Episode 147: Cheating, Cheer, and the Soccer Supporters of North America
This week the gang’s all here and on fire. We ponder the possibility of a Laila Ali/Clarissa Shields fight before a deep dive into cheating. Then we move on to think through the differences of the financial fair play violations of Manchester City versus the MLB sign stealing. [11:35] Brenda sits down with Bailey Brown, the president of the Independent Supporters Council of North America to talk about the new fan code of conduct for MLS following the Iron Front Flag turmoil, what it means to be a soccer (fútbol) supporter in North America, and her experience as the only woman to head a national or international supporters group. [30:25] Finally, our long anticipated this conversation on the Netflix docuseries Cheer! [51:23]
Of course you’ll hear the Burn Pile [1:15:03], our Bad Ass Woman of the Week [1:29:47] and what is good in our worlds.
Links
Laila Ali hints at potential comeback for Claressa Shields fight, three-division world champion responds: https://www.cbssports.com/boxing/news/laila-ali-hints-at-potential-comeback-for-claressa-shields-fight-three-division-world-champion-responds
Cheer Is Built on a Pyramid of Broken Bodies: https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2020/01/athletes-cheer-deserve-better/605326
The Pathos of “Cheer” and the Wild Deceptions of Cheerleading: https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-pathos-of-cheer-and-the-wild-deceptions-of-cheerleading/
3 Hawaii cheerleaders share the spotlight in new Netflix docu-series: https://www.hawaiinewsnow.com/2020/02/18/hawaii-cheerleaders-share-spotlight-new-netflix-docu-series
Varsity Brands Owns Cheerleading and Fights to Keep it From Becoming an Official Sport: https://www.houstonpress.com/news/varsity-brands-owns-cheerleading-and-fights-to-keep-it-from-becoming-an-official-sport-7606297
Black Cheerleaders and A Long History of Protest: https://www.aaihs.org/black-cheerleaders-and-a-long-history-of-protest
The Astros sign-stealing and cheating scandal, explained: https://www.sbnation.com/mlb/2020/1/13/21064250/astros-sign-stealing-suspensions-fines-mlb/
Manchester City banned from Champions League for two seasons: https://www.theguardian.com/football/2020/feb/14/manchester-city-banned-from-champions-league-two-seasons-ffp-uefa
Are We in the Golden Age of Brazen Cheating?: https://www.theringer.com/mlb/2020/2/21/21145913/sports-cheating-houston-astros-manchester-city-saracens/
'Where's your passport?' chant not racially motivated, St. Joseph administrators say: https://santamariatimes.com/news/local/where-s-your-passport-chant-not-racially-motivated-st-joseph/article_3a8df382-c151-560b-b4bc-c38e581075f0.html
Spanish women's footballers secure historic league-wide contracts following strike: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/womens-sport/2020/02/19/spanish-womens-footballers-secure-historic-league-wide-contracts
LAUREUS WORLD SPORTS AWARDS: https://www.laureus.com/world-sports-awards/2020/
Yulimar Rojas sets new indoor triple jump world record in Madrid: https://www.bbc.com/sport/athletics/51593346/
Transcript
Brenda: Welcome to this week’s episode of Burn It All Down; it’s the feminist sports podcast you need. I’m Brenda Elsey, associate professor of history at Hofstra University in New York, and I should also mention development lead in the Americas for the Fare Network. This week the gang is all here! That includes my fellow historian, the brilliant Dr. Amira Rose Davis, assistant professor of history and African-American studies at Penn State University; Jessica Luther, independent journalist, weightlifter, PhD candidate, and baker in Austin, Texas; the force of nature, Shireen Ahmed, freelance journalist and activist in Toronto, Canada; and the great wordsmith and dog whisperer, Lindsay Gibbs. She’s a sports reporter in DC and the queen of the fabulous newsletter Power Plays. Lindsay, I hear that there’s big news afoot for the newsletter.
Lindsay: There is! As of right now when you’re all listening to this, Power Plays, you can actually pay for it! For the past four months I’ve been doing the newsletter completely for free, and starting this week I’ll be charging for it, so really great deals to get in on the ground floor, all week it’s 25% off if you go to powerplays.news, you’ll be able to sign up and subscribers get a lot, beyond getting an additional 2 newsletters per week, which people on the free list won’t get. So if you want to stay on the free list you’ll get 1 newsletter per week for free, but subscribers are gonna get entry into our book club where we’re gonna read a book on women’s sports every single month, have group discussions about it, bring in authors; I’m so excited about that. Also gonna have a special section where we highlight what we should be watching. Something everyone asked me was how do I find out what women’s sports events they should be watching, and where. I’m gonna do that work for my paid subscribers, and I think there’s a lot of networking benefits in my threads, so I think it’s gonna be worth it. If you’re a fan of Burn It All Down I think there’s a lot you can get from Power Plays and I’m both terrified and so excited to be taking this next step, this adventure.
Brenda: Yay. [claps] Way to go, Linz.
Lindsay: Thanks!
Brenda: We have a screamer of a show for you this week. We are gonna talk about cheating – yes, of the sign stealing variety, Astros – but also of the financial kind – Manchester City! I interview Bailey Brown, head of the Independent Supporters Council of North American soccer, that is, football. And we will discuss the docu-series Cheer, which we’ve been waiting to do. But before we do all that I wanna take the temperature of the room on the Laila Ali and Claressa Shields beef that may in fact be bringing Ali out of retirement. Does anyone have feelings?
Amira: Well, I’ll just say that these two hate each other and have been doing this for years, absolute years. A lot of this isn’t new. I personally…Color me the skeptic, I think it just remains this kind of level of talk, I don’t think Laila will do that. Even in this exchange she talked about her current weight is 200, and she fights at 168. I don’t actually think she’d want to take that L in the ring, personally. But I’ve been fascinated for many years by the animosity between these two and I think Claressa feels that Laila reserves a particular sort of skepticism or irritation towards her. She often points out all the other people in her generation of boxing that Laila seems to support and always reserves criticism and pointed critique about not only her stuff in the ring but out of the ring, and I think Claressa feels a bit targeted and that has fueled this a lot and I think Laila feels that Claressa threatens her legacy. So on one point it’s really funny and it’s been something that I’m like emoji side eye 😒, popcorn gif, all of it…
But also it’s something that low-key saddens me because I, to quote Hamilton the musical, the world is wide enough for both of them to be boxing stars and legends.
Brenda: Yeah, I was watching her with Stephen A. Smith and wanted to throw up anyway, because Stephen A. Smith on women’s boxing…All he could do was talk about Muhammad Ali the entire time, nothing about her career whatsoever. But yes…
Amira: Yeah, I was like why is he even…
Brenda: Yeah, did you see that? He’s like, “Let’s talk about your father!” I was like, literally, Laila, please punch him.
Amira: [laughing] For the culture.
Brenda: Can we please just have you out of retirement to kick Stephen A. Smith’s ass, please. But anyway you’re totally right Amira, she did a whole laundry list of boxers and Claressa Shields was just painfully not there where she should’ve been. Shireen?
Shireen: Yeah, I started thinking about this when Amira brought it to our attention but also part of me wonders if any of this is not fabricated but marketed as such, because it ended up getting a lot of attention.
Lindsay: Of course it is! It’s boxing.
Shireen: My friend Morgan Campbell covers a lot of boxing, we talk a lot about the drama, and a lot of this is exciting, you know, for those that are familiar with boxing, there’s a lot of hype up, it’s a part of the boxing culture, but it’s just…I hear what Amira says, and Claressa Shields knows, she’s been on our show, she packs no punches…Is that even an accurate term in the context..? Anyways, she doesn’t hang back, she’s very clear on her feelings, there’s no filter, there’s no filter! It just makes me think her anger and emotions are very palpable, whereas Laila Ali who, let’s be honest, will always get a pass because of who her dad is, he was literally the greatest of all time, period. So yes, Stephen A. Smith is terrible on pretty much everything, but she has that shield, so to speak. Her dad is Muhammad Ali, like, oh my god, d’you know what I’m saying? I don’t know that I actually want to see the two of them fight. But I wouldn’t put it past Laila Ali, she has the resources, she has the drive. The one thing is that Laila Ali is, what, fifteen years older than Claressa Shields. But I don’t know. 18.
Jessica: 18.
Shireen: Wow.
Jessica: She was 18 when Claressa was born!
Shireen: Amira’s right, it’s sad if it gets really, horribly nasty, because boxing can be gross this way, it’s terrible. But if they both come forward and fight, one thing I will say is that Laila Ali’s quote I loved, about “for the right amount of money.” I was like, say it. Speak it. I loved that quote, I was like, that is an amazing quote.
Brenda: Jess?
Jessica: Yeah, I don’t think this is gonna happen. I heard that there’s an 18-year age difference, and then Laila Ali pointed out that she hasn’t boxed for 13 years! I mean, Claressa is so good. That’s part of what’s happening here, right? As Amira was saying about legacy. I did think it was interesting that Laila pushed the $1 million purse thing, that women haven’t had that before, and part of me wonders if she’s just floating the balloon to see if a promoter out there will finally do that, whether or not she would actually accept on the other side of it is a whole other thing. But it’d be cool to see that that’s what women’s boxing is now, that she could prove that there’s money behind it without actually getting in
Amira: Yes.
