With only five months until the Cricket World Cup, a year until the Rugby World Cup, the FIFA World Cup imminent (and the IWG conference in May 2022), Rebecca Sowden has written an excellent exposé on the silence in the commercial and marketing world on these high profile events. The opening line is the most critical, 1 billion viewers from the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup are going to be directing their gaze towards Aotearoa in a very short time, who are they going to see? Rebecca even helpfully provides evidence and a guide for potential commercial partners, in case anyone needs a nudge or some ideas!
Samantha Lewis has written a great summary of the issues surrounding the way Lisa De Vanna’s allegations against Football Australia have been handled and the wider implications and importance of culture(s) and inclusion in sports organisations and teams. Samantha outlines the challenges as sports organisations face the growing demand to properly address allegations, rather than putting the organisation and reputation first. But that this is a complex situation that means acknowledging the range of experiences people can have in one organisation. Women are not a homogenous group, so while one woman might have a positive experience, that does not mean another will. Samantha also explores the inflammatory language that is being used by media and on social media regarding Lisa’s allegations, that has homophobic implications.
A different country, a different sport, but another woman athlete, Canadian bobsledder Kaillie Humphries, is paying the price of her sports organisation prioritising its reputation over properly investigating allegations of inappropriate behaviour by a male coach. The first review (clearing the coach and the organisation) has been binned by a judge’s ruling, and a second review announced. But this won’t come in time for Kaillie to compete at the winter Olympics and IOC and US immigration won’t expedite Kaillie’s visa application process for U.S. citizenship despite what she has experienced.
There was an interesting story this week of a teen girl in India who had to disguise herself as a boy to be allowed to play local club cricket. But the story includes the line that she has kept her “boy haircut”. I feel like this comment is perpetuating a stereotype in a story about stereotypes?
It looks like I’m not eligible to enter Miss France this year with the organisers stipulating an entry criteria, including being at least 5’5″ (I’m 5’1″ and a bit), contestants also must not; have been married, had children, have tattoos, smoke or have a hair weave or extensions. The organisers are, obviously, being sued for discrimination.
I posted on social media about this yesterday, but this data and resources are so important it’s worth repeating! It was great to see the insights into women coaches in Aotearoa released this week by High Performance Sport NZ and Massey University. I am grateful to have been part of this project by being contracted by HPSNZ to do the analysis of the survey data and comments, and bring the findings to life through data visualisation infographics. The biggest insight for me is the multiple roles women hold in addition to a top coaching role. Only 15% of our head coaches are paid with most needing to work to make ends meet, while many also volunteer for their sport or have other roles with their NSO, RSO and/or club. And then, despite all the energy given by our top women coaches, many are treated poorly by others in their sport. Reading through the comments from our women coaches was quite grim. Here’s hoping that seeing this data and having these resources will provide further impetus for change.
Find the infographics by scrolling halfway down this page until you get to the fancy looking pie graph: https://hpsnz.org.nz/resources/women-in-high-performance-sport-project/
HPSNZ story: https://hpsnz.org.nz/journal-entries/insights-from-women-coaches-new-infographics/
Massey University story: https://www.massey.ac.nz/massey/about-massey/news/article.cfm?mnarticle_uuid=26929C0D-EBFF-4ED8-95DE-9F184DE7E713
This week 19 years ago, the Sport and Recreation NZ Act was introduced, including noting that a commitment was encouraging more women to be active. This Act saw the Hillary Commission become SPARC with the focus for sport at a community level shift to general participation and winning medals at a high performance level. Nick Hill was appointed CEO of SPARC, formed following the merger of the Hillary Commission, the NZ Sports Foundation and the policy arm of the Office of Tourism and Sport. Nine years later almost to the day, SPARC became two entities, Sport NZ and High Performance Sport NZ. This week in 2018 it was revealed by Stuff that young high performance cyclists were warned to keep Anthony Peden’s inappropriate relationship quiet. And this week last year, Aotearoa elected the most diverse parliament so far, with an increase in women, LGBTQI+ and Māori MPs.
Check out all the media headlines in women’s sport for the week of 22nd October right here.
Alida Shanks 