Nick Bendel
Shamed!
May 16th 2009 04:09
Four Corners is to be commended for exposing the shocking misogyny that lies at the heart of the game’s culture (and, incidentally, that of Aussie Rules too). It is a culture that objectifies women, transforming them from human beings worthy of respect into sexual playthings who may be used however footballers see fit. It is a shameful culture.
Claim and counter-claim have been made about the group sex episode from 2002 involving the Cronulla Sharks and a 19 year old called ‘Clare’. Was she the innocent victim portrayed by Four Corners, or was she a willing participant as Johns insists? One can only speculate. But what the program did make clear is that if the young lady in question was not sexually assaulted, there would be a shockingly high number of others who would have been over the years. This is the horrific truth that the Johns scandal has brought into the open.
Whenever these scandals periodically occur, one thing can always be guaranteed- that the character of the alleged victim will always come under quick and vicious attack. For proof, simply visit YouTube, where a queue of people rapidly formed to defame Clare.
“I’m a footy boy and she is a slut we both have a job to do hahahaha”, wrote hsv57ltr. “She is a slut. End of story…and regrets it now…fuck off”, said scottparko. “Clare you should be disgusted in yourself”, MissAJC lectured. “A man’s infidelity is for his wife to judge. No wonder they treated you like a ‘piece of meat’, you met these guys and went back to their room…Clare is just a dirty skank, there are heaps of them out there. She would have loved it.” 11111FALCON11111 was of like mind: “Fucking whore money digger. Period.”
Squeegle2419- apparently a female- contributed a couple of interesting posts. “Men are men, and women are not stupid”, she argued in the first. “She knew what she was getting herself into just like the hordes of women that do the same. These issues cannot be put on the men. The men behave badly, but the women are just as bad.” In the second, she elaborated: “I can’t say any man can understand a situation like this, not being a woman. That being said, Matty has overwhelming support from females. We all know the sort of girls that chase football players, the attention seekers. This girl is just the same. Victims of gang rapists do not cause the fuss this woman has, and she consented. Obviously she has a predisposition to mental illness, and why isn’t she being held accountable? She is a slut, her age is irrelevant, she is above the age of consent.”
In the minds of far too many, the Clares of this world are “sluts”. Because they may dress provocatively and act flirtatiously, they are not human beings, but sluts. They are sluts, who are either desperate to have sex with as many men as possible, or who are deserving of whatever sexual degradation may be meted out to them. Consequently, they can never be victims- they can only be sluts.
There was a revealing segment during the Four Corners piece, in which a group of young Knights were recorded at an NRL seminar on consent. These under-20s were shown two dramatised scenarios. In the first video, a woman goes out on her birthday, gets drunk, goes home with two footballers, consents to having sex with one, before being raped by the second. In the second video, a man goes out on his birthday, gets drunk, goes home with a footballer, before being raped. When the players are asked to comment on the first scenario, there appears to be little sympathy for the female victim. “She put out first”, remarks one Knight; “She flirted with both of them”, points out another. However, when the players are asked to comment on the second scenario, there appears to be widespread sympathy for the male victim. “You don’t ask for that”, stated one.
This is the double standard around which league’s misogynistic culture is based. Men are human beings; women are sluts. A footballer who may engage in casual group sex with “the boys” is a stud; a woman who may find herself in the same situation is a slut- and we all know how sluts deserve to be treated. Given this double standard, common sense suggests that the incidence of rape in rugby league circles must be disproportionately high. So why, then, don’t we hear more about it? Presumably, the victims must conclude that due to the difficulty of proving the crime, the certainty of having their name dragged through the mud and the trauma of reliving the assault, it is not worth it. The result is that if footballers are not getting away with murder, a large number of them are getting away with rape. This is the horrific truth that the Johns scandal has brought into the open.
There is only one way to deal with this problem: education. As Sport: The Australian Disease argued in a recent article, today’s league players are actually better behaved than their predecessors, thanks to all the counselling they receive. And thus while they may be worse behaved than the average bloke, their standards are at least higher than they would otherwise be. Just like those young Knights, everybody who plays in the NRL must have it repeatedly drummed into them that women are deserving of respect. That they may flash their flesh, that they may drink to excess, that they may throw themselves at footballers is irrelevant; they are not sluts, but human beings, and thus deserving of respect. Above all, the players must be reminded of the Golden Rule, which even after all this time rings as true as it ever did: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”
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