Shireen: “It would be my absolute pleasure for the right amount of money.” I need that on a t-shirt.
Brenda: [laughing] That’s great.
Lindsay: To me though I’m a little sad, because I think that right now, who else is Claressa Shields going to go against? You know what I mean? Women’s boxing needs more depth, it needs more tension. There is a lot of talent out there but they don’t have the names because Claressa Shields is the name of the sport right now and everyone acts like there’s only room for one big name. My hope would be that there’s a current boxer that Claressa Shields will challenge, that will really challenge her, and get a million dollars. That would be the ideal world. I understand why she’s going after Laila Ali like this, because, you know, she needs to stay in the headlines, this is all part of boxing and self-promotion and it comes from a very real place, this animosity. It comes from a very real place but I also think it’s strategic, it’s not an either-or thing, and yeah, let’s get more names in the ring, literally.
Amira: Yeah, and can I just say to Shireen, it’s not just that she’s Muhammad Ali’s daughter, it’s that she was the face of women’s boxing. It’s her own career that affords her…She’s able to build a career, certainly, on that familial legacy. I think a lot of this is a kind of animosity between generations. Claressa has been able to access some doors that were closed when Laila was having a career, and I agree with Lindsay, boxing has always been about flaring these kind of discontents, and also these have been long simmering. You can look at a tweet here, a tweet there, even when they’re not checking each other by name. And so it’s really easy to flare and amplify things that are very much left.
Lindsay: And there’s so many layers to this, there’s all the privilege that I know Claressa feels–
Amira: Exactly.
Lindsay: –She built her career from absolutely nothing and came up from nothing, whereas Laila obviously had a big head start in many ways. But then Claressa came up on the scene, and ever since she first came on the scene she’s been the one saying “I’m the one bringing boxing to the mainstream.” She’s always kind of done a lot of discounting of the work of the people that came before her, so I understand why Laila feels shafted by that.
Brenda: Okay, so we had a lot of feelings about that. Jessica, would you get us started in terms of talking about cheating and the current state of the huge clusterfuck that is the Astros’ sign stealing scandal?
Jessica: Yeah, well I’m actually gonna start with a different team, because we’ve had two major teams punished – I guess that’s the right word? I don’t know, we can talk about it! – for not following the rules. I’m gonna start over in Europe where UEFA has banned Manchester City, Man City, for two years from European competition, including most importantly the Champs League, and the fined them €30 million for violating UEFA’s financial fair play rules. This is not my wheelhouse, economic fines, so I’m not gonna pretend that I totally understand all of what Man City did, and I’m just gonna quote Zito Madu of SB Nation, who is definitely smarter than me, quote: “FFPs–” those are the financial fair play rules, “–isn't perfect, but the idea behind the rules is so that owners can’t pump money into the clubs to cover losses.” So clubs only spend the money that they generate.
Through leaked emails first brought to light by German newspaper Der Spiegel, City reportedly tried to circumvent this system by having City’s owner Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, who is also deputy prime minister of the United Arab Emirates and a member of the Abu Dhabi royal family, fund most of the sponsorship deal that the club maintains with Etihad Airlines through the Abu Dhabi United Group. Basically, they’re funneling money though a thing they’re not supposed to. This is a severe punishment. Man City has voted to fight it at the Court of Arbitration for Sport. It’ll be interesting to see if it’s upheld, nothing like this has happened before, especially not of this severity. The Champs League is a lot of money: the winning team pulls down something like €80 million, there’s also just a bunch of pride in this.
Then on the other side of the pond, unending news – this is the most I’ve thought about baseball in years, I feel like – has been about the 2017 World Series winners, the Houston Astros. They were caught using technology to steal signs during the World Series winning season. As anyone knows who listens, baseball’s not my sport but I’m gonna do my best with this also. So, sign-stealing is legal in baseball, I feel like we gotta start there. The sign-stealing you know, where they tap their nose and their ear and do all that different stuff so that the catcher tells the pitcher what to pitch, the dugout tells the catcher what to tell the pitcher, the base coach is telling the batter and the runners what they think is gonna happen. The signs are complicated, each team has their own. It’s fine to try to figure out what your opponent is doing except you can’t use technology: binoculars, cameras, anything like that, it’s so-called “electronic” sign-stealing, and that’s the rule the Astros broke.
They used a camera in their home stadium…This is me trying to explain this now, they used a camera in their home stadium to watch the signs the catcher was sending to the pitchers. Someone in the team’s replay room would watch it, relay that information to a player, who then would share with his teammates. They’d use a dugout phone to send information to cell phones of the staff, and then I’m gonna quote the Washington Post here, quote: “Eventually, the Astros installed a video monitor displaying the same footage just outside the dugout where players could look at the video themselves.” This is hi-tech… “Players would bang on a trash can with a bat to signal to the hitter what pitch was coming. Generally one or two bangs corresponded to all speed pitches, and no bang corresponded to a fastball.”
MLB punished the Astros by suspending the manager, AJ Hinch, and general manager, Jeff Luhnow, for a year. They were immediately fired by the owner of the team, Jim Crane. MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred also stripped the Astros of their first and second round selections in the 2020 and 2021 drafts, and fined the franchise $5 million. Alex Cora, who was a bench coach for the Astros in 2017, is seen as the mastermind behind all this. He went on to manage the Red Sox in 2018 and 2019, he’s since been fired. The MLB is currently investigating those Red Sox teams. MLB gave the players immunity as a way to get them to be willing to talk in the investigation, and they didn’t strip the team of their 2017 World Series title. So no one thinks the Astros are the only team doing this, everyone thinks everyone is doing this. But I will say the Astros have been utter shit about apologizing after they’ve actually been busted for it. Jim Crane, the owner of the team, did this amazing thing where he insisted that the cheating didn’t help them, and the was like, “Maybe it did, maybe it didn’t.” Like, why did he go through all this trouble? We’ve talked about non-apologies on the show, the Astros have given a masterclass in this.
Okay, so we have Man City and we have the Astros. I feel like the connection is we have two major teams that got caught doing something that everyone thinks everyone does. So, is this fair, did UEFA and MLB handle these cases correctly? I guess as an outsider to both these things, the biggest thing for me…I was stunned that the Astros actually got to keep their title. So those are all my initial thoughts on this.
Brenda: Thank you so much Jess because that was a beautiful synopsis of what is two incredibly messy cases. But I am really fascinated about the rest of your reactions to the connections between these two. On the one hand you have a kind of what seems to be your regular, run of the mill schoolyard cheating, right? I mean, it’s not, it’s hi-tech or whatever, but the motivation behind it, right, is an advantage, it’s a little more clear cut than Man City’s in a way. Basically what Man City did was exaggerate their worth, and so when Sheikh Mansour, which you described really nicely Jess, when you’re talking about him taking over, the club was massively in debt, and the idea was if teams can’t break even then those very wealthy owners – who are very often sportswashing their own image and what have you – if they just take off those clubs are gonna collapse with hundreds of millions of dollars of debt that they won’t be able to pay. So that’s one element of it.
The other element of it is it was unfair to others in the EPL that Sheikh Mansour basically took them from being a complete shit team in 2007, pumped hundreds of millions of dollars, at one point their salary was like $280 million. So they were sanctioned in 2014, as was Paris St-Germain, but it wasn’t much, it was like they got two thirds of the money that they were sanctioned back, and blah blah blah. So it’s also an idea of like, if you’re looking at such a corporate model like the Champions League or the EPL, how is it unfair to just pump money into it? I mean, I hate it! But it also seems to me sort of weird to say, well, this is a corporate enterprise like the EPL, which is the most commodified thing in the whole wide world, but you just can’t commodify it quite that much. Like, you have to be at 95% of total blatant capitalist pigdom. I just can’t even with it, you know? Okay, I’ll get someone else, I have spent like deep deep hours on this, and it’s sad because I’ll never get those hours back. Suffice it to say, it’s a bunch of hyper-rich UEFA capitalists telling a bunch of hyper-rich other capitalists that they’re just that much extra capitalist.
Here’s the thing they won’t be able to prove…Okay, this is my last thing: if you go to Man City and you’re gonna say he exaggerated those contracts, that might’ve been true in 2013 and 2014, but what Sheikh Mansour did worked. They become an incredible popular team, and so it’s gonna be very hard for UEFA to prove that those sponsorships are actually more than they should’ve been, right? But that’s what we’ll see. Anyway, Shireen.
Shireen: Yeah, I’m just gonna talk about the Astros, not Man City. [laughing] Just kidding, I don’t know anything about baseball! Thank you Jess, for that. The Man City thing is hysterical, Bren, loved your take, I was not expecting that because you hate capitalism. But on the same vein, this is an emotional trauma to so many. My question was, I saw the announcement from Grant Wahl, my immediate question was: will the affect the women’s side? Now, I’ve been doing some digging, and I haven’t gotten a clear-cut answer into what happens, and most of the answers point to no. I actually emailed somebody who works at the club, particularly because Sheikh Mansour is appealing – people don’t know this, this isn’t final. When UEFA makes a decision it’s always subject to further appeal, they’re in the appeals process right now. So that was my first concern, but what Sheikh Mansour did is not uncommon within this realm, as Brenda alluded to. The whole thing is shady as fuck and it’s all about money. That being said, I also have a different take for all those Man City fans out there: karma! You know when Yaya Touré, the most underrated footballer in the world, gets fucked over by Pep Guardiola, this is gonna happen to matter how much lederhosen you have worn in Bayern, it doesn’t matter! It doesn’t matter. When you treat Touré like that – and don’t get me wrong, I have problems with him, but that is a rabbit hole. My point is: the football goddesses are just, and what is meant to happen will roll out eventually. Watch women’s football, people! That’s all I have to say.
