Female Olympic champion gymnastics coach suspended for 8 yrs for verbal and emotional abusing including fat-shaming

ready made wrote:

Salazar was born in Cuba, but yeah Rojo I guess he’s white

He is a white Cuban descendant of White Spaniards, ya dolts!

In this snowflake censorship/me too era who the hell would want to coach women.... I would bet Salazar was far harsher to Rupp/Farah than MC.

rojo wrote:

The only agenda I have is I wish society would worry mainly about the rightness or wrongness of people's actions rather than their race, gender, sexual orientation, etc. Do I

When the Salazar - Cain stuff came out, so much of it was presented with the backdrop "We have to protect all of these little girls from these evil men."

I thought to myself. 'No, we need to protect all athletes from a$$hole coaches. I'm all for more female coaches but I've heard of plenty of horrific acts by women's coaches as well."

Now do I think a male coach is statically more likely to be an ass than a woman? Probably but so what?

So what? I'll tell you. There is a bigger picture than you acknowledge. As you admit, your motivation for creating this thread, and writing it the way you did, is to shift the salazar-cain discussion away from an area you don't like - the adult male-young female dynamic. Would you say that is an appropriate summary of your motivations? Proving that it was not really about the male-female angle, and it was much much more about coach-athlete? There can be plenty of problems in the male-female world, and this female gymnastics coach can be an awful human as well. And one does not cancel the other out. The coach-athlete relationships in the article do not relate to the Salazar-cain relationship. I think you see this female gymnastics coach as a welcome counter-point to the people who you feel are focusing too much on the male-female dynamic between Salazar and Cain. You saw this story as a piece of evidence supporting your viewpoint, and you trotted it out to the boards to affect the conversation.

It's only when you try and smush these two independent stories together to try to encourage readers to adopt your worldview, that it seems like you have an agenda to push. You could even be right! And you would still be pushing your agenda. You're allowed to do it, that's your editorial freedom as the controller of your platform. Just don't play dumb about it.

Boilerplate for when you reply: Don't be defensive, that's an ego reaction. Respond to my criticism straight-on. Do not cite something you have done in the past that counteracts what you are doing now...respond to the exact things I am calling you out for in this moment.

And when it comes to this thing about "fat shaming" Yes elite level athletics requires absolutely minimal body fat and therefore it is the coaches role to point out when someone has exceeded that, what's the alternative let them lose because they were carrying 5 extra pounds and lost by 5 seconds lol!

Canon1 wrote:

And when it comes to this thing about "fat shaming" Yes elite level athletics requires absolutely minimal body fat and therefore it is the coaches role to point out when someone has exceeded that, what's the alternative let them lose because they were carrying 5 extra pounds and lost by 5 seconds lol!

Think of it this way. Parents generally need to talk to their kids about personal hygiene, sex, etc...even weight sometimes. Mess-ups in these areas of life can be catastrophic, so it is best for a parent to address them with their child. But the conversations themselves can also be catastrophic. Do you see how there are a million ways that parents go about breaching these subjects?

That's the distinction I want to draw about Salazar. I don't think it's wrong for him to talk about weight with his athletes. But there are ways to do this abusively. When you ask questions like "what's the alternative", you're implicitly denying the different ways Salazar could have done this professionally and appropriately.

ready made wrote:

White men get to do this:

https://abcnews.go.com/US/michigan-rally-shelter-place-order-spills-capitol-building/story?id=70432928

You're a RACIST!!!

rojo wrote:

The only agenda I have is I wish society would worry mainly about the rightness or wrongness of people's actions rather than their race, gender, sexual orientation, etc. Do I

When the Salazar - Cain stuff came out, so much of it was presented with the backdrop "We have to protect all of these little girls from these evil men."

I thought to myself. 'No, we need to protect all athletes from jerk coaches. I'm all for more female coaches but I've heard of plenty of horrific acts by women's coaches as well."

Now do I think a male coach is statically more likely to be a jerk than a woman? Probably but so what?

"The only agenda I have is I wish society would worry mainly about the rightness or wrongness of people's actions rather than their race, gender, sexual orientation, etc."

Sounds like a straw man argument. I'm pretty sure penal codes provide the same sentencing guidelines for all people.

so you take this as a chance to... say racists ain't racist, just 'welp you run into some bad apples, could happen to anyone for any reason anytime'.

then is your use of 'oppressed person' ironic?

