VICE CA - SPORTSRSS feed for https://www.vice.com/en/topic/sportshttps://www.vice.com/en%2Ftopic%2Fsports%3Flocale%3Den_caenTue, 26 Oct 2021 21:38:07 GMT<![CDATA[Scathing Report Reveals NHL’s Blackhawks Ignored Sexual Assault Complaints]]>https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/xgdqn3/chicago-blackhawks-sexual-assault-reportTue, 26 Oct 2021 21:38:07 GMTThe NHL has fined the Chicago Blackhawks $2 million and the team’s general manager and senior vice president of operations have stepped aside after independent investigators released a report outlining how management overlooked a sexual assault complaint against a coach.

At a Tuesday press conference, the investigators said they interviewed more than 139 witnesses looking into how the team handled the complaint from a player against video coach Bradley Aldrich during the 2010 Stanley Cup playoffs. 

“The report is both disturbing and difficult to read. It speaks for itself,” Blackhawks CEO Danny Wirtz said at the press conference

You can read the full 107 page report here. 

While the report doesn’t go into details of the allegations, a lawsuit against the team made by the former player alleges that in May 2010, while the player was at Aldrich’s apartment for coaching advice, Aldrich began to masturbate, threatened the player with a bat, and told him he would not play in the NHL again if he didn’t engage in a sex act with him. The investigators said Aldrich admits the sexual activity happened but says it was consensual. 

The report found that team management was made aware of the allegations in May and held a meeting about it but decided to focus on hockey since the Blackhawks were in a playoff run. Present at the meeting were the general manager Stan Bowman, Al MacIsaac (senior vice president of hockey operations), John McDonough (then president of the team), Joel Quenneville (the then coach who now coaches the Florida Panthers), and Kevin Cheveldayoff (now the general manager of the Winnipeg Jets). The Blackhawks ended up winning the Stanley Cup and allowed Aldrich to take part in the celebration. It wasn’t until three weeks later that management told human resources about the allegation.

“The failure to promptly and thoroughly investigate the matter and the decision to take no action from May 23 to June 14 had consequences,” the report says. “During that period, Aldrich continued to work with and travel with the team. Aldrich engaged in an unwanted sexual advance on a Blackhawks intern—physically grabbing the intern in a sexual manner. And Aldrich continued to participate in team activities and celebrations, in the presence of John Doe.” 

The team allowed Aldrich to resign with dignity after the celebration. While accepting the resignation the team paid Aldrich over $20,000 in severance and allowed him to have a day with the Stanley Cup. 

Aldrich went on to work at the Miami University in Ohio where a recently released investigation alleged he sexually assaulted two men. He then worked as a volunteer assistant coach at a Michigan high school, where he was convicted for sexually abusing a teenage player and sentenced to nine months in prison. The teenage player is also suing the Blackhawks.

Bowman and MacIsaac stepped down on Tuesday. No other people present at the meeting are currently working with the Blackhawks. 

“We deeply regret the harm caused to John Doe and the other individuals who were affected and the failure to promptly respond. As an organization, we extend our profound apologies to the individuals who suffered from these experiences,” the team said in a statement. “We must—and will—do better.”

One former player told ESPN earlier this year he believed the team attempted to “sweep the situation under the rug.”

The investigation into the team’s management was launched in August by the Blackhawks following the two lawsuits coming to light. The NHL said they will be holding meetings with Cheveldayoff and Quenneville who remain in influential roles in the league to determine “next steps,” NHL commissioner Gary Bettman said. 

Bowman also stepped down as the general manager of the United States Olympic team Tuesday.  

Correction: A previous version of this story said Aldrich worked at University of Miami (Florida). He worked at at Miami University (Ohio).

Follow Mack Lamoureux on Twitter.

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xgdqn3Mack LamoureuxNatasha GrzincicSportsChicagoblackhawksstan bowmanNHLHockeysexual assualtcover upsworldnewsNews
<![CDATA[NHLer Who Spoke at Anti-Vaxxer Rally Kicked Out of Training Camp]]>https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/qj8yb3/nhler-who-spoke-at-anti-vaxxer-rally-kicked-out-of-training-campWed, 22 Sep 2021 14:56:31 GMTA veteran NHLer player who spoke at an anti-vax rally has been barred from training camp for not being vaccinated.

The Columbus Blue Jackets have reportedly made it clear to Zac Rinaldo, a now-fringe NHLer who has played over 300 games during his nine-year career, that he’s “not welcome” at the club’s training camp. Rinaldo signed a one-year $750,000 contract earlier this year.

The 32-year-old isn’t the most highly-skilled player and as a  “grinder” would likely be competing for one of the very bottom forward spots on the team, meaning he was not a lock to make it. However, the team hasn’t closed the door to Rinaldo in case he reverses course and decides to get vaccinated.

"The ball is in his court right now,” Blue Jackets general manager Jarmo Kekalainen told The Athletic. "We do everything as a team. That’s a requirement of being a Blue Jacket. We’re going with the group we have here, which is 100 percent vaccinated. We’ll see how it develops.”

Earlier in the year, the Blue Jackets fired an assistant coach for refusing to get vaccinated.

The news comes after Rinaldo spoke briefly at an anti-vaccine passport rally in his hometown of Hamilton, Ontario, for a fringe far-right Canadian political party in the days leading up to the country's election. The party actively courted the anti-vax, anti-mask, and COVID-conspiracy movements (they failed to elect a single member to the Canadian parliament.)

“I’m not anti-vax, I’m not anti-mask,” he said at an anti-vax rally. “I’m pro-choice.”

Rinaldo has not clarified why if he’s “not anti-vax” he has yet to receive the vaccine nor commented on the Columbus Blue Jackets response. Instead of lacing up his skates in an NHL dressing room he’ll be attending the training camp of the Blue Jackets minor-league team, the Cleveland Monster. If Rinaldo plays in the minors rather than the NHL he makes significantly less cash—$275,000 compared to $750,000, meaning each skipped vaccine shot will cost Rinaldo $237,500.

The Athletic’s Blue Jackets beat writer, Aaron Portzline, tweeted out that “the NHL Players’ Association is reviewing the (Blue Jackets’) decision to ban forward Zac Rinaldo.”