Brenda: Amira?
Amira: [chuckling] What I’m really interested in is watching the reactions, and maybe as a point of comparison with the Astros, the reactions have been so interesting, because a lot of what I’m seeing has been, again, this is all taking place…A conversation on the managerial, upper level, right, is detached from on the ground…Like, nobody is banging on trash cans or covering up a supposed tattoo…third nipple…There’s some weird stuff happening with the Astros. [Brenda cackling in the distance] Yeah. One of the reactions that I saw was from Jozy Altidore who retweeted Grant’s tweet announcing this fine with an eyebrow-raised emoji 🤨 saying, “where is this energy from UEFA and FIFA when It comes to dealing with racism?” And I think that’s a really interesting place for thinking what systematic responses look like and for what, and I thought that that was one of the reactions that I saw where I’m like, here’s how this is being able to be punished. This is a huge fine, a huge intervention. I thought that was interesting.
Whereas when you have reactions a lot to the Astros, the focus on the sanctions themselves is that they didn’t go far enough, but there’s also this kind of, as Jess said, all these non-apologies from not only the institution but the players themselves has also allowed the conversation to exist on multiple levels so that you can actually talk about it on the ground, players as well. It has led to a lot of players, even from other sports, chiming in to talk about how cheating affects them or how they’re mad or whatever, or they’re mad that people told or people are snitches or whatever.
Lindsay: LeBron’s tweet “I am of Sports!”
Amira: Exactly, I was exactly gonna say that! It’s the most ridiculous. “I am of sports.” I think that that’s been really interesting to watch, what the engagement is with these moments seems to me that the Astros scandal has had more engagement…not on the ground so to say, but like on the ground, because I don’t have a better word right now.
Brenda: Yeah, that is so interesting too, the issue of the racial politics in the UEFA case, because of course Sheikh Mansour is not British, in the traditional…Like, if he was a white pasty English dude, would they be so willing to go after him in the same way, or is it playing into these prejudices about Islamophobia and this Middle Eastern money and blah blah blah. I mean, that’s an open question. Linz?
Lindsay: Yeah, first of all, my favorite sports mystery of all time now is what was under José Altuve’s shirt and why would he not take his shirt off. There’s all these videos going around…Everyone’s admitted to the trash can thing, but now there are all these rumors that there were buzzers underneath the shirts involved, and in one particular celebratory moment José Altuve refused to take his shirt off and everyone’s pointing to that as being like, oh, he’s gotta have a buzzer underneath it, but there have been multiple very serious reasons as to why he wouldn’t take his shirt off. First of all, his wife apparently was mad that he was taking his shirt off too much so he was stopping taking his shirt off, but if you go to Instagram his Instagram is full of shirtless photos, so maybe his wife doesn’t count Instagram…
Jessica: You’ve done the research.
Lindsay: I dunno, everyone online has, so I’ve benefited from people’s sleuthing. Then this week we were told – or last week? I don’t know what time is anymore – that it was actually that he had a really bad tattoo, it was ugly…
Jessica: So ugly.
Lindsay: It was only half-finished or something, and so he specifically told his teammates not to take off his shirt. I just think that we need a 5000-word investigative piece just on this, because it’s legitimately my favorite thing.
Amira: My favorite meme was the unfinished tattoo being a bat in a trash can.
All: [cracking up]
Jessica: Oh, the internet.
Lindsay: But I do think it’s interesting, the difference here between this first being kind of coaches and players vs. owners and management, you know? And where we draw that line in sports. The owner of the Astros keeps coming out and saying “I knew nothing about this.” Even though there’s plenty of evidence that he should’ve known. The really outstanding thing to me is that this is an open secret. When the Nationals were getting ready to face the Astros in the World Series this years apparently everybody came up to them and they got tips from all around the league about how to beat the Astros because of how many people suspected that, even in 2019, a couple of years after this trashcan scheme, they were still doing hi-tech sign stealing. The fact that it’s this kind of open secret within MLB…Multiple people said they tried to report it, but MLB really didn’t do anything until there was a whistleblower coming forward in The Athletic, that’s really interesting to me.
Another interesting thing is that the player union is involved. After the players are granted immunity, like we said, and a lot of people think that shouldn’t have happened, but there’s actually all this stuff where the players union…I can’t really get into it, because it honestly confuses me. Basically there’s legally really no way that these punishments against the players themselves would be able to be upheld because of some legal…Are you punishing them just to punish them, knowing it’ll be overturned? I dunno, it’s interesting.
Brenda: Jess, you wanna wrap us up?
Jessica: Yeah, I was listening to ESPN Daily with Mina Kimes this week and she floated the idea that maybe this is good for baseball in the end, because she’s gonna watch every single Astros game because she’s really interested in how crowds are gonna respond, like what it’s gonna be like for the Astros to go into unfriendly stadiums, like, how many trashcan lids are gonna be brought in, snuck in, and players are really mad. It’s spring training now and they’re in front of reporters all the time and they seem very angry. It’s going to be interesting to see what this looks like on the field as far as how players respond to the players when they’re actually against each other.
The last thing I wanted to mention, it’s been interesting…The 2017 World Series title was a big deal. It’s one of the moments when sports brought a city back together after the devastation, in this case it was Hurricane Harvey, and it meant a lot to the city. Fandom works in very specific ways all the time where people dig in, but Houston has really dug in in a lot of ways, people are very defensive of their team and there’s one thing I wanted to mention, which was an absolute troll move by the Houston Chronicle this week. They released a list titled, How your favorite (and least favorite) baseball teams also cheated. It’s this horrible list where when you go to it you have to click through every single picture to read the list, which–
Amira: I hate that, yeah.
Jessica: It’s the worst kind of list ever. So this felt like the ultimate troll move, to even have something titled that and then make it the worst format that exists on the internet. So credit to them. But yeah, it’ll be interesting to see what this means for baseball this season.
Brenda: And now we’re joined by Bailey Brown, the president of the Independent Supporters Council of North American football/soccer.
I am so excited to have with us today at Burn It All Down, Bailey Brown, the president of the Independent Supporters Council of North America, and you should know that that includes the soccer, all the soccer. Bailey, a lot of people don’t really understand what the Independent Supporters Council does and is, could you just give our listeners a sense of the organization?
Bailey: Yeah, so we are a collective of supporter groups that span from MLS, all three levels of USL, NWSL, and NPSL and CPL. So we have over a hundred members now, which is really exciting that we can say that. We’re currently calculating the total of people that that embraces, but yeah, we are a collective that advocates to our leagues, we also work to educate and also promote inclusion within the stadiums. We kind of do a whole lot of different things but mostly promote soccer, promote inclusion, educate, advocate, and yeah, have a lot of fun in the process.
Brenda: And a lot of your supporters groups are deeply involved in their community, doing work in their communities. What are the types of projects they’ve done that have impressed you?
Bailey: Oh man, so one thing I’ve always thought was really cool was, we have a group in Seattle called Gorilla FC, they used to build tiny houses and I thought that was just so so cool that every year they would make sure that that happened. Our members in Minnesota are doing phenomenal things with their refugee community, I’m trying to think…It’s just incredible, because a lot of it is like little projects that they do over the year and it just adds up to like $20,000 worth of outreach into their community and it might be working with underprivileged kids and starting soccer teams and making sure that they have everything they need so that they have a team to belong to, all the way to food banks and refugee work and work with the homeless or even LGBT work, it’s incredible.
It’s so vast that it’s really hard to just pick one thing that impresses me because I think that what impresses me most is that every year it continues to grow – the numbers of people participating, the amount of money that’s being donated, the amount of work that’s being done, just grows every year. We actually give an award at our annual conference every year for Philanthropic Group of the Year. This past year it went to KC Cauldron for supporting Kansas City, and the year before that it went to our Minnesota United groups. But yeah, it’s incredible, the list of diversity that comes within the community outreach and how it goes every year.
Brenda: So as far as I know you are the only woman to head up a national, or in this case international, supporters group. What is that like? What’s that been like for you?
Bailey: If I’m being completely honest I don’t know that gender has played a huge role in my experiences. I think that leading up to what I’ve done in the past I would say that I’ve had comments made to me. I know when I first started…So, I’m from Dallas, and when I first started going to FC Dallas everybody assumed I was there because of a guy I was dating, which I always thought was funny because I was a season ticket holder! So it was actually the opposite. But you know, I think throughout time, something that I think is really special at least to the North American supporter culture scene is that a lot of times nobody thinks twice about if it’s a female or a male that’s getting put into leadership, it’s about are they qualified, are they the best for the position. So, I’m in my second year now serving as president of the Independent Supporters Council and I’ve had some amazing experiences but I think they all come out of the love of soccer and not so much having experiences where my gender comes up or comes into question. You were at our conference this year…
Brenda: It was amazing.
