Should Catalans Dragons have signed Israel Folau? Should they have been allowed to sign Israel Folau? This is the water cooler discussion on both sides of the world for rugby league and some rugby union fans this morning.
I will get to that.
But my biggest concern – and there were some great ones since, from the likes of Wigan saying their home game against Catalans “will now be Pride Day, as the Warriors look support the LGBTQ+ community” and for gay player Keegan Hirst – were these statements.
“We don’t believe that, under our current regulatory framework, these can prevent his participation in the sport,” from the Rugby Football League.
And from Super League chief executive Robert Elstone: “Super League does not have the authority to veto the registration of players.”
This goes to the heart of structural and philosophical flaws for the game in the northern hemisphere and is one the best examples we’ve ever seen of why the American (and then Australian) models for pro sports – where clubs are mere franchises of the governing body – are superior in every way to the feudal English concept of the league just organising fixtures and butting out of everything else.
That model just does not work in the modern world where sponsors and the public can be alienated so easily by not responding correctly to the issue of the day, which itself can be different to the issue of yesterday or that of tomorrow.
If Super League cannot veto the registration of players, it can only save some face by announcing today that it is changing its legal relationship with the RFL so it can.
The same goes for the RFL but just last year, the same body told The Sun: “The RFL board has ultimate discretion to refuse to register a player where it may bring the game into disrepute or he has been deregistered by any other governing body.”
So in assessing the RFL’s position, we must at least consider the possibility that it received legal advice Folau would sue them and win if it tried to block his registration. As a result of its backing down, it no longer has an authority it claimed to have only a year ago.
But we already know ‘authority’ is a word that can only be applied loosely to the RFL in 2020. It doesn’t have much left, having suffered the humiliation of Super League breaking away and poaching most of its staff.
Last year, the RFL was so worried about an overseas team making the Challenge Cup final and adversely affecting the crowd that it asked Catalans and Toronto to insure it against the possibility they might be successful.
Catalans and Toronto aren’t, in the 19th-century terms of the RFL’s structures, ‘members’. They are ‘invited’ to play in the RFL’s competitions. And the rules can be altered at a moment’s notice for non-members. So it can ask Catalans for a cash guarantee to defend its title but it can’t bar an international social-issue pariah from playing for them?
How curious.
Israel Folau is rejoining the 13-man game. (AAP Image/Action Photographics, Colin Whelan)
Here is where the brouhaha splits in two.
On the one hand, there are the antiquated structures and local culture that make issues like the NRL campaigning for same-sex marriage, shelving the national anthem and locking out Izzy so very, very hard for British officials to contemplate.
But on the other is the meek reluctance to even consider trying to do these things. If you can’t fill Wembley then don’t play there. If standing up for your values sends you broke, go broke.
Fighting Israel Folau in court could have been the making of the RFL. No national newspaper in England has a rugby league writer on staff. They all have court reporters. The game would have been in front of the public for months and just about everyone, bar the Christian far right, would have admired their stance.
And if they lost and went broke? Someone would have to run rugby league in the UK. The game would still be played, there would need to be referees. There would be some TV rights income and government funding which would need administering.
What rose in the RFL’s ashes would possibly be better than what’s there now.
A couple more points, lest I be accused of skating over salient issues.
Yes, Catalans’ recruitment policy is appalling. They are a rogues’ gallery to rival Souths before Russell Crowe took over. What’s more, their morally bankrupt approach to signings doesn’t work – and yet they persist.
Secondly, as I explained in a previous column, I personally find Folau’s comments ridiculous more than anything. He represents religion and reminds us all of the folly of trying to adopt dangerous ancient doctrine for selective modern values.
Religion is the enemy, not Folau.
But – and this is the big ‘but’ – a young person struggling with his or her sexuality does not have the luxury of being so dismissive.
You can take the long view on these issues but it’s the here and now where the potential for harm lies.
It’s a trope of our times: one person’s ‘freedom’ to express antiquated views against the freedom of a minority not to be subjected to those views.