While the NHL hasn’t mandated vaccines it’s put in protocols that would greatly limit an NHL player who hasn’t been vaccinated ability to move around, especially when the team is on the road. This includes a player having to do a 14-day quarantine upon travelling from Canada to the States or vice-versa.

Leading up to the training camps that occur before the season, which begins in early October, some NHL teams are making a point of announcing their team is “100% vaccinated.” As the NHL nears the start of its season in the midst of the fourth wave of the COVID-19 pandemic the vaccine plays an important role and the league said that they expect to have 98% of their players vaccinated by the start of the regular season.

It’s unknown if other players will de facto opt-out of the season because of vaccination status like Rinaldo. The vaccination is causing another small wrinkle for some teams as well, with players who waited to get vaccinated now having to miss a portion of training camp. For example, newly acquired Edmonton Oilers defenceman Duncan Keith will miss the start of his team’s training camp because he’s still quarantining after his second shot.

A hockey journeyman, Rinaldo has played for the Philadelphia Flyers, Boston Bruins, Arizona Coyotes, Nashville Predators, and most recently the Calgary Flames before inking his deal with the Blue Jackets. In his 374 games, he’s scored 18 goals and 24 assists but has garnered over 758 penalty minutes.

Thanks to his history of goonish behaviour, Rinaldo isn’t necessarily the most popular player in the league and a few in hockey media decided to dunk on him following the announcement.

“Zac Rinaldo has turned down the first cheap shot of his life,” wrote one writer.

Follow Mack Lamoureux on Twitter.

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<![CDATA[Montreal Won a Hockey Game, So Fans Celebrated by Trashing Cop Cars]]>https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/m7e93b/montreal-won-a-hockey-game-so-fans-celebrated-by-trashing-cop-carsFri, 25 Jun 2021 16:30:43 GMTFor the first time in 28 years, the Montreal Canadiens have gotten a chance to play in the Stanley Cup final—and fans celebrated the news by beating the crap out of a cop car.

The underdog Canadiens are in the midst of a Cinderella story run towards the championship. They came into the playoffs with the worst record in the league—ranked 18th.

From coming back and beating the Toronto Maple Leafs in seven, to sweeping the Winnipeg Jets, to punching their ticket to the Stanley Cup final with a 3-2 overtime win over the Golden Knights on Thursday, it’s been quite the ride for Habs fans who were, unsurprisingly, jubilant.

And, as we all know, when sports fans get overly jubilant, things tend to get flipped and kicked.

While 3,500 fans were allowed in the Bell Centre arena in downtown Montreal Thursday for Game 6 against the Knights, the vast majority of fans watched the game from home, in bars, or at a large outdoor TV outside the Bell Centre. Artturi Lehkonen played hero as he potted the winning goal less than two minutes into overtime.

But soon after the cheering on the ice stopped, the cheering in the streets began and revellers amassed. The lucky few who were actually inside the Bell Centre for the game weren’t able to leave the building as the crowd outside was deemed too raucous.

Videos show fans shooting off fireworks, cheering, and marching in thrown-together parades. Police say they anticipated a rowdy crowd beforehand, so they had riot cops at the ready and deployed “a strong police presence throughout downtown.” According to local media, the cops and fans played a cat and mouse game as celebrations continually moved to the streets with fewer cops patrolling.

The most visceral image of the entire celebration (or riot, whatever you want to call it) was a cop car being flipped and getting vandalized. Videos show people rolling it, stomping in its windows, kicking it, throwing traffic cones at it, what have you.

Eventually, police moved in and deployed tear gas to disperse the crowd, who eventually relented and went home. According to the Montreal Gazette, eight police cars were damaged, two officers suffered minor injuries, and 15 people were arrested. Those arrested face charges including armed assault, assault, and obstructing the work of a police officer. An additional 60 more revellers received bylaw infractions.

In terms of how these things go, last night was relatively calm for the proud sports fans. A police spokesperson told La Presse that “most people behaved in an exemplary manner.” And at least they were rioting because they won, not because they lost.

Looking at you, Vancouver.

Follow Mack Lamoureux on Twitter.

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<![CDATA[Russians Aren’t Buying the Artemi Panarin Allegations, Either]]>https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/epdwg7/russians-arent-buying-the-artemi-panarin-allegations-eitherThu, 25 Feb 2021 14:56:04 GMTIf the assault allegation against New York Rangers star Artemi Panarin was aimed at kicking up a public storm against the politically outspoken 29-year-old winger on the home front—where public criticism of the Kremlin is discouraged—it appears to have failed.

As the Rangers rushed to Panarin’s defense, calling it “intimidation tactic” and a “fabricated story”, much of the Russian sports world also reacted with varying degrees of wariness to a claim by his former hockey coach, Andrei Nazarov, that Panarin assaulted an 18-year-old woman in Riga, Latvia, in 2011. Virtually no evidence has emerged to back up his allegation, and Latvian police said they have no report of the alleged incident.

Critics believe the claim was revenge for Panarin’s public support for opposition leader Alexei Navalny; Nazarov and several other figures from the Russian hockey world have been critical in the past of Panarin’s support for the anti-corruption politician. 

While Nazarov’s comments made a splash, according to Egor Paraskun, a Russian sports writer who covers hockey for the outlet Sports.ru, it’s still unclear whether it’ll seriously hurt Panarin’s reputation. “Some won’t understand and will think Panarin truly made a bad move,” he says, “and some will closely follow all the facts and attempt to collect as much information as possible.”

In a recent post, Paraskun picked apart the circumstances around Nazarov’s claim—including what he describes as the curious absence of a significant online footprint by the author who published the original interview with Nazarov in Komsomolskaya Pravda, Russia’s leading tabloid. That’s in addition to reporting from Latvian journalists appearing to further discredit Nazarov’s story that Panarin “sent her to the floor with several powerful blows.”

Further doubt emerged Wednesday after a former teammate who was with Panarin during the alleged incident denied there was a level of physical violence that Nazarov alleged. “The maximum that could have occurred is that [Artemi] pushed one of the girls,” Mikahil Anisin, who played alongside Panarin on the Russian professional team Vityaz at the time, told the outlet Sport Express. “And it’s not a fact that it even happened.”

