“Brave Sport” by Laura McPhie with support from Andrea Carey & Allison ForsythSafe sport has been a focal part of attention and announcements in the sport system over the past few years. Sport after sport seems to be making headlines either for their inaction in safe sport, or for making missteps in how they have moved forward.Athletes have been at the forefront the safe sport movement, sharing their experiences and their frustrations about the slow progress. Money has been invested in a new organization. Change has been needed but slow to emerge. The clarity of what safe sport actually should be has not been well articulated by sport leaders terms like abuse free sport (actually the name of the new website and resource hub) are showing up, but safe sport remains a nebulous concept for most of the sport system and that is at the national level try asking your local sport club what they are doing for safe sport, and chances are they wont know what you are even talking about.If you ask Allison Forsyth, Olympian and co-Founder of ITP Sport & Recreation, you will get a very clear response to what safe sport is. She states that safe sport is creating positive, healthy and safe training and competition environments whose culture is built on being free of maltreatment and abuse. Allison has been at the forefront of the safe sport movement, as an athlete who was sexually abused by her coach, she knows firsthand how important it is for athletes, and each person in the sport system to have safe places to disclose but also that the culture of sport needs to dramatically change to remove the power imbalances that are rampant in decision-making and governance. “Prevention is obviously the aim of Safe Sport but the top tool in prevention is often seen as an online training and education module. This is baseline and important but much more is needed. We must dig into the current reality of each sport, the cultural legacy, and the normalization of behaviours. In this work, it is critical to not judge or come from a place of blame. It is all of our responsibility to shift. What I see most are micro-aggressions and boundary transgressions that are unintentional, yet easily lead to much more serious issues. This is where the work is” shares Allison.Power imbalances and culture.Positive, healthy and safe environments.At the heart of sport and these situations are humans often children and youth. As we think about what this means in terms of what is needed and how we centre taking care of each participant, we need to consider how safe sport is an opportunity to care for each participant and athlete, and not at the expense of each other but rather in community with each other.As such, lets imagine a sports world for a moment. In this world, not only do we have a place to report harm that has already happened, but we also create environments where people can voice their needs, ways for others to improve, and can call people in. Its a world where harm will still happen (because we can not eliminate all harm that happens) but the people and systems involved will be ready to support the people who have or might be hurt. AND the people and systems understand their responsibilities, are not afraid of acknowledging what has happened and what needs to change and do not wait until extreme trauma has been caused to make changes. This sports world centres positive, healthy and safe environments because the culture has been built around peoples needs.In this world, the man who just stepped forward to speak to the police about the 2003 sexual assault that happened at the World Juniors wouldnt wait 19 years to speak up about something that they knew was wrong. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/names-given-halifax-police-2003-sexual-assault-allegations-world-juniors-1.6560536 In this world, someone like me would have a safe way to bring up concerns without having to escalate to blowing up everything. I was a coach for 15 years and during that time I heard too much sexism, racism, predatory behavior, agism, homophobia you name it, I witnessed or experienced it. Imagine a world where our coaches and peers that knew something was odd would feel safe enough to bring it up and knew how to do that.Culture is at the core of this sports world a culture of supporting people and of respect, responsibility, and accountability.In equity, diversity and inclusion work we are often supporting leaders to navigate hard and uncomfortable topics building bridges between cultural awareness and leadership to support them to create environments where their team can show up as they are in the spaces and places they want to be.As we think about safe sport and where it needs to evolve to, there is an important connection both in terms of the multitude of safe sport complaints that are connected to peoples identities (their diversity); as well as the linkage to culture within organizations and how people can show up as well as articulate when something is not going well.In Equity, Diversity and Inclusion spaces, we talk about:Safe Space: simply put, you will not be judged or harmed in the space for who you are. While learning may occur in these spaces, the ultimate goal is to provide supportBut we have expanded on that to try to foster Brave Space.Brave Spaces acknowledge:- Encourage dialogue- That in every interaction there are power dynamics and the role of power holders is to listen to the community- No matter the power dynamics, people should be accountable for their role in harm or perpetuating structures of harm Owning intentions and impacts- Holding people accountable does not give permission to cause harm- People have a variety of ways to raise concerns and have a choice in how and when those conversations are held- Respect is given especially in how a person experienced an interactionWhen we transfer this to sport, we see an intersection of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion work and Safe Sport. As we coin this space of “Brave Sport” it is our opportunity to explore together what that could mean – so inputs are welcomed – this can be built by the sports community for the sports community. How can we use this as an opportunity to co-create cultures that are built around positive, healthy and safe environments?Brave Sport looks like- People who are open to hearing hard needs, experiences, feelings, conversations, etc.- Instead of those people immediately thinking about how do we protect they instead think through, what does this very real person in front of me need and how do I support them?- People acknowledge their ability to create and make change- We shift away from an Us vs Them and create an environment where we:
- Center athletes needs
- Acknowledge that I have an obligation to Athletes and to create safe spaces for them
- Take responsibility to create relationships where people can raise their concerns and needs
– Create environments and systems that foster bringing forward concerns and that those concerns are taken seriously. (Acknowledging that some people are not safe to report and that harms do not happen in a vacuum)- People can access support and accommodations when needed, without having to fight strict structuresThis does not dismiss the incredible need for Safe Sport but I also want us to dream further. Lets create a safe structure to report extreme harm AND also create a world where we acknowledge that harms are not always what society views as extreme or criminal. Extreme harm happens in environments where racism, sexism, homophobia, ageism, ableism, etc. are allowed to thrive. As a sports community, we need to understand how to stop those from thriving in our sports ecosystems.It would be irresponsible for me to ask for accountable spaces without doing it myself. I walked away from coaching after 15 years because I knew that I was not providing the types of spaces that I believed in. I was not healthy and that was leaking into how I coached, and I hated myself for it. To many, I was a good coach, but to many, I was not. I know that I caused harm and I think if you ask any coach, most of us, when honest with ourselves would say the same. It is why I do equity, diversity and inclusion work now and why I believe so passionately in the connection between EDI and safe sport.We need to challenge the systems that set situations up where people can be harmful, pushes others into harmful behaviors, silences people experiencing harm, centers the protection of systems/people of power, and creates environments where extreme harm is happening.Allison shares “To be brave in the Safe Sport conversation is to have empathy for all those affected by Safe Sport from coaches fearful of unfounded allegations that could damage their career and life, to officials who are leaving in droves because they are tired of how they are treated, there are many groups suffering. We create Brave spaces for all voices to be heard, considered, and valued.”We need to prioritize respect, responsibility, and accountability within sport organizations. We need to shift the culture of sport to remove the power imbalances. We need to centre positive, healthy and safe environments because the culture has been built around peoples needs.This would be brave sport. What would brave sport look like for you?