For someone that follows rugby league as passionately as I do, I’ve spent a lot of time over the last week talking about AFL.
It began earlier in the week when social media exploded following the announcement that Channel Seven senior journalist Rebecca Maddern would become co-host of the AFL Footy Show.
Comments like “this show will now become as funny as a shark attack” and “it’s honestly going to suck having a woman on there”, left me scratching my head as to why, yet again, the ability of a woman to contribute positively to a conversation on sport was being debated.
Funnily enough, no one questions the ability of Ray Warren or Jim Wilson to commentate on sport, despite them ‘never having laced on a pair of boots’. However, qualified women often need to justify what gives them the authority, knowledge or right to participate and drive conversations about sport.
The controversy did not end there, though.
On Friday night at the game between the Collingwood and Richmond, a group of Magpies fans held up a banner with the crest of the United Patriots Front on it, which read: “Go Pies. Stop the Mosques“.
Collingwood released a statement almost immediately after the game, stating the club was “appalled” by the banner, and promising action would be swiftly taken once the perpetrators were found.
Pies president Eddie McGuire said, “Get them out of our grounds. Get them out of our sport.”
Some sections of the media will use both the Maddern incident and the sign from Friday night as another opportunity to label one of our sporting codes as having particular problems, in this case sexism and racism.
This happens all the time.
For example, each time domestic violence occurs in rugby league, the incident is used to contribute to a narrative which paints all rugby league players as having little to no understanding of how to behave in public, having no respect for women, and suggesting women are not welcome in the rugby league family.
Each time a flare is lit in the A-League, the incident is used to contribute to a narrative which paints the game’s fans as hoodlums and thugs, and football as a sport where incidents of violence are prevalent.
But no one sport has a problem more significant than the others. The reality is that each of these narratives are relevant to all our sports, and will likely be for years to come. Because sport reflects society.
So long as issues like racism, sexism and homophobia continue to be prevalent, they will continue to be reflected in sport, and perpetrators will include players, the fans and people who sit on governing bodies.
The perpetrators of acts of racism, sexism and homophobia do not represent our sports – quite the contrary – they are a minority. Just like the Collingwood fans on Friday night do not represent the AFL, the fan that lights a flare at the A-League does not represent football, and the player who commits an act of domestic violence does not represent the NRL.
So let’s stop writing that narrative, and create a new one.
Instead of labelling one sport as having a specific problem, why don’t our codes to work together and make a stand against the issues which all codes collectively face? Surely this would be far more productive than pointing the finger.
I saw an excellent example of this on the weekend, where several athletes joined together for the inaugural SKINS Rainbow Laces campaign, which is focused on kicking homophobia out of sport.
We here at The Roar proudly rocked the rainbow laces.
At the launch at Bondi Beach on Wednesday, it did not matter that Sharni Layton plays netball for the NSW Swifts, Matt Toomua plays rugby for the ACT Brumbies, Dylan Shiels plays AFL for the Greater Western Sydney Giants, or Nathan Peats plays NRL for the Parramatta Eels.
Instead, the focus was on creating a collective voice to say that homophobia is unacceptable.
The campaign saw a number of athletes and teams wearing rainbow laces, including Alex Blackwell during the World T20 final between Australia and the West Indies, and athletes like Johnathan Thurston spoke openly about the need to eradicate homophobia in sport.
Athletes are revered as role models, so let’s take advantage of this to drive and influence change in our communities.
Whether it be in relation to sexism, racism or homophobia, I want to see our sports standing together, saying that this sort of behaviour is unacceptable and has no place in Australian society, rather than simply trying to get one up on each other in the code wars.
apaway
Roar Guru
Rick Rubbish. Total and utter rubbish, but hey, you got responses so I guess you're happy.
Martha
Guest
Many schools have changed codes over the years - St Pats strathfield for one because they were disenchanted, didn't get any money, or the parents agitated. However the GPS has always been RU - The Old Boys Union would freak if it were otherwise
clipper
Guest
no probs, SVB, I agree that saying other codes are Énglish' is a bit silly and that league obviously is non existent in London, but is hardly much more noticeable in Melbourne - just think they are more inclined, per capita, to attend any sport.
James Dean ( seriously )
Guest
Cmon mate they know what's best for us all .
Martha
Guest
cathar U may not have noticed but SOO is on winter Wednesday nights when everyone is at home and the AFL GF is Sat arvo when people are at GF parties that RL deserted for a while because of no viewers. The Storm have won/cheated to 3 premierships and still average 13K a game - does that give u an idea. And anyway u know you will get a close game at the NRL GF wink wink. NRL has admitted they had a image problem and are trying to do something about it so denying it by comparing to other codes is mindless.