Four other previous teammates from his time in the KHL also said they never heard of the incident. 

Meanwhile, commentators in the press have also cast doubt on the claims. While few paint Panarin as scandal-free, they point to Nazarov’s penchant for attention, unbuttoned commentary and fealty before the Kremlin. He’s long been deemed untrustworthy, said Sport Express columnist Alexei Shevchenko in a video blog, “while all the ex-coach’s statements really make one wonder.” Olympic tennis champion Yevgeny Kafelnikov went even further, voicing his full support for Panarin to local media and urging the embattled hockey star to “stay true to yourself.”

Yet despite the lack of public outrage in Russia against Panarin, the damage to his career may have already been done. For example, Paraskun, the Sports.ru writer, and others are waiting to see whether he’ll face disciplinary action that could keep him off the Russian national team during this year’s world championship—or next year’s Winter Olympics in Beijing.

 In a column for the daily newspaper Sovetsky Sport, one commentator invoked the infamous 1958 rape trial against Soviet soccer star Eduard Streltsov ahead of that year’s World Cup. Some believe Streltsov may have been framed, though he confessed to the crime after reportedly being told he’d be allowed to compete in the championship. He was sent to the Gulag for 12 years; he served only five, but his legend was forever tainted.

While criminal charges against Panarin appear to be off the table for now, it remains to be seen whether he’ll face a similar level of ostracism from the sport back home. “I am very afraid that something similar will happen to the leader of the Russian national hockey team,” writes the commentator Vitaly Slavin (though he appears to suggest American pressure would play a role).

 Whatever happens, experts say the affair is a cautionary tale about mixing politics and sport, or any other cultural pursuit, in Russia—a sentiment echoed even by those who support Panarin. According to Richard Arnold, a political science professor at Muskingum University in Ohio, public figures have long since learned to self-censor themselves lest they fall afoul of powerful forces.

“There’s nothing definite—that they’re going to be punished for saying something—but there’s always the chance,” says Arnold, who has studied the intersection of sports and politics in the former Soviet country. “People don’t want to stick their head out above the parapet.”

Other observers say the saga reflects the general dynamics in Russia, where two camps—comprising those cheering for Vladimir Putin and those fed up with two decades of his heavy-handed rule—appear increasingly polarized.

Yet they also imply the showdown between the two is not an equal one.

“You can break a person by someone else’s hand,” reads a Tuesday column in the critical Novaya Gazeta newspaper, which describes Nazarov as a pro-government zealot. “This form of discrediting is much more subtle than any recent projects involving the Russian secret services.”

Panarin has taken an “indefinite leave of absence” from the Rangers since the allegations went public earlier this week. ESPN reports that he has no plans to return to Russia but still has family there. 

 Follow Dan Peleschuk on Twitter.

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epdwg7 Dan PeleschukJosh VisserNewsworldnewsHockeyrussiaPutinartemi panarinRussian PoliticsSports
<![CDATA[Cleveland Ballclub Will Eventually Get Around to Changing Racist Nickname]]>https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/88a5k5/cleveland-ballclub-will-eventually-get-around-to-changing-racist-nicknameMon, 14 Dec 2020 17:41:21 GMTCleveland’s Major League Baseball team chose “Indians” as its nickname more than a hundred years ago, as the U.S. government was still finding new ways to claw land away from tribes while forcing Native people to assimilate. 

Now, after decades of criticism from Native American groups about the name, the team is finally going to change it, according to the New York Times

The team announced in July that it would finally review the name, as racial justice protests that often targeted racist monuments and statues swept the country. 

“In the coming weeks, we will engage Native American leaders to better understand their perspectives, meet with local civic leaders, and continue to listen to the perceptions of our players, fans, partners, and employees,” Cleveland owner Paul Dolan said in a statement at the time. “We feel a real sense of urgency to discuss these perspectives with key stakeholders while also taking the time needed to ensure those conversations are inclusive and meaningful.”

The backlash to Cleveland’s name, though, as well as other teams' use of Native Americans as logos, mascots, and nicknames—the list includes MLB’s Atlanta Braves, the NHL’s Chicago Blackhawks, and the NFL’s Kansas City Chiefs—has existed for decades. And the team has been gesturing at addressing that backlash without actually doing so for quite some time.

In 1997, three Native protesters were arrested for protesting the team’s name and its wildly racist caricature of a mascot, Chief Wahoo. In 1999, the Society of Indian Psychologists wrote a statement saying that mascots and symbols using Native people “seriously compromises our ability to engage in ethical professional practice and service to the community.”

The Cleveland team said it would deemphasize Chief Wahoo as a mascot in 2016 (before using caps bearing his visage in the playoffs that year). It stopped using Chief Wahoo as a mascot in 2019; since then, the logo has been a block letter C. This past season, the team wore road uniforms, which said “Cleveland” rather than the “Indians” displayed on home uniforms, for its home opener as a symbolic acknowledgment of the racism of the team's nickname. “We know change is due,” said star shortstop Francisco Lindor.

The Times reports that the process of change will be in line with this exceedingly slow and halting drip. One source familiar with the team's plans told the paper the team will play the coming season with the racist nickname it has deemed it necessary to drop.

And at least one local Native American group says the engagement Dolan promised hasn’t happened, and that it’s “dubious” of the claim that the team is consulting with Native American leaders. “Our fear is that, once again, the franchise will attempt to make dupes of the Native community and use this occasion to weave a false narrative in support of transitioning from ‘Indians’ to ‘Tribe’—which is unacceptable,” Sundance, the director of the Cleveland chapter of the American Indian Movement (AIM), said in a statement responding to the Times story. 

Cleveland is just the latest team to face a long-overdue reckoning with its nickname. In July, the Washington National Football League team announced it would finally drop the nickname “Redskins.” The team has still not decided on a new name; Washington team president Jason Wright recently said the team could keep “Washington Football Team” as a long-term solution. The Times reports that Cleveland is itself considering going a period without a name.

