Blurred lines: when does a bit of banter slip into bullying in sport?
Of all the distressing stories to emerge from the racism scandal at Yorkshire County Cricket Club, one of the most shocking was an independent panel found the repeated use of the P-word against Azeem Rafiq was delivered “in the spirit of friendly banter”. Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised. “It’s just banter,” has long been a get-out-of-jailfree card to excuse laddism, sexism and much else besides. Yet speak to anyone in sport, and they stress that it is also vital for bonding and team-building.
The question is: when does banter cross the line into bullying? On the surface, it doesn’t sound that complicated. When Gary Ballance admitted he had used racist language towards Rafiq during their time as teammates, but said it was a feature of their “friendly” two-way verbals, few supported him. On the other end of the spectrum, few would take offence at a mild joke about, say, missing a full toss while batting. However two recent academic studies into banter in British sport suggest the terrain in the middle can be more complex to navigate than many think.
In the first study, 12 players from a diverse club in the south-east were asked where the line should be drawn between acceptable and unacceptable banter. For them, “calling another guy on the team by a woman’s name because his surname rhymes with it” and “putting pots of mustard in a teammate’s bag, because he hates mustard in his sandwiches” to “[teammate’s name] pretending to ‘bum’ us with his cricket bat during a break in play” were all fine.
You may raise your eyebrows at this. However the academics found that such banter “was described by the vast majority of players as having a largely positive effect on the team – and further indicative of the team relationship”. However, it was agreed that a person’s sexuality or ethnic background was off limits. As one British Asian on the team put it: “Things like that should never be involved. I’ve been called things like ‘Paki’ [on the field by opposing players] – that’s not banter, it’s just harassment.”
The study’s authors, William Lawless and Rory Magrath, argue a distinction can be made between “inclusionary” forms of banter – which centre on close friendships and is lighthearted and inoffensive – and exclusionary forms, which are beyond the pale. However they also stress that context, and the dynamics of a relationship, are also key. After all, what is said in the confines of a dressing room might sound very different in a courtroom. As they point out, banter can also serve a double function – outwardly appearing aggressive, and yet also relying on an intimate and personal understanding of the recipient.
“We also recognise that banter is complex and often contradictory,” they add. “Accordingly, these concepts should be treated as fluid, rather than binary – particularly when one considers the complicated nature of language and its interpretation.” Is it so easy to separate banter into two neat categories? New research into the attitudes of five coaches at leading football academies suggests not.
The study – “When it is no longer a bit of banter: Coaches’ perspectives of bullying in professional soccer” – found that coaches largely agreed on the components of bullying, including someone being frequently being targeted and an imbalance of power. However some also felt players needed to “put up” with banter as a demonstration of their mental strength and masculine worth.
As one put it: “You’ve got 20 highly testosterone-fuelled lads, it’s not going to be hunky-dory, chummy-chummy, is it?” The academics noted something else too: there was also a feeling within the coaches’ accounts that bullying in football is dependent on the “weaknesses” in personality or mood of the victims. In other words, the coaches felt that those who didn’t get the banter were at least partly to blame.
“It suggests that these values are ingrained from the top down in professional soccer, with the result that academy coaches may suppress bullying under the guise of banter,” the academics note. “Therefore, in professional soccer, these terms may not be as separate as first imagined.”
Part of the solution, the academics suggest, is the need for better coach education programmes to raise awareness around bullying and the potential severity of banter, and to encourage coaches to be more self-reflective. But, they suggest, it is broader than that, with sport as a whole needing to consider its workplace culture.
On Tuesday we should learn more about what went on at Headingley when Rafiq appears before the Commons’ digital, culture, media and sport select committee along with others involved in the scandal, including the club’s former chair, Roger Hutton. All will be free to answer MPs’ questions freely under parliamentary privilege without fear of legal reprisal. But so far only a summary of the club’s 12month investigation has been made public, which found Rafiq was a victim of “racial harassment and bullying”.
Meanwhile Prof James Newman of Sheffield Hallam University, who led the study into football coaches, believes sport as a whole is still too willing to accept behaviour that would be unacceptable in other professions. “It’s hard-wired into sport that there is tolerance of banter, and that individuals are expected to put up with things that wouldn’t be allowed elsewhere,” he told me. “And, as we are increasingly finding out, it is very hard for a player to say ‘you’ve actually offended me’ when their power base perception is so low.”