Bailey: Yeah, there’s just so much diversity in supporters culture here in North America that you’re gonna see the same type of representation on your leadership boards as you’re gonna see in the crowds and I think that’s what’s phenomenal is that at any point in time I really do feel like people look at their boards for the most part, or look at whoever is kind of leading the charge, and they’re going to see some type of a face that represents them in some way. So yeah, I think that’s kind of how I would reflect on that more so. I know that, when I go overseas a lot, not particular to conferences or anything, but I get a lot of questions if I’m sitting at a pub and watching soccer and they’ll be like, you’re a female, you’re an American female, wait, you watch soccer? They don’t say soccer, they say football, right, but then it becomes a discussion point, but not so much in North America. So if I were to move overseas I’m sure it would become a much bigger discussion.
Brenda: I do think it indicates too the different sort of trajectory of soccer in the US, it’s not predominantly been the sport that defines the national masculine identity or toxic version of masculinity that we might see in other sports.
Bailey: Absolutely, and I would almost say, if anything, it’s more of a generational thing that kind of defines the soccer community over here, right? Like I feel like it’s almost like, I hate saying the millennials, but right? Soccer became kind of the sport of the millennials and they’re pushing for it. I think you’re gonna see a lot more people in that age group championing the values that come with being a part of that age group right now in the United States or Canada – that’s where all of our representation is – more so than this good old boy’s club that it may be in other places around the world.
Brenda: Right. So what made you get into soccer?
Bailey: So if I’m being completely honest I was actually not allowed to play soccer growing up, and I always love to tell this story because it kind of embarrasses my parents, which…I’m sure they’ll listen to this, because I tell them every time I do something. But I always remind them, this was the one sport you never let me play! Mostly because they didn’t want me to play sports that they didn’t wanna watch, and that included a lot of outdoor sports. I don’t know that it had anything to do with the fact that it was soccer, but more so outdoors. In Texas we have extreme weather, right, so I almost can’t blame them. I started getting into soccer when I was in high school, a lot of my friends watched soccer or played soccer even, and I took German, which…Texas, right? That’s totally the language you need to know in this state. But it was right before the 2006 World Cup and so I remember just being so excited, learning about European culture and all that kind of stuff in our German class, and I’m just like, I’m gonna watch the World Cup this summer! And I just fell in love for the amount of time that I got to watch the sport on TV.
I obviously watched the German national team, because that was hitting close to home with what I was doing in school and I was definitely a nerd, but yeah, from there I fell in love with Bayern Munich, they had a lot of players on the national team at that time, and I became the person who would get up and watch soccer on their Xbox while I was in college, out of college. I think what really kind of changed it for me, and this is what I always try to tell people, because I’m still involved in Bayern Munich fan clubs and stuff like that over here, give your local soccer a chance. You don’t realize how good it is over here if you don’t give it a chance, right?
So after I went I was in Europe in 2012, that was a Euro Cup year, not in Germany but I was in Europe so I got to kind of feel the vibes of what was going on around, and I got to go to some public watch parties, and I was like, this is incredible, this is phenomenal! Where can I find something like this in the United States? And I had some people with connections to FC Dallas – I’m not gonna lie, I didn’t even know we had a professional team – and just started going to games, and within I think a month of going to games after that July I had bought season tickets and from there it was one of those things where it was more than just watching a sport, it became a community, and I think that’s what a lot of supporters kind of get into what they do, they find a sport they love but within the sport they find a community they comes with it. And yeah, that’s kind of my soccer story.
Brenda: So I know that ISC’s been really active over working with MLS regarding its fan code of conduct over the last year, and it was pretty big news this week that a new fan code of conduct came out–
Bailey: Yass!
Brenda: Congratulations for your success in helping to reshape that.
Bailey: Thank you.
Brenda: Can you describe to listeners kind of what has changed and how ISC sees that?
Bailey: Yeah, absolutely. So I mean, the process started last fall when everything came to a head, and let me give some backstory to how we got involved in it.
Brenda: Yeah, yeah.
Bailey: So we kind of knew there was a new code of conduct coming out last year, and we started getting word that this idea of “political” was gonna be in there, and it might cause issues. Last month we actually dropped a statement wanting clarification on what “political” meant, and then obviously addressing some of these code of conduct clauses and official appeals system in case you get a ban or a sanction, so we’re kind of looking at that, but we’re kind of holding back and watching what the Pacific northwest was doing, because we knew the Iron Front flag was a really big deal, specifically kind of to that legion, it was something they had always traditionally flown for a while, and so we didn’t really approach it aggressively until we kind of got word from them on if it was gonna be allowed or not.
Brenda: And maybe we should kind of talk about its political positioning a little bit, right? Could you just explain a bit about why it became a big deal?
Bailey: So yeah, people were essentially saying that the Iron Front flag, which is the three arrows pointed down, was a sign of antifa, which they’re saying is a part of a political group, and is supporting domestic terrorism, essentially, which was why they were not wanting it in the stadiums. Which would be completely understandable for domestic terrorism stuff, except for the fact that Iron Front does not stand for domestic terrorism, right? It’s for inclusion.
Brenda: It’s anti-fascist.
Bailey: Yes, it’s an anti-fascist symbol, so yeah, we were kind of waiting to see if this was gonna be an FO – FO as in front office – if all of the front offices were going to make their own decisions on what was gonna happen, and that’s when the hammer essentially just came down on it, and everybody just said no, it’s not gonna be allowed, the Antifaschistische Aktion action flag is never gonna be allowed, which is the red and white flag in a circle that you see kind of overlapping. That’s what a lot of people kind of consider “antifa” which is literally just short for anti-fascism, or anti-fascist. It’s not an actual organized group. [laughs]
So we have that, and then we start seeing issues with like “Refugees welcome” and it’s this pile up that we start to see. Finally we have the neo-nazi punching fans outside of the Seattle game, and then we have issues going down in Portland where we have Proud Boys literally standing outside of the stadium trying to cause issues, and the infamous walkout game…Not walkout game, the walkout game was afterwards, but the 33 minute protest of both Seattle and Portland based on the Iron Front, and both groups flew it in protest after 33 minutes of silence. And then the meeting in Las Vegas, right, so after that they overturned the ban, things kind of calmed down a little bit, and that’s when we started this offseason process of rewriting this code of conduct essentially where we just asked the league, we said hey, we want you guys to bring in experts. We’re not claiming to be experts, we’re okay with saying that, we’re okay with you guys saying you’re not experts in human rights, so let’s go to experts, let’s see what’s happening, and let’s see if we can get to the bottom of this. Let’s change this and make it something that’s gonna work for both parties so that we can really continue to champion these values of inclusion that really come with our supporter groups and their communities in North America.
So from there we had a lot of different calls over the different months…We had people from MLS show up to our conference this year which was phenomenal, which was great, it was awesome. In the end we did get essentially all of our asks, and it was really exciting. The big changes in the code of conduct are they took out the word “offensive” and they replaced it with the word “discriminatory” and really took out this big question of “Is what I’m saying offensive because it’s subjective, or is this actually being discriminatory and hateful?” And I actually have it in front of me, so I’ll read it to you all. The new code of conduct says that prohibited conduct will include, and there’s two bullet points, so the word “political” is completely taken out of the first one, and says “Displaying signs, symbols, images, using language or making gestures that are threatening, abusive, or discriminatory, including on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, gender, gender identity, ability, and/or sexual orientation.”
So to us it became very clear at that point, if it’s discriminatory it’s not allowed. The second bullet point actually goes and kind of addresses what we were asking – what is political? What are y’all actually watching when you say we don’t want political signs in our stadium. And they were able to do it without saying the word political…Well, I guess they have political for “political party” but it didn’t…It says, “Displaying signs, symbols or images for commercial purposes or for electioneering, campaigning or advocating for or against any candidate, political party, legislative issue, or government action.” So the new code of conduct is essentially if it champions human rights and inclusion within the stadium and is like a positive message, essentially, it can come in. So that’s gonna lead to include the Iron Front front, it’s going to include the Antifaschistische Aktion flag, it’s going to include “Refugees are welcome.” All of these things that are going up in our stadiums really to promote this inclusive environment are going to be allowed this season, which starts in a week. So it’s really really exciting.
Brenda: Wow.
Bailey: There’s been some questions over some of it, particularly the legislative issue over the government action line, but one thing that we’re really encouraged about is that our communication with Major League Soccer is not done, we’re gonna continue calls, we’re gonna continue to open dialogue, and if we need to discuss things and we need to discuss the way things are changing, whatever it may be in the world we live in, we can do so. And as a league and as counsel they are going to help with guidance and implementations so that there is a consistency and accountability between all of our offices. We’re really encouraged by that piece and we think that’s really gonna help with any confusion that might come with legislative issues around government action and those lines.
Brenda: Well congratulations!
Bailey: Yeah, it’s a lot! But we’re excited. [laughs]
Brenda: It’s wonderful. Just before I let you go, I wanna ask, so you’ve got this down, and I know it’s an ongoing conversation, but what types of things, what types of subjects are you looking to tackle next?