The backlash from the right is already beginning. President Donald Trump, who has made the dubious claim that he was the best baseball player in New York when he was in high school, criticized Cleveland’s move in a Sunday tweet. (Trump signed an executive order earlier this year ordering the Department of Justice to prosecute protesters who tear down racist monuments on federal property.)

“This is not good news, even for ‘Indians,’” Trump tweeted. “Cancel culture at work!”

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<![CDATA[Toronto Raptors Banned From Playing in Canada]]>https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/bvxmmz/toronto-raptors-banned-from-playing-in-canadaFri, 20 Nov 2020 19:13:02 GMTThanks to the coronavirus, Toronto Raptors will be starting their next season down in Florida. 

In a statement, Raptors President Masai Ujiri said the team attempted to find a solution with the Canadian government that “would permit us to play our 2020-21 season on home soil” but to no avail.

“Ultimately, the current public health situation facing Canadians, combined with the urgent need to determine where we will play means that we will begin our 2020-21 season in Tampa,” wrote Ujiri.

Last year was an odd one for the Raptors. After going all the way in 2019, the team lost star Kawhi Leonard after just one year, still played great, had the season stop midway, were forced to finish it in an isolation zone at Disney World, and then were eliminated in the second round by the Boston Celtics. Now they’ll be starting their season, not in Ontario, Canada, but Tampa, Florida—a win in some ways (the weather) and a massive loss in others (it’s Florida during a pandemic).

Countless COVID-19 infections have been tied to the return of sports. In multiple leagues across the world, players, as well as full teams, have had to enter into quarantine after contracting the virus during a sporting event. Recently the NFL fined the Tennessee Titans $350,000 for their shotty handling of social distancing and mask regulations during practice and workouts. 

The exact details of where the Raptors will be playing are unknown, but training camps open on December 1st, so they’re going to need to figure it out rather quickly. The CBC reports that public officials have said if the pandemic can be brought under control the Raptors could return home to Scotiabank Arena.

Canadian teams in predominantly American leagues have been forced to be flexible this year. The Toronto Blue Jays, who found themselves in a similar situation, played their home games out of Buffalo. The NHL, the only major league to have multiple Canadian teams, has been publicly mulling over forming an all-Canadian division to get over the travel headache when play is set to resume on January 1st. 

In his statement, Ujiri urged Canadians to “cheer us on from afar.” 

"So we'll be away from our home and our fans for now. They say absence makes the heart grow fonder,” he wrote. “I'm not sure that's possible for us—we love Toronto and Canada, and we know we have the best fans in the NBA.”

Follow Mack Lamoureux on Twitter.

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<![CDATA["We Won’t Stop": Gymnasts Around the World Are Organizing To End Abuse]]>https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/ep4377/we-wont-stop-gymnasts-around-the-world-are-organizing-to-end-abuseWed, 23 Sep 2020 18:09:40 GMTAt the end of June, Becky Downie, a member of the British women’s gymnastics team for more than a decade and the 2019 world silver medalist on the uneven bars, tweeted “Athlete A just opened a huge can of worms in the gymnastics world and I’m not sure people are ready for what’s next!!”

A few days later, we learned what the 28-year-old had been hinting at: a movement of gymnasts rising up against psychological, emotional, and physical abuse they had endured throughout their careers. It started with the British gymnasts, a statement, and a hashtag. On June 29th, dozens of current and former British gymnasts posted a statement to their social media feeds about how in response to Athlete A, the Netflix documentary about former USA Gymnastics team doctor Larry Nassar and the culture of intimidation and cruelty that allowed him to abuse gymnasts for decades, they were standing in solidarity with all survivors and condemning the abusive culture of the sport that enabled his crimes. The statement was as emphatic about what this group of athletes stood for—ethical coaching, training regimens based on scientific research, a culture built on trust instead of fear—as against. Each gymnast ended their post with the #gymnastalliance hashtag.

From there, it took off. In the weeks to come, hundreds of gymnasts from all over would post their personal stories of pain and abuse to social media using the hashtag. They spoke of being forced to train and compete on serious injuries; of being publicly shamed for their weight; of being screamed at and belittled for making mistakes in practice. Press attention would soon follow, with reports on ITV and other outlets. And the #gymnastalliance would soon spread to other countries, with gymnasts in Belgium, New Zealand, Australia, and the Netherlands speaking up about abuse at the highest level of sports there. Hotlines have been set up; independent inquiries have been promised; coaches have been suspended.

Downie was right; we weren’t ready. But the long overdue reckoning with abusive coaching in women’s gymnastics had arrived.

“I think there is a natural build to people kind of being ready and to being able to speak up and it requires people sort of going it alone first,” Jennifer Sey, one of the producers of Athlete A, told me. (She also appears in the documentary.) Sey would know; she had been going at it alone for years. In 2008, the 1986 national champion published a memoir, Chalked Up: Inside Elite Gymnastics’ Merciless Coaching, Overzealous Parents, Eating Disorders, and Elusive Olympic Dreams, that was an unsparing look at her experiences in the sport and the elite gymnastics world as a whole. The backlash from much of the gymnastics community was swift; Sey was denounced by some of her former teammates and on blogs. (There was more than one thread devoted to tearing her and the book down on the gymnastics message board where I used to lurk.) One of the people who criticized Sey’s memoir was Jane Allen, then the head of Gymnastics Australia. Nowadays, Allen is CEO of British Gymnastics, and many British gymnasts have been calling her for her resignation since the Gymnast Alliance began, saying that under her tenure, a culture of fear and intimidation permeated the sport and that the organization didn’t handle allegations of abuse against coaches appropriately. Or at all.

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Jane Allen, CEO of British Gymnastics. Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images.

Sey, 1996 Olympic gold medalist Dominique Moceanu (who came out against the Karolyis, the infamous Romanian coaching duo whose pupils included Nadia Comaneci and Mary Lou Retton, back in 2008), and a handful of other gymnasts spent years out there twisting alone until September 2016 when the Indianapolis Star published its first story about Nassar. That’s when the dam broke. Hundreds of women and girls, many of them gymnasts, came forward and said that Nassar had sexually abused them. But they also talked about the culture of the sport—extremely young athletes forced to train upwards of 30 hours a week on injuries, domineering coaches who fat-shamed them and forced them to train and compete on injuries Though most of the focus was on sexual abuse and the Nassar case, this broader culture came under scrutiny as well.