So this coach got an 8 year suspension and we just trolled Mary Cain?

This is a slippery slope, to say the least. Many extenuating circumstances surrounding these two incidents. First off, we need to define "Verbal Abuse". For example; if you're conducting a training session (running) and yell "You're running too slow.....pick it up"! is that considered "Verbal Abuse"? Technically the answer is YES. Now we get into the semantics of the "Tone", was it a male or female coach, did the athlete feel offended and became upset. All of these can be interpreted differently. Clearly with the case of the gymnastic coach not only abusive verbal comments but also physical abuse with regard to "removing a cast" in order to compete. There is no argument as to the coach's behavior and the accuser's accusations all corroborate. In the case with Alberto I believe it was more a case of insensitivity and lack of communication. Mary was fully compliant with being a member of the group and Alberto's behavior was not targeted only at her. Not too mention that Mary was going through a difficult period and was vulnerable. I'd say this was more bad coaching if anything. Let's not forget that Mary was quite a bit older and not a pre-teen adolescent. I will say that I believe female coaches are more inclined to be "Abusive" toward female athletes as opposed to male coaches. Regardless, abuse is abuse on any level and should not be tolerated but there needs to be some degree of leniency and not an excessive literal interpretation.

rojo wrote:

The only agenda I have is I wish society would worry mainly about the rightness or wrongness of people's actions rather than their race, gender, sexual orientation, etc. Do I

When the Salazar - Cain stuff came out, so much of it was presented with the backdrop "We have to protect all of these little girls from these evil men."

I thought to myself. 'No, we need to protect all athletes from ase coaches. I'm all for more female coaches but I've heard of plenty of horrific acts by women's coaches as well."

Now do I think a male coach is statically more likely to be an ass than a woman? Probably but so what?

Bull. You’ve never been that concerned about MC

rojo wrote:

The only agenda I have is I wish society would worry mainly about the rightness or wrongness of people's actions rather than their race, gender, sexual orientation, etc. Do I

+1 Totally agree. Gymnastics has a long history of abusive male and female coaches. Male gymnasts have also been abused but since it's not as popular a sport, you don't hear about it.

It's not about the sex of the coaches or the athletes, it's about the controlling mentality pervasive in elite sports.

rojo wrote:

If you have access to the OC article below, the allegations are pretty disturbing.

Two interesting thoughts popped into my head when I read this.

2) Will people see this and now realize the male-female aspect of the Alberto Salazar allegations ffrom Mary Cain overplayed? I said on our podcast I had heard of many elite female coaches saying awful things to women and now we have some examples of it in print. When you are an oppressed person, it's easy to assume the reason why someone is treating you like **** is because they are white or a man or whatever. The reality is many people are just jerks regardless of their race/sex

Everytime I think one of the Brojos has reached the top of incredibly dense thinking, one of them pops out of the bushes to raise the bar.

Haz FatJo JAMPED tha SHaRk ?!?!?

I also agree with rojo on this...not much else lol but there are plenty of abusive female coaches/managers and the case here is an example. I've had to deal with both males and females who are abusive. Females tend to be more emotionally abusive and controlling but the risk of physical abuse is higher with males.

ObserverofTrends wrote:

Females tend to be more emotionally abusive and controlling but the risk of physical abuse is higher with males.

Let's keep an eye on North Korea now that a woman is in power to see if this is true or if she will just launch missiles.

When coaches start believing it's about them and their success and not the athletes we have a problem. They start seeing them as puzzle pieces to help their agenda and not the athletes/people they are supposed to be helping succeed.

Bettingfool wrote:

When coaches start believing it's about them and their success and not the athletes we have a problem. They start seeing them as puzzle pieces to help their agenda and not the athletes/people they are supposed to be helping succeed.

+1

TTH wrote:

rojo wrote:

If you have access to the OC article below, the allegations are pretty disturbing.

Two interesting thoughts popped into my head when I read this.

2) Will people see this and now realize the male-female aspect of the Alberto Salazar allegations ffrom Mary Cain overplayed? I said on our podcast I had heard of many elite female coaches saying awful things to women and now we have some examples of it in print. When you are an oppressed person, it's easy to assume the reason why someone is treating you like **** is because they are white or a man or whatever. The reality is many people are just jerks regardless of their race/sex

Everytime I think one of the Brojos has reached the top of incredibly dense thinking, one of them pops out of the bushes to raise the bar.

+1