According to the recent post-mortem report of Malaysia’s performance at the Paris Olympics, developing a bigger pool of younger athletes and female athletes is vital for Malaysia to achieve the target of winning its first-ever Olympic gold medal. — 123rf
WHEN athletes drop out due to abuse and violence, the country’s sports community loses out as well.
Sports organisations lose potential medals and will eventually suffer from a depleted talent pool, says former national athlete Sarina Sundara Rajah.
“The reputational damage caused by adverse publicity of cases of harassment or abuse meanwhile sometimes leads to the termination of sponsorship contracts,” says the Safe Sport Malaysia founding president.
Concurring, National Institute of Sports researcher Syahirah Fathynah says abuse and violence cases discourage young people from becoming involved in sports, undermining the country’s efforts of nurturing future sporting talents.
According to the recent post-mortem report of Malaysia’s performance at the Paris Olympics, developing a bigger pool of younger athletes and female athletes is vital for Malaysia to achieve the target of winning its first-ever Olympic gold medal. Needless to say, this is also necessary for the country to achieve success and glory at all the other international competitions and tournaments.
Fathynah adds abuse and violence will also impact sporting performance.
She highlights a 2017 survey which found that 67 out of 422 athletes perceived they had experienced sexual harassment and most of them claimed their performance declined.
“The major effect of emotion was anger, some of the victims had sleep difficulties and headaches,” she says.
While many would think of sexual harassment first when thinking about cases of abuse and misconduct in sports, that is far from being the only way violence manifests in sports, Sarina says.
“Driven by several high-profile cases in several countries such as those within the United States gymnastics, the topic of sexual violence in sports has gained considerable public attention in the last few years.
“Yet, sexual violence is only one facet of the problem,” she says.
There are also implicit ways violence in sports can manifest such as through harmful practices like excessive weight monitoring or forced dieting.
A former gymnast, Sarina shares that she had struggled with eating disorder throughout her career and weighing was used as a punishment.
“There were no policies to regulate excessive or inappropriate weight management, and often, coaches would engage in harmful practices,” she says.
Then there is explicit violence such as when the female gymnasts from Terengganu were banned from competing in this year’s Malaysia Games, she adds.
“In this case, the ban stems from perceptions that such attire is inappropriate and does not align with particular cultural or religious norms.
“This justification targets female athletes, treating their clothing choices as grounds for exclusion,” Sarina says.
Such abuse can severely affect an athlete’s performance not only in the sports but also in their personal lives.
Sarina says these types of abuse may impair performance, leading to drop out or even resulting in psychosomatic illnesses, disordered eating, anxiety, depression, substance abuse and self-harm, among others.
Fathynah agrees that these cases will create a challenge in promoting a healthy, active lifestyle for athletes.
Also at risk of being affected by cases of abuse, misconduct and violence in sports is the athlete’s entourage.
Both Sarina and Fathynah say the athlete’s entourage members may also be prone to becoming traumatised by the abuse they witness.
“Those participants’ family or friends may have feelings of fear, anger, disappointment, sadness, loss of trust and so on,” Fathynah says.
To nurture an environment that is safe for athletes, Sarina believes strongly that it is essential to have a more balanced gender representation in sports leadership.
“It is an absolute article of faith that women need to be increasingly in decision-making positions, in positions of authority and most importantly, in positions that enable them to influence the direction of travel via policy-making and legislation,” says Sarina.