Like many of the Nassar survivors, Athlete A indicted that culture. In the film, Sey has perhaps the most important insight into how the culture operates and fucks with your perceptions of reality, so that in many cases it takes years or even decades to realize that what happened to you was not “tough coaching” but abuse.

"You think you’re hungry," Sey said in the documentary, "you think your ankle hurts, you think you’re working very hard. But you’re told and you’re screamed that you’re lazy and you’re fat and there’s nothing wrong with your ankle."

"You’re told and you’re screamed that you’re lazy and you’re fat and there’s nothing wrong with your ankle."

It is this aspect of Athlete A that gymnasts who have posted under the hashtag seem to have latched onto. The majority of stories posted since Gymnast Alliance first appeared have been about emotional and psychological abuse, not sexual abuse (though there are certainly accounts of sexual abuse in some of the stories). And it’s the culture of the sport that the very first statement posted to the hashtag took aim at. It was at once a statement of solidarity with abuse survivors and a call for changing the sport’s norms to include ethical, humane coaching practices.

“I had the idea on the weekend after I watched the film, what if we did a joint social media post so it came from all of us,” Jennifer Pinches, a member of Great Britain’s 2012 Olympic team, told VICE News. “The film does such a good job of showing this is not just one bad guy. It’s the culture around [him] that enabled it to happen. I felt like it was important for me to address that.”

She started reaching out to her former teammates, who reached out to others. People got on board quickly. Pinches showed the statement to the other gymnasts for input and approval. It was 2000 British Olympian Lisa Mason who came up with the hashtag and, as it would later turn out, the name of a movement for gymnast rights. When it came time, dozens of British gymnasts posted the statement along with the hashtag, filling up the social media feeds of the gymnastics community.

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Jennifer Pinches shakes hands with an admirer at the London Olympics. Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images.

“Then I just sat watching other people post it, for like the whole evening, [wondering] is this actually having an effect?” Pinches said.

It was. That’s due, in no small part, to the planning that Pinches, Mason, and others put into it. They made sure that it wouldn’t be just one or two voices shouting into the void; rather it was dozens, which then turned into hundreds. “The outpouring of support on social media was incredible and heartbreaking because it led to people opening up about things that happened to them.”

Though the #gymnastalliance would quickly become something of a sports #metoo movement, the original statement is devoid of mention of specific misdeeds or abuses. That, Pinches, explained, was by design. Though she fully supports all of the women who have come forward and told their painful stories, Pinches didn’t want people to feel that they couldn’t participate unless they were willing to talk about their own personal trauma publicly. “I 100 percent just felt that people should only do what’s best for them, what’s comfortable for them, what’s best for their mental health,” she said.

“Also, lots and lots of gymnasts I know have only had positive experiences and I didn’t want to exclude [them]. This should be about everyone coming together to say this is the type of culture we need to see.” In this way, Pinches and the British gymnasts built the largest possible base of support, a base that has only grown in the months since the movement that they’ve created has gone global and led to dozens of news stories, promises of independent investigations, and talk of reform from all of the major institutions of the sport.

And the timing couldn’t have been better for the British gymnasts. “It’s not that no one’s ever said ‘Gymnasts need a healthy environment’ before,” said Pinches. “That’s not a new message. It’s that all the conditions are right for people to actually take this seriously.” First, there was the platform, Netflix. Everyone has Netflix. Then there was the pandemic. People were in quarantine with little else to do but watch Netflix. Many gymnasts, perhaps for the first time in their careers, were not training and had time to reflect on their own experiences. Finally, the film started trending almost right after its release. The popularity of the documentary and the public reaction to it was a sign to the gymnasts that people were watching, that they were listening, and that this was their chance to strike.

But perhaps the most important audience of all was their fellow gymnasts. Shortly after the British gymnasts’ statements went up, gymnasts from other countries started to add their stories to the hashtag.

Mary-Anne Monckton was the first Australian gymnast to post her story. In her Instagram post, she shared a familiar story to anyone who had been following the hashtag: She was screamed at by coaches, belittled and shamed for her weight, had food withheld, and overtrained to the point of career-ending injury.

“After watching the Athlete A documentary, I started to realize that behaviors we thought were normal, were, in fact abusive behavior and wrong,” she wrote to me in an email. It took seeing the behaviors onscreen, acknowledged as abusive in the film, to get her to realize this.

Witnessing her British compatriots speak out encouraged her to do the same. Which then led to more Australian gymnasts coming forward. Gymnastics Australia has called on the Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) to conduct an independent investigation of the national governing body and the culture of sport. The AHRC is the same institution that conducted a review of abuse in the Australian Defense Force. In New Zealand, the outcry from current and former gymnasts led to the establishment of an independent inquiry headed by David Howman, the former CEO of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA).

Gymnast Alliance spread beyond the Commonwealth. Gymnasts in the Netherlands spoke out about abusive coaches there, leading to a temporary suspension of the women’s elite program the outcome of an investigation. The uprising also spread to Belgium. Dorien Motten is one of several Belgian gymnasts who has spoken out. Like many other gymnasts who have posted their stories, this is not the first time that Motten had tried to raise the alarm. She told me that she, along with a few others, submitted an anonymous report about the abuse to her federation’s ethics commission with the assistance of a psychologist. They were told that they had to provide their names in order to move forward, which was not something they were keen on doing since the head of the ethics commission was also the head of the federation and the women’s program. “Our complaint was wiped off the table immediately,” she wrote in an email.

“When athletes are either abused or being taken advantage of, it’s because the power imbalance is so strong and so one-sided,” Rob Koehler, director general of Global Athlete, an international athlete advocacy group, told VICE News. I don’t know how much more one-sided you can get than having the director of the ethics commission also be the head of the federation. In this scenario, the gymnasts hold absolutely none of the cards.

“When athletes are either abused or being taken advantage of, it’s because the power imbalance is so strong and so one-sided.”