Bailey: Yeah, so we just tackled this with Major League Soccer, and in regards to codes of conduct now we are really going to be pushing the National Women’s Soccer League to publish one, because they do not have one, as well as United Soccer League for all three, so championship league, league one, league two. That way they’re not just being defined by the places they’re in or any other codes of conduct that are in place, but that as a league they’re gonna stand up and say hey, we’re championing these values as well. So we’re gonna be working this year really pushing to get those done. This past year at conference we were all about diversity and inclusion, we had panels highlighting people of color and supporter groups and what we can do to be more inclusive, as well as the LGBTQ community.
So moving into this year, it’s not as if we’re going to forget about those, obviously, we’re really going to try to empower our members with the information that they’ve learned, but we’re going to be pushing more a forward-female-type push into our next conference in 2021, which is actually gonna be in Portland hosted…It’s our first solo host by an NWSL group, so we’re really excited about that. With that we’re trying to work with Football Supporters Europe – they do what we do but for over there, kind of in a different capacity just because they have to deal with UEFA…We’re not dealing with the beast that is CONCACAF here yet! I’m sure it’ll be coming probably, it’s a little different, but they did this amazing project called Fan.tastic Females and essentially it’s a traveling exhibit around Europe, and even outside of Europe, to get the story of females and why they’re into soccer, why they support and how they support and just showing that there’s a place for females in the stands, there’s a place for females on the field, that this game belongs to all. It’s an incredible exhibit and if you can ever get over to it in Europe please do, but we are hoping that we can bring it here.
So we got the green light from them to essentially take the project and start doing our own additions to highlight more people from North America, there’s only one on there right now, so we’ll obviously be adding on while keeping some of theirs…This is like our dream, right, to make this happen. It’s a big undertaking, fingers crossed. But yeah, we want it to come out at conference, debut at conference, and put it on tour around the United States and Canada, wherever people want it to go, so that people can see just the involvement of females in the soccer communities here in North America. So those are some of the projects we’re looking at in addition to continuing advocation and educational materials for our members
Brenda: Wow, never short on ambition. Thank you so much for being with us at Burn It All Down, Bailey Brown, we are very impressed.
Bailey: Aw, thank you for having me on.
Brenda: Okay, I know that everybody here has been waiting to discuss the Netflix docu-series Cheer, and we did interview Jade in episode 146, Amira sat down with her, and so Amira, I’m hoping that you can start us off on what is really an exciting conversation for everybody.
Amira: It’s here! It’s here! It’s time to talk about Cheer! It’s here! It’s here! It’s time to talk about Cheer! I’m so excited, I’ve been wanting to have this conversation, there’s so much to say! So just to start off for those of you who have not been paying attention to the world for the last six weeks the Netflix docu-series Cheer came out in January, it is a six part episode that follows the Navarro junior college cheer team in Texas and follows their pursuit of their 14th grand championship at Daytona. It profiles the team, we get to know the coach, we get to know a lot of the athletes, and it really hones in on about eight of them that we get to know, who have cheered their way into our hearts, like Jerry!
But it also of course opens up a conversation about collegiate sports, about cheerleading, about competitive cheer…I’m particularly interested in the racial politics of that, which we can get to in a second; about injury, about a whole host of things that I have been so eager to talk to everybody about. And so I did sit down with Jade. Now, Jade Withrow is a top girl, she’s a flier, she’s in the center of the pyramid. If you’ve watched it, we see her a lot in the first episode, in terms of one on one interview time, but she is one of the featured fliers for the Navarro cheer team, and she’s now cheering at Kennesaw State, and I called her up and talked to her about her experiences and what she thought of the show watching it back, and her experience being a woman of color on that team in the sport of cheer, so if you haven’t listened to that yet I really encourage you to check it out – that was in episode 146. I guess I’ll just start with this question, after you’ve binged this series, what were your immediate takeaways? What are the things that stood out to you? Why? Why has this captured our fascination?
Brenda: Alright, let’s roundtable that. Jess, wanna start?
Jessica: Yeah, I think it’s really good storytelling, is a big part of it. One thing I keep wondering is what got edited out in the storytelling, but I do think it’s compelling how they introduce us to all these characters and told us their stories and sort of unraveled those alongside the build to Daytona, and I don’t know how I feel…I mean, I love Jerry, I’d die for Jerry, Morgan…Now I’m just thinking of them all. But one thing I took away from it is the sound, the sound of the bodies hitting when they throw these young women into the air and they land…So, they’re landing, they call them baskets, because the men lace their arms together basically and then catch them as they land, and whoever did the sound for this documentary should win awards for that. Listening to that is almost worse than watching it. There’s been a discuss around the coach, people love her, I mean…She’s an interesting…What’s the right way to say this? “What’s the line in coaching when it becomes abuse?” I think is something I kept thinking about. There’s one guy named, was it TT?
Amira: So hard to watch.
Jessica: Where he is injured, he goes and competes when she told him not to, and he comes back a little bit injured, and in order to punish him for that – the way it’s edited – she forces him to practice that day, and he’s crying as he’s participating, but also he’s one of those people lacing his arms together to catch people, so it seems dangerous to the fliers as much as to TT’s back, like Morgan, who’s getting caught, so your ribs are smacking people’s forearms, right? And she hurt so much, she goes to the ER in secret because she doesn’t want her coach to find out because of the dynamics around all this stuff. I do think there’s a discussion worth having around what actually counts as abuse and what it is we’re celebrating here around this coach.
The final thing in the final episode, the do a five minute thing about who controls cheerleading, and one thing I think is super interesting and there’s this great article from 2015 by Leif Reigstad, who wrote in the Houston Press about varsity brands who basically have a monopoly over the sport of cheerleading. I mean, everything. They stream all the competitions, they make all the merchandise, and they fight – so, there’s this whole thing about whether or not this should be an NCAA AA sport, whether or not it should be a sport at the high school level, and there’s a lot of discussion about whether or not it’s not considered a sport because people don’t take it as seriously as sport, but there is this other huge thing which is that varsity brands lobby hard, they do not want the regulation that come, they don’t wanna let go of their monopoly. They spend about five very compelling minutes in the last episode on that, and I just keep thinking about that part of this.
Brenda: Shireen?
Shireen: Yeah, first of all thank you to Amira, I’ll absolutely yield to her Netflix suggestions. I was reluctant to watch this, particularly in the first episode, I was texting Amira going, “I hate this show,” because there’s one scene of a professor who’s like, “Well y’all, I think Tex-Mex is actually better than Mexican food,” and then I was like, I’m not fucking watching this show, I can’t! But then Amira’s like no, you don’t ever have too see that person again, if you keep watching.
Amira: She’s the greatest villain of the show. I still get angry thinking about her class, which is terrible.
Shireen: It was horrible, I’m like, Amira, why are you making me do this, and she’s like no no no no, just keep watching, and I was like, fine. And I did it and I’m glad I did. I just want to echo what Jess said, the sound editing for this, as an athlete and somebody who has never done any type of tumbling or gymnastics, but the level of athleticism required for this is mind-boggling to me, and I played soccer at a high level for a very long time, I was stunned. The amount of injuries was really upsetting for me to watch because you need rest, and these types of injuries, like, the level of trust required, the mental acuity, the emotional and psychological acuity required was staggering. We know that cheerleading on a high school and collegiate level is very difficult, it’s just when it goes pro it’s very different of what that looks like, and none of these athletes talked about being professional in the capacity of what we know professional to be, it’s a very different scene. I also thought that that was very interesting.
I was really mad at Monica for much of this series, because as much as…She absolutely reminded me, and this is really weird, she reminded me of Pep Guardiola in this very softly vicious manner in the way that they coach. It’s cutthroat, and she offered no apology. But she was very interesting that her background was in business, because she has a MBA, and how she was using that and how she built this up from the ground up and how she brought in kids, many of whom were from homes that were vulnerable, were not stable, and then those stories really affected me. Morgan’s story…I follow all of these people on Instagram, and I’m still not feeling the bows but I particularly am not gonna comment about headgear and what someone chooses to wear, obviously. I don’t get the bows, but whatever. Also this idea of what beauty is, it’s a lot of makeup, and they spent a lot of time in this series putting on their makeup and we’re watching them do this. I think they’re stunning without it, but also it’s a performative thing and I totally get it, so that’s fine, but just that idea of what beauty looks to be…Gabi Butler, who’s someone I’m very fascinated with, is one of these people who’s very muscular, her quads are beautiful. So Morgan is the more slender, more small-featured person, but Gabi is the one that has the hearts of so many girls. She has explained how she started just Youtube-ing herself and she’s a self-made entrepreneur and also what made me slightly uncomfortable was how her family, which…
Amira: Yeah, she didn’t Youtube herself, her parents Youtube’d her!
Lindsay: That conversation between her and her father was one of the most uncomfortable things I’ve ever heard in my entire life.
Brenda: Oh, yeah. When he goes in the shower when she’s in the shower and just like, harasses…
Shireen: Yeah! It was just really…That whole thing with her parents kind of exploiting that…
Lindsay: Not ‘kind of,’ yeah…
Shireen: Yeah, sorry, so there’s all these feelings I have, so anyways, it was phenomenal, there’s so many things…We need like a series of discussions on this.
