I’ll be honest: I’m pessimistic. I think equality and social justice in sport are beyond real reform now. Sports organisations are too commodified to take on any view that doesn’t prioritise excellence or expansion, and neither of those prioritises care or what participants actually experience.
Equality and social justice tend to get written into policy as an afterthought, riding on the push for growth, rather than being about genuinely bringing people into the sport.
There are pockets of people trying to do the right thing, who care about what equality and social justice mean in practice, but they’re usually isolated and unsupported because they can’t “give” their organisation anything other than a nice story.
I often feel valued by the children I coach and their parents. Their feedback means the most to me. Being able to run a girl’s only group off the back of one of my coaching sessions was very special.
I often feel weary and not valued by the constant feeling of battling to help. I have so much to offer my sport, but despite reassurances that what I’m working on is interesting, I still have to fight to have my voice heard. I’m offering what should really be consultancy, for free, and I still don’t have an audience.
For me, power dynamics in sport is about whose voice counts. In sport the default “good” coach (white, male, elite) gets listened to, make the decisions, and their way gets treated as the standard.
Anyone that doesn’t fit that profile must work to prove themself before they can be taken seriously. As far as biases go, the most damaging ones are ones we don’t question, because they are simply the way the sport works.
When we capture the voices of minorities (Others), that one voice becomes representative of all Others. My experience as a woman in sport is completely different from many other women’s.
What we need is greater empathy with other people, and an understanding that no two people have the same experience of sport. That means being conscious of how people interact with the sport, and open to developing it in ways that support the individuals who take part. Having people across an organisation work this way, rather than just collecting statistics, would be a huge step forward.
As a coach, I feel I have to prove myself over and over again, because I’m a woman and because I choose to coach at a recreational level. Whenever I say I coach recreational sport, there’s an automatic assumption that less work goes into my craft and that I know less than someone working in elite sport, which is so frustrating.
In any group of sport-specific coaches, I have to mention my level of education or I’m completely overlooked, and even then I still have to fight my corner.
I am shocked that people think that the higher the level you coach, the more you’re worth listening to, and how engrained that perception is. I think that creates a power dynamic that affects men and women differently, and for different reasons.
For women it’s far more complex than status. It feels like a fight for the right to be seen, and a pressure to conform to a male standard of care so that your place isn’t threatened by what it means to be a woman.
Honestly, I’m not sure the big organisations will take the lead on change. I think change has to come from the ground up.
First, we need to stop treating statistics as the answer and start listening to individual experiences, accepting that no two people experience sport the same way. Second, the people already doing this work well need support and connection, so they’re not left isolated. Third, we need to challenge the idea that coaching at a higher level makes you worth more.
Recreational and community coaches do skilled, important work, and that should be recognised.
Finally, we need to question the standards everyone is measured against, including a male standard of care, so that people don’t have to give up part of who they are to belong in sport.
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