“When all the sexual abuse came out in America, we were shocked and we immediately thought about the things we [had] gone through,” Motten wrote in an email. “But our main thought was that we [had] gone through wasn’t that big of a deal because we didn’t have any sexual abuse, only mental and emotional.” The Belgian gymnasts decided not to say anything publicly at that time.

“But then Athlete A came out and we saw that the mental abuse was kind of a base for the sexual abuse to take place,” she continued. “I asked the others, ‘Would we [have] let a doctor do those things to us when we were on the national team?’ And the answer was yes. We would have let this happen because we [were] brainwashed and would have thought it was normal, like all of the other bad things that happened there.”

This realization became an impetus for the Belgian gymnasts to start speaking out publicly. “We started talking again with the girls who we had filed the complaint with 1.5 years [ago] and we said, ‘Ok, we do something now or we have to stay silent forever.’...This was our chance to make a change!”

With the rise of the Alliance and the sheer volume of abusive stories that gymnasts all over the world have told and the common threads found running through all of them, the question we must ask is this: How did women’s gymnastics get to this point where experiencing abusive or demeaning coaching appears to be the norm and not the exception?

(While a handful of male gymnasts have come forward, citing abusive practices from their coaches and program directors, the overwhelming majority of the complaints have come from women, so for the purposes of this story, I’m going to focus on women’s gymnastics.)

Most point to the age of female gymnasts—among the youngest at the Games—and the early specialization demands of the sport, which push athletes to submit to long training hours when they are very young and still growing. Not only does the high level training commence young, but so does the normalization of certain abusive behaviors.

That women’s gymnastics would come to be dominated by especially young athletes was not obvious in the earliest years of the sport. The early gymnasts were adult women, in both age, appearance, and performance. Acrobatics weren’t emphasized; rather, the rules required these gymnasts to exhibit a certain femininity and grace in all of their movements. This was the kind of women’s sport that the International Olympic Committee, which was infamously against including women’s events in the Games, could get behind.

Starting in the mid-to-late 1960s, the ages of female gymnasts started to decline while the acrobatic complexity started going in the opposite direction. This led to the International Gymnastics Federation instituting the sport’s first age minimum in 1971. This move was not primarily borne out of concern for the athletes but out of concern for the image of the sport as one suitable for adult women. But the pixie trend would not be stopped. The following year, Olga Korbut made her Olympic debut at 17; four years after that, Nadia Comaneci became the youngest Olympic champion at 14.

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Nadia Comaneci in 1976. Photo by Don Morley/Getty Images.

The age was raised again in 1981 to 15 and then, in 1993, FIG voted again to increase the age to 16, a change that would take effect in 1997, after a wave of bad press related to athlete well-being. Michel Leglise, President of the FIG Medical Commission, said that the charges being levied against the sport were unfair and unwarranted. They weren’t then, and, as the Alliance is showing, they aren’t now either.

Even though the downward age trend has halted and started to reverse itself, the training and preparation hasn’t, as shown by the remarkable consistency in the stories the gymnasts have told over the last four decades. There is significant overlap between Sey experienced as an elite in the early-to-mid 1980s to what the gymnasts from the past 15 years have described in their posts. The gymnasts may be older but they’re still being treated as though they’re young girls devoid of agency. Becky Downie, a longstanding member of the British team and the 2019 world silver medalist on bars, posted to social media about being 26 years old and having her ankle pain dismissed by the national team coaches, who accused her of being “mentally weak” and was told to push through it. Two weeks later, she broke at that ankle and had to undergo yet another surgery.

FIG has been slow to respond to the crises of the last four years. It took them until 2019, three years after the first allegations against Nassar were made public, to create the Gymnastics Ethics Foundation. And FIG’s officials still spend too much time talking about athlete welfare as a public relations problem. FIG president Morinori Watanabe said in 2019, “At this moment in time, the media and the public too often relate gymnastics to harassment...We must get away from this image in the global sporting community.”

When asked for comment, FIG responded that their reform efforts are sincere and ongoing. “First and foremost, we would like to stress that ‘safeguarding and protecting participants in Gymnastics’ are not empty words for us, but something we constantly fight for,” they wrote and referred me to Watanabe’s statement in response to the rise of the Alliance. FIG has just announced that it will host an online conference call about coaching abuse in October.

“There is some responsibility on their shoulders for the fact that this culture has persisted all around the world,” Pinches said, while noting that she wasn’t certain what their role should be in all of this.

Over the last couple of years, high ranking officials in FIG have made public statements that appeared to be dismissive of survivors’ abuse claims. Early last year, Liubou Charkashnya, president of FIG’s Athlete Commision, said that at least some of the Nassar survivors were primarily motivated by financial gain. And Nellie Kim, FIG vice president and one of the most powerful figures in women’s gymnastics, echoed similar sentiments and added that she wouldn’t open a gym in the U.S. because she worries about retaliation from athletes and parents.

When asked about Kim’s comments, while pointing out that she was speaking for herself and not the organization, FIG said of Kim’s response to Russian media “that the way her words were translated did not exactly reflect her thoughts.”

What Kim and Charkashyna’s comments make abundantly clear is the problematic culture that the Gymnast Alliance has spoken of doesn’t solely reside in training gyms or national governing bodies; it’s present in FIG as well. Of course it is. Why would the international federation be immune to the global culture of the sport? They have made this culture and been made by it.

“One of the issues in the sport is that the athletes have no real agency and no power,” Sey said. This is particularly ludicrous to her because, of all the players and stakeholders—coaches, judges, officials—the athletes are the only truly indispensable ones. You simply can’t have a sport without them. “Yet the only constituency that was commoditized and treated with absolutely zero care were the only ones [who were] essential.” However as we’ve seen with essential workers during the pandemic, being indispensable doesn’t mean you’re taken care of or protected or compensated properly. Being called “essential’ is coercive, a way to compel work or certain behavior. It does not, in and of itself, confer power. As always, in order to get power, you have to rise up and take it.

“I wrote that statement, I organized the initial little flick of the first domino, but that wouldn’t have been possible without everyone else,” Pinches said. She repeatedly emphasized to me that this was very much a team effort.

