Athlete sexual abuse scandal still festering
Christine Brennan: So far, talk has led to few tangible actions to fix problem
WASHINGTON – It has now been more than 20 months since the USA Gymnastics sex abuse story broke right before the Rio Olympic Games in the summer of 2016. In that time, tangible results to combat the abuse of young American athletes have been few and far between.
To be sure, there has been progress. More than 150 gymnasts spoke out in January to ensure that former gymnastics team doctor Larry Nassar will spend the rest of his life in jail. Other athletes in other sports, some inspired by the courage of the gymnasts, have turned the spotlight to athlete abuse in taekwondo, swimming and figure skating. Who knows what’s next, although logic tells us there will definitely be a next.
In February, President Trump signed The Protecting Young Victims from Sexual Abuse and Safe Sport Authorization Act, which requires adults who interact with amateur athletes to report suspected abuse to law enforcement within 24 hours. And yet, ask those athletes who have suffered abuse if they think their sports are still rife with it, and you’ll often get an affirmative answer.
So, where do we stand in the midst of the most horrifying scandal in U.S. Olympic history?
In a second-floor conference room of the Russell Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill, with four elite athletes telling their difficult stories to members of the Senate Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety, Insurance and Data Security.
In other words, we’re all still doing a lot of talking about the problem.
For more than two hours, U.S. sena- tors asked the questions so many Americans have asked over the past few months, trying to come to grips with the magnitude of sexual abuse taking place in the nation’s Olympic movement.
Giving the best answers they could were Olympic gymnasts Jordyn Wieber and Jamie Dantzscher, ex-speedskater Bridie Farrell and figure skater-turnedskating coach Craig Maurizi. All were abused within their sport. All have become the courageous voices of change within the shaken U.S. Olympic world.
“People are just starting to listen to us,” Wieber, a 2012 Olympic gold medalist, said afterward. “This is a much bigger problem than just Nassar. This is a systematic issue, people abusing and getting away with it. It took 250 people coming forward and speaking in court. That shouldn’t have to happen. But now I’m just glad things are moving in the right direction and changes are eventually going to be made.”
Farrell said she was silent about the abuse she endured for more than 15 years. “So I’m willing to fight for that many years before I get frustrated,” she said. “Am I surprised that it takes so long? No. But I think that every single time it’s discussed a little bit more that progress is being made.”
Maurizi first reported abuse by Olympic skating coach Richard Callaghan in the late 1990s. This winter, he reported Callaghan to the U.S. Center for SafeSport, the relatively new national non-profit clearinghouse for reporting and preventing abuse in sport. Last month, Callaghan was suspended.
“For me, it was 20 years that I had to wait for anything to happen, so 20 months for me is like nothing,” he said.
Perhaps the most interested specta- tors Wednesday were four representatives of the U.S. Olympic Committee seated quietly in the fourth row. They included interim CEO Susanne Lyons, who replaced the embattled Scott Blackmun when he resigned in late February. They were not invited to the hearing, but they came anyway.
“It was in the newspaper and we needed to be here to listen and be present,” spokesman Mark Jones said.
This came in stark contrast to January’s riveting victim impact statements in the Nassar case in a courtroom in Lansing, Mich., when the USOC was a glaring no-show.
The next time this committee convenes on this topic, the USOC will be invited. They will be among those testifying May 22, when this national conversation continues, hopefully with more answers than questions.