But I go back to my original point – two organisations that call themselves ‘governing’ bodies who don’t want a player in their competition yet claim they don’t have the power to stop him being in it.
That’s embarrassing.
Borat
Guest
Another thing I want to add. Euro model is more sustainable, it funds itself, and then further with those funds and via negotiations with councils etc, it then uses some of those funds and invests back into the community, like say Tottenham when they built their new stadium, part of their costs had to go into housing / shops / redevelopment of the Tottenham area. So they literally invested back into their community, the community gains greatly from it. Meanwhile in Australia and US all the clubs are dependent on government tax payers money to survive. Read about how Brumbies and Raiders were complaining about ACT gov paying GWS AFL team more than them. News stories about that. Or in NFL where clubs just keep on building new stadiums with tax payers money all the time. Taxpayers in USA pay billions for stadiums, it's basically a big rort, the owners gain the most benefit from that. Meanwhile back to the Tottenham stadium example, they built their highly advanced stadium 100% with their own money (they had to get loans from private banks, and need to repay these back over 30 years or so). From a pure econ perspective the Euro model is so much better than the highly flawed and inferior / loser Aus and US model in almost every way. Same applies to governance, which is against what you were saying. There is a reason why nations have decentralised power (via states, providence, etc), there is a reason why UK is looking at even more decentralisation potentially. Even China has some levels of decentralisation. Same applies to sport. Nasim Taleb can explains the benefits of decentralisation for example, or there are many resources online why it's superior so I won't go into detail on that one. But even in terms of entertainment it's better also. It makes the finance game so much more important for clubs, clubs aren't just competing on the football field, they're competing in literally every facet. This includes business (i.e. their finances, their investments, their ability to forecast / predict the future (which is a 50/50 game to begin with), measure risk, etc). It's amazing. And they aren't being propped up by tax payers like US and Aus sport teams are when they do all this, there is real skin in the game (another excellent term from Nasib Taleb by the way, another thing which is very important in terms of the economy / risk / efficiency etc). As a fan you can then get really into the financials and other complexities behind the game too, this becomes a new area of viewership, the way they structure it you can see clubs decline over say a 10 year period (Man Utd, Arsenal), or watch clubs rise over a 10 year period (Leceister, Tottenham), making things much more interesting and entertaining over the long-run too. These long run cycles appear, it's much more similar to say real life economics or real life macro, again versus the distorted Aus and US monopoly models.
GoGWS
Roar Guru
It is that really your best shot? In the bubble you seem intent on staying… good for you. I must say I’m a little disappointed in that pathetic little Pascal’s wager nonsense you’ve used as a closer… the problem of course (lost on people like you, who make comments like that) is that we all only ever walk to the crease once,.. people like you waste this precious opportunity looking up into the stands, or to the sky, imagining that there is another game going on outside the field of play and in fact there isn’t… this life is the game, and you’re at the crease right now whether you accept that or not. If you want to spend your one and only time at the crease distracted and daydreaming of a better life, a future life… well then good for you. It seems a terrible waste but that’s your prerogative… you can waste your one-in-14 billion year innings gazing off to the stands if that’s what you want to do. Good for you I guess but don’t expect people like me to join you…and it is genuinely a shame you haven’t done some basic reading in this area and so readily expose your ignorance. Anyway good luck… natural selection as a concept isn’t intuitive which is why it took to the mid 1800s for someone to uncover it.. it actually does makes logical sense when you follow the mechanisms as claimed, and it is supported many many seperate lines of evidence..all I can say is research it (properly) to debunk it. And finally, I’m not even sure what ‘evolving’ or ‘decaying’ genes pools is supposed to mean – more apologist talking points no doubt. Seriously grab a few books and spend a week or so educating yourself. Good luck.
Forty Twenty
Roar Rookie
There are heaps of ancient footprints and fossils of all sorts of long extinct creatures. Some creatures haven't changed much, most are gone and many have evolved. All the evidence is there. The reason people keep on getting colds and flu is because viruses evolve . It's going on constantly
DP Schaefer
Roar Rookie
Then why isn't there any fossil evidence of the millions of steps taken by thousands of life forms? Nothing. Why instead, do we have living creatures who haven't changed in supposed 65 million years?? Logic dictates that there is a huge error in the theory.