Amira: It’s interesting as they’ve been making the media rounds in the wake of this show, Gabi was posed that question when they were at Ellen, who basically said like, besides that teacher on the first episode your parents have been getting a lot of flack, like a real villain of the show. One of the things that Gabi said was like, it’s really been important for her family to watch it back, because they’ve all been able to say, wow, maybe this is a little messed up, and that her parents had this moment where they’re like, do we push you too hard? You didn’t look happy here. So at least what she’s saying now is that it has opened up a conversation with her parents, and I’m hopeful that is accurate and I’m hopeful that leads to her dad maybe not being like that.
Brenda: Linz?
Lindsay: Okay, I’ve been taking notes, because I have so many things. Okay, so first of all, regarding the makeup: what they’re doing athletically…I watch so many sports, and I am not an athlete myself, I talk about this on the show a lot, so I am amazed at all sports, the athleticism; I’m always watching sports in awe of what these people are doing, nothing even comes close to the level of awe that I have when I’m watching the Cheer stuff, and they’re asked to do it with a smile on their face! We don’t ask football players to not look like they’re exerting effort or in pain! We don’t ask basketball players to smile through everything. So that adds this really creepy level that I’m not super duper comfortable with, but is also really part of it.
One of the strange things that I found watching this was this push and pull with the NCAA, like, on the one hand it was people like Gabi can profit off of what they’re doing, do you know what I mean? Everybody is allowed to right now take advantage of the promotional opportunities around this show the way Last Chance U which was a documentary that the same director has also done on Netflix, can’t, because of name/image/likeness rules in the NCAA. Gabi couldn’t have the following she has and monetize it in the way she has been able to if cheerleading was more regulated by the NCAA. On the other hand, and I was actually talking about this, I was Slate Hang Up and Listen podcast earlier this week talking a little bit about this, but it’s like, there are no practice hour restrictions on this, you know what I mean? I’m never rooting for things to be under the NCAA’s umbrella, except I kept wishing that they actually had some of those guidelines and some of those restrictions in place, because it seems like it’s so unregulated that it veers towards…It’s exploitative in this whole different way that typical NCAA sports, which is really uncomfortable, and it’s the same kind of push and pull I got with the coach, with Monica, where it was like, yes you’re doing a lot for these kids, yes you’re not as openly abusive as a lot of these male coaches that we’re seeing, but they way that you are kind of finding these like, damaged people from these abusive environments, and almost manipulating their sense of loneliness and loss into your gain, also actually made me nauseas a lot of times.
Brenda: Huh. That’s so funny, I have so many mixed feelings that I don’t think I could even articulate it quite that way. I think I’m the only former cheerleader on the show, right? [pause]
Jessica: Brenda was a cheerleader! You’re out there smiling?!
Brenda: Oh yeah. They used to put vaseline on our teeth–
Jessica: What?!
Brenda: Because that way you can hold the smile. Your lips don’t get chapped and you can keep the smile for like, hours at a time. There’s all kinds of tricks you know, like with Spanx, that they don’t even get into, right? Like hair-spraying and gluing your Spanx in place.
Shireen: Hair-spraying your Spanx?!
Brenda: Yeah, because you don’t want it to go up your butt, so sometimes you glue it, sometimes people hair-sprayed it to try to keep it in the same spot, like I know every trick for like nylon to not tear possible – I will never use that because I have not raised my daughters to be cheerleaders, but yeah. The level of athleticism was just absolutely insane and asking them to be on the sidelines of these games and do this traditional stuff was just wild to me. I guess I just have a few quick things, because we could talk for hours about this. I think that reality TV or documentaries have sometimes done really poor jobs presenting class, and I think this did an amazing job of that.
Shireen: Yes, yes, yes.
Brenda: Particularly given the places that they’re from, whether it’s Boca Raton, whether it’s Houston, whether it’s Oklahoma, showing the ways in which there are structural barriers to people from the working class, and that’s compounded by race obviously, throughout the show, and it was just really moving for me. I would say that Morgan looked really familiar, that kind of aiming to please, so Linz, when you say there’s a manipulation there, I don’t know that a person like Monica would understand that. She’s just like…She should, I’m not saying she shouldn’t, but when she’s says that Morgan is just always aiming to please, right, she’s always aiming to work hard, I really got the sense that the coach really believed that, that this working class girl was just…And it’s true she was aiming to please, but she never sort of says “Why is she constantly aiming to please?!”
Amira: Right.
Lindsay: Right, I don’t think it was a conscious thing at all times, but it was very clearly what was happening, to me, at least–
Brenda: And Morgan certainly wouldn’t agree with you that she’s being manipulative. So one of the interesting things is that if you asked her I am almost 100% sure that she would say no, like, this is “She believes in me, she’s stability.” You know?
Lindsay: Oh, yeah.
Brenda: So the way in which it’s experienced from the inside is just so different. So the class stuff just killed me, the other thing is about integrated gender in sport. I loved when men are sitting there looking at videos and complimenting their women teammates, and they’re like, oh my god, I would love to do [x] with her, she’s so good at this. And there’s a way in which men are rooting for their teammates in an integrated sport that’s just exhilarating for me, that you just don’t see. You might get like, a men’s basketball team has to go to the women’s game and be like, [clapping] “Okay, good job, ladies.” But there’s something different about the respect that they have for the women that they’re working with when they’re on the same team.
Jessica: Can I just say something really quick on that? I loved the camaraderie in general, because this is such a feminized sport, right? We think of girls as catty, and they fight all the time and they don’t like each other, and I always think of like Bring It On and Cheer-ocracy and all that kind of stuff, and just to see all these people, all these men and women just support each other so hard all the time, I think that’s why we all responded to Jerry’s mat talk so much, and because of the way Jerry does it, but that I just found very heartwarming.
Brenda: Yeah, I want Jerry on my desk every Monday morning, like a little bobblehead Jerry to be like, “Come on, Brenda!!” Shireen?
Shireen: I also feel like there’s a lot of mat talk in Burn It All Down and I think there’s different ways of it, but also how they support each other and the struggles in the moment and there’s injury or there’s something else, you always…I loved Jerry as well. I was very fascinated by Lexi, I also follow her on every social media. She’s the one who doesn’t conform to the rules of the sport, that doesn’t conform, I just find her fascinating. And Jerry is everyone’s…And Jerry’s bigger, and he was trying to lose weight at one point and talking about that was stuff that was just really fascinating to me that that also plays into body image and dysmorphia that occurs in men. That’s something that they didn’t delve into a lot, but it was there.
Brenda: And so what about the look? Amira, a racialized look there?
Amira: Yeah no certainly, I mean, I really resonate with what you said where if you asked Morgan if she was being manipulative, would they see it, right? And I think that there’s a way in which the what Navarro and what Monica means to these participants is so palpable and what this cheer family means is so palpable that it’s very hard to be in that and have and articulate the other processes layered onto it. One of those is there’s this very intense racialization, and competitive cheer has its own racial politics, and I think for certain millennials like me who’re raised on Bring It On, we’ve always seen that like there’s a white squad and there’s a Black squad and x, y, and z. And I think competitive cheer has certainly, like gymnastics, has been a sport that is diversifying. I talked to Jade about this, her other all-star competitive team is majority women of color, but I think how it plays out in Navarro is it’s certainly an integrated squad, like, there’s Black people everywhere, but they’re men, right?
There’s a way in which there’s the look factor, that doesn’t extend to the bases, it doesn’t extend to the spotters, it doesn’t extend to the men, and so there’s a little bit more opportunity and permissibility there. You can see glimpses of this, right, when Morgan is auditioning and Monica says “She just has the look.” Like, the technique’s not necessarily there, but I can work with that, but she “has the look.” Then with Jade, who’s kind of ethnically ambiguous, her hair is straightened, she can get into “the look” for competition. And I think there’s even three Hawaiian members of the squad, Ashlee is another woman of color, but she’s Asian, and so I think it shows you the slippages of the color line, where you have a Puerto Rican girl, you have an Asian girl, but there’s nobody on that squad who’s Black who’s a woman, and I think that there’s a really interesting discussion there about what the look has been, and why teams recruit to that look or play to that look, or who is seen as redeemable, who is seen as ‘their technique’s not there but I can work with them because in short shorts and high cowboy boots they can sell Navarro, this little town in Texas,’ and kind of uphold this.
The team that they were really in the most competition with, Trinity Valley, they have a new coach and he’s a Black man, and so I was really interested, I kept trying to look around him when they would show that squad in glimpses, I was like, hmm, does that change the kind of racial politics of the scene? So I think that’s one of the areas that I’m also examining. And then of course the last part, what I really had a quite sobering conversation with Jade about, was what happens next? What happens when you’ve been doing this your whole life, and a lot of them have built up brands around this, what happens when you outgrow the institutional development of the sport? So there’s options and there’s all-star and there’s little pockets of possibilities, but by and large like so many other sports we see are, for so many college athletes, this is the end of the road. I think that is a particularly hard transition in the fact that I hope that when they remount this, because they’re definitely gonna do a followup season, we’ll see familiar returners, but I also hope that there is a little bit of time to go follow the non-returners and to see where they are. I know Ashlee and Syd, who’s another member of the team, they date and in Hawaii, now they’re going to New Zealand for a year to cheer with Hawaiian all-stars and New Zealand all-stars, and so I’ve been following their Instagrams, because it’s adorable obviously, but you know I’m really interested in what happens next.
