports to spend their money on - is just as likely to create long term systemic abuse situations as one where the state exerts near total control over everyone’s options but in particular over the options of impoverished people, that is your right I am not here to argue what economic system is better.

But I will say that I hope people who are interested will read about the history of the systemic abuse in those countries because it gives one an excellent view into how abusive cultures lead to the brainwashing of all participants into accepting abuse as normal. Whereever that tendency comes from it permeates the sport and it is a major problem because such attitudes allows abuse to go on for decades unchecked.

What I have tried to do with my posts about abuse on this forum is to open the eyes of parents to the idea of how abusive cultures opperate- how to recognize them, how to avoid them and how to survive them.

To that end I usually avoid commenting on specific coaches or specific abuse accusations because my point is this- when you look at an abuse case, look at it from the point of view of learning about abuse. Don’t look at “that” gym as being the abusive one and your gym as being the nice one. Use these stories to look again at your child’s gym. Stay ever vigilant. Use them to become alert to red flags and use them to educate and empower yourself and your child.

 

[Aussie_coach]

Looking deep into the past to ty and uncover the origin of this abusive culture is not about making excuses or avoiding blame. The coaches are still responsible for their actions no mater where the culture originated. But understanding its origins can help us to move forward and heal said culture.

I think oe of the other problems is that many of these gymnasts spent their entire childhoods doing gymnastics, so they grow up and become coaches or open gyms. They know about gymnastics but don't nessarily have the skills and personality traits that would cause someone to select teaching children or owning a business as a profession.