DP Schaefer
Roar Rookie
Oh dear, your arguments nosedived in quality rather abruptly. I will look at the reference you suggested and you can do the some reading too. Do some research on biology and genetics, both clearly identify that it is simply not possible nor is there any evidence of DNA strands accepting and reforming with the introduction of totally new material. I do understand the premise of evolution, rather more than thee it seems. Genetics shows the gene pool is decaying rather than ‘evolving’ into something new. And I’m quite at peace with having the correct information, especially as being incorrect results in discomfort for a long, long time…. Yet, respect and cheers to you as well. :thumbup:
TIGER
Roar Rookie
Sorry clicked the add comment by accident. I wanted to point out the dominant point in the article related the the League structure in the U.K. and their positions of power and authority. And yes he did bring the religious point up but I don't think he intended it to be the main issue for discussion.
TIGER
Roar Rookie
Hey everyone. I'm relatively new to ROAR and think the idea of an open forum to discuss subjects is a great vehicle to express our opinions, but having just read a large number of comments relating to Steve Mascord's article I must say I didn't enjoy the ongoing debate about religion. That is not a criticism about your comments as it seems we are heading down the path where we can say anything about anyone anywhere at anytime. This whole folau issue has probably just brought forward this freedom of speech issue. My fear is it will give nasty people the right to be even nastier. That just can't be good.
TIGER
Roar Rookie
Your final comments perfectly sum up folau. I won't even use a capital for his name.
Doug Graves
Guest
Good to see you turning the other cheek there you pathetic hypocrite.
Doug Graves
Guest
Enough of your rambling on. I clearly requested you prove the existence of a god scientifically. I'm not interested in anecdotes or stupid "reasons" for the existence of a god or the other William Lane Craig BS arguments you believers use to delude yourselves. Have at it, show me your "scientific" evidence. And while you're at it can you tell me why the god idea is not an accepted scientific theory?
GoGWS
Roar Guru
Mate, with respect ..that 747 line demonstrates you’ve done precisely zero genuine reading on this topic..my guess is that at best you may have watched a few YouTube videos, or possibly perused and swallowed whole a few talking points from a Christian young earth apologist. And Catholics are the largest Christian sect, and the Vatican has formally accepted evolution by natural selection as fact – you just can’t imagine you own reality on these two basic facts. And by the way from your response it seems that you do not appreciate that evolution as we understand it at present has nothin definitive to say about ‘creation’ or the origin of life, and no version of evolution has claimed to solve this riddle for that matter. So Catholics can believe that God created life, and that evolution by natural selection operates. These are not irreconcilable positions to be holding. Anyway In the end your ignorance in this area is your loss not mine… you’re welcome to it. Close your eyes, block your ears and stay in that bubble. Enjoy. …On the extremely remote chance you do want to open your mind and consider ideas you may not currently understand or agree with you could try ‘The Ancestor’s Tale’..’The Greatest Show on Earth: Evidence for Evolution’… if nothing else by reading these bookS, or others like them, you will understand what all us deluded evolutionists ‘believe’, and why we ‘believe’ it. To be quoting the 747 line tells me you haven’t got the slightest understanding about how evolution is claimed to be working – in the end you may not agree with evolution but at least you won’t be quoting tired old nonsense like the childish 747 line… you’ll actually know what you’re disagreeing with, if you still disagree… or it could be that you consider the possibility that you’re wrong, and like the Catholics you may come to the view that evolution and God both exist in this world. Good luck.
Forty Twenty
Roar Rookie
The history of flight is well documented , it has evolved from nothing in to space travel. No magic tricks or anyone in the clouds getting involved , it's humans who developed flight in 747's. Small steps over many years just like evolution but evolution of life has been over a huge amount of time in very small increments . That's what science says and what modern society believes in. You find any articles to match your stance on the internet but many of them are completely useless and are a waste of time repeating.