Brenda: Okay, now it’s time for everybody’s favorite part of the show, where we pile everything that has pissed us off in sports this week, throw it on a giant incinerator, and burn it. Shireen, you wanna start us off?
Shireen: Yes, thank you. I just wanna tell everybody, I announced this on Twitter, it was gonna come one day I thought, but not this soon: I have officially broken up with Tim Duncan. He may or may not know this…He probably does not. But Tim Duncan…
Lindsay: [laughing]
Shireen: Tim Duncan has supported Bloomberg in the Democratic race. You’re wondering why I care about American politics? Not only because they’re shoved down my throat, and everyone else’s, as a non-American, but the problem I have with this, and as much as I get that Timmy had a promo, and Timmy doesn’t actually do a lot of media or any very frequently, but he said that he felt that Bloomberg actually supported post-hurricaine, and I totally get that, I understand why he felt that way and he felt that many politicians ignored the Virgin Islands – and that being said, when we look and focus on a single issue it becomes really really really difficult, and Mike Bloomberg donated money and help, but what he did post-9/11 to Black and Muslim communities, Middle Eastern communities, South Asian communities, post-9/11, was brutal. My friend Rowaida Abdelaziz actually said, and this was after one of the debates, quote, this is what Mike Bloomberg said: “I knew what to do after 9/11.” And she writes, “Pretty sure surveilling, mapping, placing informants, violating Muslim civil rights and destroying the relationship between the government and Muslims wasn’t it. #DemDebate.” And that’s pretty much what Mike Bloomberg means to a lot of people from my community. Now, that Tim Duncan didn’t see this or didn’t get that, and particularly being nurtured by someone like Greg Popovich, it really confused me. So I’m upset. I think there’s always a way to step back and talk about it, but then again Tim Duncan is not somebody to engage like this with media. Will he think about it? I will keep sending him emails! The nature of my emails have changed. So the thing is that this is sad for me, and this just shows that nobody’s flawless…Except Serge Ibaka now, who has taken Timmy’s place. So I think that this was hard, but it had to be done. I’m taking Tim Duncan’s political choices and I’m throwing them on the burn pile. Burn.
All: Burn.
Brenda: Jess.
Jessica: Yeah, so for my burn this week I owe a hat-tip to flamethrower and recent guest on the show Elana Meyers Taylor, she posted about this on Instagram this past week and it’s the only reason that I even know about this. So, the luge world cup took place this weekend in Winterberg, Germany, which sounds very cold. But a bunch of competitors pulled out–
All: [laughing]
Jessica: Like, Winterberg?! Okay. According to the AP, USA Luge, Team Austria, and athletes from Germany and Russia, including gold medal winners, withdrew from the competition citing safety concerns on the track. In case you don’t know or don’t remember, luge is that winter sport where competitors lie feet-first on a small lightweight sled mere inches from the ice and go hurtling down a long tube track. They have almost no protection on them except for their helmet. So, in Winterberg the athletes reported over and over again that there was too much ice buildup on some track curves, which ups their chances significantly of crashing. Coaches even went out on the track themselves to try to work on this, which the AP says is, quote, “a highly unusual move, but one done with hopes of making the surface at least somewhat safer.” There were a series of crashes during the training; a German doubles team pulled out afterwards saying that the chance of crashing is, quote, “extremely high, and therefore incalculable.”
US luger Chris Mazdzer, who won the silver in the 2018 Olympics, posted on Instagram and I’m just gonna read a big chunk of it, so bear with me. Quote, “The Federation of International Luge (FIL) does not appear to understand the needs of athletes and at times chooses to not listen when there are serious issues. Instead, they default to the false notion that is “if it ain't broken, don't fix it” but what they do not realize is that it is very broken.” He went on, quote, “Not only are track conditions less than ideal but this was brought to the attention of the FIL and yet again we were told that everything is ok. It is always ok.. for the last 15 years everything has been ok… I am frustrated with that same mentality, I am frustrated that as athletes we feel like numbers and do not have the ability to enact change to an organization that unless the IOC places a mandate does not want to change. […] Everything is not ok, which is why I will not be racing in the Men’s competition. Not because I am scared, not because I do not trust my ability to make it down this track, but to say to the FIL the athletes are the most valuable stakeholders of the organization and without us, things are not ok.”
US luger Brittney Arndt posted a picture of herself giving a thumbs-down on Instagram, and wrote, quote, “From the very first training runs we told the technical committee that the track was unsafe and we should not be sliding, they laughed in our faces, and told us it was our choice to forfeit our runs and not slide. the FIL took no action to secure the safety of the athletes.” She also made the very good point that she is from a team with resources and support, and so she can choose not to compete when she feels unsafe, quote, “but a lot of people don’t. there are small nations who have no choice but to race to secure funding or for other reasons.” She added, “I do not think think that the International Luge Federation cares about the safety of its athletes.” That is mind-boggling, right? One must wonder what the FIL is for if not primarily to protect its athletes and its sport. Luge is terrifying when it’s run on the safest of tracks in the safest conditions! The idea that people are being told to compete when it’s unsafe is wild to me. I don’t even understand this. This week we can go ahead and add another sports organizing body, the Federation of International Luge, to the burn pile. Burn.
All: Burn.
Brenda: Linz.
Lindsay: Uh, so I actually had a very last-minute change of my burn, because USA Gymnastics did something else horrible that I had to throw…So USA Gymnastics, as we’ve talked about, they’re trying to settle with all the Nassar survivors. Their first offer of a settlement was laughably low. This one had slightly more money, but as part of the settlement they asked the survivors to release US Olympic and Paralympic Committee Steve Penny, the former president of USA Gymnastics, and the Karolyis, Marta and Bela Karolyi, from all liability in the Nassar case. So essentially saying, take this money and you can’t get any more justice from anyone involved in this case. Rachael Denhollander, former guest of the show, and of course the first Nassar survivor to come forward, and really the leader of the survivors, has an incredible thread about this offer on Twitter, and I just wanna read one quote from her, where she says: “There have been a lot of incredibly painful and outright disgusting moments since I let my abuse become international news because these organizations made it the only way to stop Larry. But today might be the worst.” So, burn. Just throw that on the burn pile. Burn.
All: Burn.
Brenda: Amira.
Amira: Yeah, I wanna talk about Tommy Tuberville. So, for those of you who don’t know, he was the coach at Auburn, the football coach at Auburn, for many years. Last year he announced that he was gonna run for the US senate in Alabama, so he is in the Republican primary right now, challenging one Jeff Sessions. Former press secretary Sean Spicer is coordinating his campaign, it’s a mess already, right? Okay, so this past week ESPN wrote a feature on his political run, and the entire premise was if Alabama fans could vote an Auburn coach. So, literally – [Jess laughing – yeah, literally sets it up as basically talking about how he has this platform for his senate run, he talks about education, about immigration, they say he supports Donald Trump, all of these issues are important to him, yet he’s running in a state where the Iron Bowl is contested 365 days a year, and he coached one side for ten years. And so it goes, right?
One of the things it does is first of all ignores how he’s framing this in the first place, where he…Tuberville understands Alabama better than this article understands Alabama. Tuberville’s literally framing it as, “Listen, I wanna drain the swamp, I’m getting into this race because of all of these issues; we as Alabamians are very good at winning football,” and when he’s saying that he’s meaning Auburn and Alabama together. He is framing it as, “I’m a football guy, an outsider to politics, you’re electing me to go in and shake things up.” He’s not even…There’s one anecdote of some guy coming up to him and says, “Coach, I’d like to vote for you, but I don’t know if I can because you coach for Auburn,” and literally you could almost read it as a joke. If he like to vote for him, he’s liking to vote for a platform that is consistent with far-right Republican values, because this is also a man who, I must remind you, said, “I’ve been in cities, folks. You can’t drive through a neighborhood. Why? Because terrorism has taken over. ‘Sharia Law’ has taken over. There’s places you can’t go in this country, you’re not wanted in our country. I mean, this is not the Middle East.” This is what we’re talking about! If you look on his Twitter today he says “I’m draining the swamp, all these lying so-and-so politicians are mad because a football coach is about to beat them.”
This is not actually an Auburn-Alabama divide. He understands Alabama politics, he understands that a majority of the white people in that state will absolutely have no problem casting a vote for him, because they elected Jeff Sessions! Look at the race he’s running in! Spare me these articles that frame this like a moral divide that somebody will have in terms of pulling the lever for somebody who coached Auburn. I don’t care how much football means to your area, that is actually not what is propelling them to get to the polls. It’s not. Sports and politics intersect, yes, but also sometimes it’s just…This person embodies the politics already existing on the ground. So it’s not far-fetched that he’s polling within single-digit points of Jeff Sessions, like, that’s not a surprise here. Anyways, I’m annoyed. Burn it down.
All: Burn.