The dominos had already been set up by people like Sey, Moceanu, Mason (who had previously spoken about the abusive coaching she endured), the Nassar survivors, and many others. The dominoes are falling all over the world though it’s still too soon to tell what kind of changes the Alliance will lead to.

“At the end of the day, it needs to be easier for them to make real change even if it’s for the wrong reasons than it is to just protect themselves and just do, like, PR changes,” Pinches said. For that to happen, the gymnasts and their allies must apply continual, sustained pressure on institutions that would like to simply wait them out and placate them with platitudes and empty promises. “People get tired of speaking out and people move on,” Koehler said. “And sport relies on people getting tired.”

The gymnasts, however, don’t appear to be running out of steam. They seem determined to finish what they started at the end of June. Several former British gymnasts have announced that they are considering taking legal action against their federation.

“We won’t stop,” Pinches said.

This article originally appeared on VICE US.

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<![CDATA[A Brief History of Logan Paul Getting His Ass Kicked]]>https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/k7qvgy/logan-paul-boxing-getting-punched-floyd-mayweather-fightFri, 18 Sep 2020 19:13:53 GMTDuring a midwinter appearance on Revolt TV's Drink Champs, former professional boxer Floyd Mayweather casually said that he didn't train at all for his fight against then-UFC Lightweight Champion Conor McGregor. "All I did was pushups and situps. That's all I did," Mayweather said. "Pushups and situps, box a few times, hit the bag a few times [...] Sometimes I wouldn't go to the gym for a week."

Mayweather, who won the fight with a 10th round TKO, said that he didn't even watch any tape of McGregor's previous fights. "My thing is this: I don't have to watch any footage of a fight because I'm Floyd Mayweather," he said. "Everybody's got to watch me."

If that's true, then he could probably skip the pushups, forget the gym even existed, and still be fine against Logan Paul. According to TMZ Sports, Paul is trying to set up a fight against Mayweather, the undefeated (50-0) eleven-time five-division world champion. Paul, a YouTuber who is basically what would happen if a drawing of a dick on a school binder got its wish to become a real boy, told the outlet that he "can't say shit right now" about whether or not the bout is happening. The Fighting News' Mike Feinberg, though, insists that Mayweather has "officially" signed a contract to get in the ring.

The fight is expected to be an exhibition and not a sanctioned fight, which means that it wouldn't affect either man's record and, in a bit of good news for Paul's prefrontal cortex, it also means that the fighters are allowed to wear larger-than-normal gloves and protective headgear. The upcoming fight between Mike Tyson and Roy Jones Jr. has been classified as an exhibition, as was Mayweather's last fight against undefeated kickboxer Tenshin Nasukawa.

It took Mayweather just over two minutes to knock Nasukawa down three times, which was enough for a first round TKO. Most of us have struggled harder to open a jar of store-bought marinara than Mayweather did getting that knockout—so good luck, Logan!

"The level that Mayweather has reached in the game is obviously top tier," Nicco Diaz, a New York City-based boxing coach told VICE. "You don't get to that level easily. That's decades of work he's put in, and he never really got out of shape. Even with what may be a bit of rust, his ring IQ and the fact that he's stayed in good form, he could win that fight [against Paul] tonight."

Paul has had one amateur fight and one professional bout as a cruiserweight. He fought fellow YouTuber KSI both times, and he didn't win either one. Vox described their first fight, a majority draw, as a "flawlessly executed circus of bullshit." The second, which took place 14 months later, was more of the same, except this time Paul lost.

Although KSI dominated the first three rounds, Paul fucked up a good fourth round by hitting KSI while he was on the mat. He was docked two points, which was enough to give KSI a split-decision win after six rounds. (Paul appealed the points deduction with the California State Athletic Commission, but his appeal was denied. "I quite literally only lost because of my actions," he said in a rare moment of self-awareness.)

As satisfying as it is to see Paul get punched in the face (the main appeal of the recent remake of Valley Girl is that it features Paul getting a blow to the nose), he hasn't boxed since last November. According to Sporting News, he got "knocked out cold" during a spring training session with UFC fighter Paulo Costa. He also spent several months trying to schedule… something with Antonio Brown, the embattled former NFL wide receiver. The fight never went beyond social media shit-talk, a threatened lawsuit from Brown, and Paul's truly unfortunate diss track. ("You ain't caught a pass in like so long/Dropped from your team, boy you're done for.")

"It's not happening," Paul said in the spring. "He DM'd me, and he said something like, 'I'm expecting a national apology [for the track].' And I said, 'I'm sorry you're a bitch.' I really am, that dude needs help."

Earlier this month, Paul issued a press release, teasing his return to the ring in a "major event" that could take place sometime this winter, so he might've been laying the groundwork for this whole Mayweather thing. It also means that he has several months to, you know, maybe realize that it might be a terrible idea.

Some boxing insiders certainly think it is. "It’s scary how bad Logan’s stamina is, and it might be a mistake for him to fight someone like Mayweather," Boxing News 24 wrote. "Logan’s gas tank was running on empty after one round [against KSI]. It was pathetic."

WBC Silver Lightweight Champion Ryan Garcia doesn't seem to think Paul has a chance either. "Logan Paul is fighting Floyd Mayweather," he tweeted. "Prayers going up for Logan." And KSI just thinks it's all bullshit. "My thoughts on Floyd Mayweather vs Logan Paul," he wrote, attaching a picture of a cap.

Diaz, who said he watched both of Paul's previous fights, was slightly more measured in his assessment. "Honestly, I see zero chance for him with one of the top, if not the top pound-for-pound fighters," he said. "I think Logan will demand more of Mayweather's attention than Nashukawa, but if Floyd goes back to his aggressive ways, he could definitely get him out by the first round. It's all about what kind of fight this becomes. If Logan comes out and tries to box, he loses easily. If he tries to make it a dog fight, he may survive a bit longer."

Either way, he should probably wear the headgear.

This article originally appeared on VICE US.