Ruckin Oaf
Guest
Gee that's bad luck for you there Jacko. Imagination is more your strong suit than the other,
DP Schaefer
Roar Rookie
Mate, happy to have a look at anything that isn't twaddle, but I've actually done a lot of work looking into this, am far from ignorant and yet to find anything of substance. Won't go into the Catholicism but you'd be severely misled if you believe they accept that above divine creation. Some, having an each way bet, might be tempted to give credence to some evolutionary path under Divine control but's that's the best you'd get. And evidence.. none.. in fact the opposite. Genealogy disproves it, Biology disagrees with it, mathematical science finds it at impossible odds, cosmology and geology challenge it, and on and on. Show me a writing that proves, if you strike a junkyard with enough lightening over a few million years the inanimate objects will come to life, form into a 747 and fly out. Because that is what you are believing can happen. In fact, that's a bit easier than the actual path evolution claims to have happened. And I prefer gospels and letters by several people (not one goat herder there) backed by eyewitnesses to the 1859 scratchings of a malcontent Christophobic. :thumbup:
Republican
Guest
.......'mercenary ' is not exclusive to Folau or League. This is inherently cultural of the big business i.e. 'sport' at this tier today and symptomatic of a crass commoditisation that sees it beholden to multinational television behemoths. Sport is an oxymoron in reality, considering the virtue it continues to compromise in the name of 'professionalism'.
jeznez
Roar Guru
Glenn, I'd love to hear a little bit more about this 'End' you speak of. Do people get bored in eternity? It is is such an unimaginably long period that I can't imagine anything wouldn't eventually become hell like. The concept of too much of a good thing springs to mind. Do you still have free will in your afterlife? How does that marry up with getting into Heaven being a one time deal, which most religions seem to offer? What happens if you misbehave in the afterlife, if you evolve and change? Can you be kicked out of Heaven? What about the flip, if you go to Hell can you achieve grace and get out? It really doesn't make sense to me as a construct, either you can be booted out of Heaven or you can't have free will while you are there - neither is very palatable to me. The whole idea that we are in a testing ground, spending a limited amount of time with incomplete information that will determine how we are going to spend eternity seems absurd to me, yet that is what most religions seem to offer. If a parent put their kids in a room with twenty conflicting sets of rules and told the kids they had to pick a set of rules and obey them for the next twenty minutes - and that depending whether they obeyed the right ones that would determine how they were going to treat them for the next twenty years. With them either getting everything they had it in their power to give or the parents locking the kids up and torturing them if they chose from the 95% of rules that were wrong, or chose the right rules and then failed to follow them. How would you rate that parent? Personally I'd be horrified and think we should be calling child services, yet that seems to be pretty much the model most religions with an afterlife offer. I know you say that to be an atheist "requires very little thought and liberates us from any concept of conscience" but while you are touting the afterlife as I say below, I think it's the religious fitting that bill.
Tom G
Roar Rookie
Any exchange with you is like shouting down an empty well.. no point
Nick
Roar Guru
We'll have to agree to disagree. I've read his auto-biography, he speaks at length that it was more for show and tactics. He never blew up when he played doubles, never blew up against players like Bjorn Borg, never blew up until about 1980.
Nambawan
Roar Rookie
I'm just a dedicated supporter of rugby league - have been for nigh on 7 decades. I have no objections to Folau coming back to League. Equally I have no interest in his religious rants or the rants of the voluble idealogues who vilify him. But at the same time I recognise Folau is a mercenary sportsman - he ditched League before when it suited him and will now go wherever he can make a dollar - fair enough I suppose. But I believe most League ( and probably Union) supporters are happy to have Folau back playing football and that the NRL's blanket refusal to even consider his return was just another stupid decision of theirs which was not supported by the majority of the league supporting public.
aussierad
Roar Rookie
Any actual evidence to back your broad sweeping statements, Moosey? How many died under the Christian sword? How many died under other religions?