Martha
Guest
KAKS the SCG matters refer to Cricket
Martha
Guest
Mary you were being neutral up till this biased answer. Generalisations are the fodder of the illiterate. Just because it had Go Pies on it you assume it is a magpies supporter whereas no-one knows this for sure.
SVB
Guest
Fair enough clipper. I misread what you wrote. I don't think RL is really that big in London really, apart from the League Cup Final every year at Wembley which gets a pretty decent crowd. But London is really a huge city with many institutions and a large history. Australians have naturally taken to a lot of the sports invented in England, as this country was settled by the English themselves who had a large influence all over the world. The fact that some people refer to some of those sports in this country as the English codes sounds petty and comes across as someone not being able to handle the fact that others are different to them.
Kaks
Roar Guru
Obviously Perry, however we have people here making baseless statements saying that Football is the most violent game in Australia. It is not. Those statistics read differently with context, however one thing that still remains is the fact that football is actually not the most violent game like some AFL fans here like to make it out to be.
marron
Guest
That's why, of course, in Melbourne the most hated club is the most working class one, and in Sydney the most hated club is the perceived silver spooners. A code which, by historical quirk, is the code that all strata of society play, does not remove a class system and its snobbery.
clipper
Guest
SVB - if you read my post you will realise that I'm talking about Melbourne having the 2 Soccer sides - London has around 14. My point was that in Melbourne, where they don't really care about league or Rugby, they still get 10-12,000 to a match, whereas in London in leagues premier competition they struggle to get 2,000 - in a city 3 times the size and Perry Bridge makes a lot of sense in his last 2 comments.
Agent11
Guest
i guess the 'protect AFL' agenda trumps the stop violence against women message in some parts of the country...
Cathar Treize
Roar Guru
up to 600,000 viewers have watched the State of Origin in Victoria on TV and better numbers for the NRL GF than Sydney attracts for the AFL yet interest barely registers in the state?
Cathar Treize
Roar Guru
Apparently another female spectator was bashed at an AFL game in Adelaide over the weekend. Though it made social media, it failed to make mainstream news. I wonder why? How? Could this have created the narrative that if a women goes to the AFL she is likely to be bashed?
James Dean ( seriously )
Guest
Money is the deciding factor here and they are proving that just about anybody is for sale all the way to the top , why do you think we have an unelected prime minister .
Perry Bridge
Guest
#agent11 Yes - the Socceroos, Kangaroos (RL), and Wallabies fairly dominated to very well represented by NSW players - and ABS stats clearly illustrate NSW as the national home of participation in those sports. RL and RU participation outside of NSW/QLD heartland is less than AFL participation is outside of it's heartland. The cricket side - well, yes - although at present Rod Marsh has ensured WA players get a good look in too. Sydney is diverse and yet despite this - their News Corp owned Daily Telegraph still managed to do their best (false reporting) to stitch up the AFL when GWS came along. Irony was Roy Masters in the other media stable used the old "It's been reported that" line to allow him to perpetuate falsehoods. Always be wary of that line when used by news media.
Perry Bridge
Guest
Kaks using this as proof of anything is missing the point - There were four during NRL games, three during the cricket, two during rugby matches, two during AFL fixtures and one during soccer matches. Clearly there are move evictions/arrests etc than what relates to this category of 'violent incident'. No one wants to see any - and we don't know the relative number of 'patron event hours' in question across the 2 venues for the reporting period. For example - if the SCG cricket test averages 25,000 people a day over lets say 4 days of 7 hours each - that's 700,000 'patron event hours' alone there let alone any ODIs, shield matches, BBL matches. For soccer to get to that working on say a 2 hour event for 20,000 fans at Allianz - you'd need 17-18 matches to get a comparable number of 'patron event hours'. This is something often over looked when comparing evictions/arrests in general - even by the likes of Simon Hill. Statistics in the hands of beginners are pretty well meaningless without some sort of contextual relationship being constructed otherwise it's the old comparing apples with carrots.
Kaks
Roar Guru
Still more statistics than you've provided
harry houdini
Roar Rookie
Funnily enough you are the only one suggesting that, but we do know that you have in the past linked people to anti AFL rhetoric claiming it was someone else's work when it was yours, that is not normal. Go middie, good work.
Birdy
Guest
A vast number if people these days , demanding their right to privacy when filling out any type of form , government, job application , hospital forms , census etc cross out their religion or mark it atheist . This is a big mistake , huge infact. All these forms are handed in for government statistics for future planning. Think about it , Some organised groups make sure all their members fill out the religion question.