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<![CDATA[One Day Late, NHL Cancels Games as Players Protest Police Shooting]]>https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/g5pnjy/one-day-late-nhl-cancels-games-as-players-protest-police-shootingThu, 27 Aug 2020 20:43:49 GMTAll of the NHL’s Thursday hockey games have been postponed following pressure from players to support calls for racial justice in response to the shooting of Jacob Blake by police, according to reports.

The move comes a day after players from every major North American sports league—WNBA, NBA, MLS, MLB—decided to strike in support of Blake and widespread protests against anti-Black racism and police brutality.

While basketball, baseball, soccer, and tennis players postponed games and issued statements against police brutality on Wednesday, the NHL offered a “moment of reflection” for Blake and then went ahead with all three scheduled games, two of which took place after the Milwaukee Bucks sparked the action. Heavy criticism ensued, alleging the NHL should have taken a stronger stance against racism, especially considering the league had a recent racial reckoning of its own.

San Jose Sharks winger Evander Kane, the co-head of the Hockey Diversity Alliance, spoke out against the NHL’s inaction.

“Actually it’s incredibly insulting as a black man in hockey the lack of action and acknowledgement from the NHL, just straight up insulting,” Kane said.

“Being the only Big 4 sports league that has predominantly white athletes, it would've been an even bigger statement to stand in solidarity with the other leagues,” one Twitter user said.

The hockey league responded to criticism on Thursday, finally postponing its ongoing playoffs. But onlookers say the move came too late, and is the latest example of the league flubbing an issue surrounding racism.

According to news reports, the NHL made the decision after the Hockey Diversity Alliance, which was formed this year to address racism in the league, formally requested suspensions of post-season games scheduled in Toronto and Edmonton.

“We strongly feel this sends a clear message that human rights take priority over sports, Ottawa Senators player and HDA board member Anthony Duclair said. “We should not stay silent towards systemic racism and any racial inequalities in our society.”

Kane he took to Twitter to remind followers the initiative was player-led, not spearheaded by the league. The same is true of the strikes that sparked across sports on Wednesday.

Follow Anya Zoledziowski on Twitter.

This article originally appeared on VICE US.

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<![CDATA[Raptors Consider Game Boycott Following Police Shooting of Jacob Blake]]>https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/5dzab3/toronto-raptors-consider-nba-game-boycott-following-police-shooting-of-jacob-blakeWed, 26 Aug 2020 15:12:58 GMTThe Toronto Raptors are considering boycotting their next playoff game in response to Jacob Blake’s violent shooting by police in Wisconsin.

In a news conference following the Raptors Tuesday practice, players Norman Powell and Fred VanVleet said the team is trying to figure out how to respond. Not playing on Thursday against the Boston Celtics in the second-round Eastern conference playoff opener is one option of many.

"We knew coming here or not coming here was not going to stop anything, but I think ultimately playing or not playing puts pressure on somebody," VanVleet said inside the NBA's Florida bubble at the Walt Disney World Resort.

“Would it be nice if, in a perfect world, we all say we're not playing, and the owner of the Milwaukee Bucks—that's going to trickle down—if he steps up to the plate and puts pressure on the district attorney's office, and state's attorney, and governors, and politicians there to make real change and get some justice,” VanVleet said.

Late Sunday, Blake, a 29-year-old Black father living in Kenosha, Wisconsin, was shot multiple times in the back by police while his three young sons sat in the family SUV. The incident left Blake paralyzed from the waist down. The news, which included video footage of the shooting, has reinvigorated Black Lives Matter protests condemning police brutality and anti-Black racism that first gained traction after police were caught on camera killing George Floyd.

According to Powell, more needs to be done to spur people into action. He said BLM protests, taking a knee during anthems, and wearing anti-racism slogans is “not getting the job done,” CBC News reported.

"I feel like Black Lives Matter is just another thing in conversation now," Powell said. "Something needs to happen where you're forcing those people who can effect and make the change to do something."

VanVleet said everyone needs to get involved. "Here we are today with another unfortunate incident, so my thoughts today are with that man and his family and trying to wrap my mind around what they're going through," VanVleet said.

"Are we going to hold everybody accountable, or are we just going to put the spotlight on Black people or Black athletes or entertainers and say 'What are you doing? What are you contributing to your community? What are you putting on the line?” he said.

Details about the Raptors’ response to Blake haven’t yet been released, so it’s unclear if Thursday’s playoff game will go ahead. The Celtics had a similar meeting, ESPN reported.

“Obviously, our thoughts go to Jacob Blake and his family," Celtics coach Brad Stevens said. "And, obviously, that video was horrifying. That video was awful. And to think of three kids being in that car is like ... that just makes you shaken, right? It's ridiculous. ... We've talked about it as a team and just how we feel. We haven't talked about it enough, but obviously everybody is shook.”

The Raptors have been vocal opponents of anti-Black racism, arriving at the NBA’s bubble last month in a bus with the Black Lives Matter slogan emblazoned on its sides. Like other NBA teams, the Raptors jerseys sport social justice phrases like “education reform,” “respect us,” and “say their names.”

Draymond Green, a power forward for the Golden State Warriors, initially responded to the Raptors’ gestures by saying Black Lives Matter doesn’t affect the team because it’s Canadian—despite a notable Black Lives Matter presence in Toronto.

Raptors President Masai Ujiri responded by underscoring his intention to use his franchise’s presence in Florida “as a statement” to support Black and minority issues, Narcity reported. Last week, video footage surfaced of Ujiri getting pushed by San Francisco Bay Area sheriff’s deputy Alan Strickland while trying to get courtside after his team won its first NBA championship. The footage is part of a countersuit filed by Ujiri’s legal team against Strickland, who had tried to sue Ujiri for injuries during the widely disputed altercation.

The footage shows Strickland pushing Ujiri twice, telling him to “back the fuck up,” before the NBA executive pushes back.

In a public statement released by the Raptors, Ujiri said the video “demonstrated how horribly I was treated by a law enforcement officer last year.”

“There’s only one indisputable reason why that is the case—because I am Black,” Ujiri said. “What saddens me most about this ordeal is that the only reason why I am getting the justice I deserve in this moment is because of my success.”

Follow Anya Zoledziowski on Twitter.

This article originally appeared on VICE US.

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