Brenda: Last but not least, thank you to Jessica Luther for inspiring what has made me maybe the angriest I’ve been since, like, yesterday. A high school basketball game occurred in California, in LA area, last week, or close to Valentine’s Day, and it ended in xenophobic chants by fans. There were two teams, St. Joseph’s and Righetti High. This is is Santa Maria so they’re very close to one another. I’m happy to report that St. Joseph’s won 74-57, and the visiting losing fans started to chant at the end, “Where’s your passport?” to the other players. This is presumably because their team had several Puerto Rican players on their team. So if you see the video, which we’ll post, you can see them gleefully chanting this, and I understand that they’re children that are shaped by the prevailing environment in which they live…But first off the assistant principal of the Righetti High students, Ted Lyon, or he probably says “Lion,” actually was sitting there doing nothing while this happened. Right…I’m talking about in exact proximity. The school says they are not racialized chants, they have nothing to do with race.
So, first off, I wanna burn this non-apology and denial of the fact that this was xenophobic and racist behavior of both your students and your assistant principal. And you should be really, really embarrassed about the fact that your students don’t apparently know that Puerto Ricans have the same US passport as the rest of the people who are US citizens. That is so embarrassing! You should be embarrassed at the the job you’re doing at that school. High school principal Erinn Dougherty of the St. Joseph’s school came out and had words with the assistant principal, and then had to apologize, saying she should’ve done a better job keeping her cool. No, Ms. Dougherty, I think that your reaction was absolutely, absolutely fucking on point. So, you know, I wanna burn the behavior of those students, and not so metaphorically burn the behavior of assistant principal Ted Lyon, and all of the racism and xenophobia that is allowed to go on in high school sports. Burn.
All: Burn.
Brenda: After all that burning it’s time to celebrate some accomplishments of women in sports this week with our badass women of the week segment. Congrats, before all that, to Elana Meyers Taylor, on the birth of her son Nicholas. We’re wishing him lots of health and happiness, and we’re so excited to see Nico in action. Honorable mentions this week go to Egypt women’s national baseball team. They will tour Pakistan in mid-April and so will make Egyptian history by playing the first baseball game by a national team.
Lesley Visser, the legendary sports reporter, will be the first woman ever to receive the Emmy’s Sports Lifetime Achievement Award.
Kim Mulkey, head coach of the Baylor Bear’s basketball team, is the fastest coach in men’s or women’s D1 basketball to 600 wins.
South Carolina women’s basketball has now had 80 consecutive home games with over 10,000 fans in attendance. The team and the culture around it that Dawn Staley has built is phenomenal.
The annual Laureus Awards were handed out. Simone Biles is World Sportswoman of the Year; Sophia Floersch won World Comeback of the Year award after returning to auto racing following a scary crash; Oksana Masters, a Nordic skier and cyclist, took home the Sportsperson of the Year with a Disability award; and Chloe Kim is the World Action Sportsperson of the Year. Wow.
Speaking of Sophia Floersch, she will be part of the first all-female crew in the LMP2 class for the European Le Mans Series in auto racing. She’ll be joined by Katerhine Legge and Tatiana Calderon.
On March 20, the Dutch women’s national soccer league will host a record crowd of over 11,000 fans.
Congrats to the Equal Playing Field folks who participated in the match in France during the 2019 Women’s World Cup. They have officially been given Guinness World Record status holders for having most players in a 5-aside match: 822. We should add that that included friend of the show Moya Dodd.
Thailand makes its debut in the T20 Women's World Cup of cricket in Australia. It is the first ever appearance for the South East Asian nation.
Yulimar Rojas, Venezuelan athlete, has set a new indoor triple jump world record in Madrid.
Can I get a drumroll please?
And the badass woman of the week is Spanish women footballers who went on strike to demand better contracts, and they got it! It took over a year of negotiations but the players in Spain’s top division have reached a deal with the league for their first collective bargaining agreement, that secured minimum full-time and part-time salaries, and respected requests for maternity, holiday, and injury pay, are probably, likely, hopefully to have been met.
And now, in dark times, we like to talk about what’s good in our worlds. Shireen?
Shireen: Uh, volleyball mom-ing. Sallahuddin and I went to a tournament yesterday and his team won bronze at his competition, and I just, you know, if we’re gonna mat talk, I’m gonna mat talk myself, “Come on, Shireen! You can flip the scoreboard!” Because actually all the parents have to take turns, and I was mat talking everybody, and it was stellar. I stretched before I flipped the little flippy thing, it was pretty incredible. I had an oil change, I always find that fascinating, and I did that on Friday night–
Amira: What?
Shireen: And most importantly…Yeah, like in my car, I got an oil change…
Amira: No, I understood that part…
All: [laughing]
Brenda: No judging in the What’s Good!
Shireen: I love Jiffy Lube! I can’t help it. Steph Yang is coming to visit this week and–
Amira: This is not clarifying at all.
Lindsay: [giggling, incomprehensible]
Shireen: –and Jessica Luther is coming to town, I’m very, very excited about that. I’ve blocked out the whole week, I know she’s not here all that time, but I’m still, for prep and post, still, I’ve blocked out everything. Some of my kids are on standby, we’re very excited for the Luthers.
Brenda: Lindsay.
Lindsay: I’m about to go to a drag brunch and I’ve never been to one before and I’m so excited, so that is what is good with me!
Brenda: Wow, that is exciting. Amira.
Amira: Yeah, I just got back from Portland where I saw our friend Jules Boykoff, he’s lovely, his wonderful wife Kaia, and I just wanted to give a special shoutout to the students on the committee that welcomed me there, Sophia and Carmen and Gina, they are rockstars. And my good friend Courtney Cox, she’s been on the pod before, who drove from Eugene, Oregon, down to see me, and we had a wonderful two days. So it was a good trip; I got lost in Powell’s, why is a bookstore that amazing? I’m surprised I made it out after like an hour and a half of making Jules walk around with me there, so it was a good time. I had a good time, and now I’m back here and I’m looking forward to this week, I’m doing a Black History Month internal kind of presentation for the NFL, I’m gonna tell them about themselves, that’s gonna be fun on Tuesday, and then I’m speaking in Baltimore and gonna get to see some friends from grad school who are still at Hopkins after my talk on Wednesday. So it’s a full week, last week of Black History Month, I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, but yeah, that’s what’s good for me.
Brenda: Ooh, that’s amazing. I am excited about participating in a conference that includes friend of the show Moya Dodd this week, at NYU. It’s about feminism and football regulation, so I’m pretty excited about that. I am just back from Brazil, so I would like to say I saw São Paulo vs Corinthians, and yeah, I was super super close to Dani Alves, who’s now playing midfield, so that was exciting. Yeah. I felt really good about that. Also probably not that many of you saw, but Leo Messi had a hat trick in the first half of the game yesterday, just in the first half! I mean, he got four in total, so you know, I’m always pretty happy. Good days for Messi, good days for Brenda type of thing. Jess?
Jessica: Yeah, so I want to give a shoutout to flamethrower Adam, he owns a restaurant here in Austin called L'Oca d’Oro, it’s an Italian place, and Aaron and I went there last night before we went to see Pop-Up Magazine, which is this amazing live show that I love. It was fun to meet Adam, we talked a little shop and eat the amazing food: there was fresh pasta, they did this grilled broccoli appetizer thing which was perfect. So I just wanted to thank Adam for that. Last week my friend, the musician Mobley, I’ve mentioned him multiple times in my What’s Good, he put out his first single and accompanying video for his new album that comes out later this year, and I am in the video! I’m so excited about this.
Shireen: You were so good!
Brenda: So gorg.
Jessica: I made my whole family watch it on the television with me, it’s called Nobody’s Favourite, the British spelling of favorite with the U in there. It’s the first video in a series, so you’ll see me in more than one of these. Again, his name’s Mobley, it’s Nobody’s Favourite, it made me very happy this week, so go watch it.
Lindsay: My favorite moment was your Instagram comment where, was it Aaron, who said you looked really mad, are you go, “I’m ACTING!”
Brenda: “I’m an actor!”
All: [laughing]
Shireen: “I’m an actor!”
Brenda: You’re an acteur, with the French U. You were amazing. What a babe.
Shireen: Yeah.
Brenda: That’s it for this week in Burn It All Down. Though we’re done for now, we should mention that you can always burn day and night with our fabulous array of merchandise at our Teespring store, https://teespring.com/stores/burn-it-all-down. Burn It All Down lives on Soundcloud, but can be found on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Play, and TuneIn. We appreciate your reviews and feedback, so please subscribe and rate to let us know what we did well and how we can improve. You can find us on Facebook and Instagram @burnitalldownpod, and on Twitter @burnitdownpod. You can email us at burnitalldownpod@gmail.com; check out our website, https://www.burnitalldownpod.com/, where you can find previous episodes, transcripts, and a link to our Patreon. We would really appreciate you subscribing, sharing, and rating our show. We also wanna give a huge, huge shoutout to our Patrons, whose support without which we could not do this show. We are so very grateful to all of you. Those of you who aren’t patrons, consider signing up, there's a lot of extra cool content. On behalf of all of us at Burn It All Down, I’m Brenda Elsey. Keep burning on, but not out.