Rob Gage

[McGurk]

@ohmyheck

What you’re missing is that minimizing and discounting sexual assault is so normalized in our culture that people don’t even realize they’re doing it.

Decent people, who believe they’re supporting victims and are sympathetic to them, still internalize the crap they’re heard all their lives and repeat it.

Which is why I had to do the post with the multi-quote above.

[Virginia_Horse_Mom]

@RugBug

Denali6298, be truthful at least. Please show me where I say “well at least he stopped” as any type of justification?

I criticized VHM because she implied multiple times that the minor was a liar…and opined multiple times that she thought it was fabricated. She very clearly questioned the veracity of the incident and just about every detail of the OpEd.

I’m certainly guilty of going down a rabbit hole that matters from a legal perspective but that can have ramifications in shutting down victims (thanks for pointing that out, @McGurk). I don’t feel like I need to shut that part of my perspective down and leave it to others, but I do need to be more thoughtful about how I express it.

So, yeah…

Hey - we got to a better spot after that unfortunate detour on this long thread. I don’t want to argue again.

I also don’t want to go back to the place where we debate that OpEd, and what was at the root of my posts :no:

It stinks to feel like you are on defense and getting attacked when engaging in important discussions on this thread. :sigh: We all need to try and engage more carefully.

[Virginia_Horse_Mom]

@McGurk

@ohmyheck

What you’re missing is that minimizing and discounting sexual assault is so normalized in our culture that people don’t even realize they’re doing it.

Decent people, who believe they’re supporting victims and are sympathetic to them still internalize the crap they’re heard all their lives and repeat it.

Which is why I had to do the post with the multi-quote above.

That’s insightful.

[ohmyheck]

del

[Midge]

They should just get it over with and rename that page, “No matter who says what, Rob was innocent. And we can prove it because Upper Echelon Academy has a partnership with USEF and the girl who accused the skater wasn’t actually assaulted.”

Kathy took down the post about the skater I think because even she could see they looked like a bunch of apologists for sexiual predators.

[MHM]

@Denali6298

Once should be enough. Him stopping when she became conscious means nothing. She was asleep and a minor. It doesn’t matter that he stopped. It shouldn’t matter.

I wasn’t there, and I don’t have a crystal ball, so I can’t claim to know what would have happened that night.

But the start of that story sounds a lot like the Brock Turner case. Except that victim did not wake up, and Turner only stopped when a couple of bystanders saw him and did something about the situation.

Any story that starts with one of the parties being asleep/drunk/unconscious/in a coma is the description of a crime scene, no matter how it turned out.

[Virginia_Horse_Mom]

@poltroon

So today this article came to me, and I learned that some of my college classmates were abused by a former Olympic athlete who worked as a coach and an educator. I knew this man and interacted with him; I don’t remember much about it. It is a long article. It echoes so many of the things we are talking about here, except his prey were young men, young men who were so convinced by his charm that they didn’t even always realize what was really happening.

Thank you for sharing this article. I had a reply earlier… but included the link to the article, and the post went into purgatory… it will probably reappear and pop into the thread right after my second attempt, and make this redundant. :sigh:

Anyway, even though the ESPN article in Poltroon’s previous post is a long read, I think it’s incredibly relevant, and something EVERYONE who has waded into this topic about the “severity” of abuse, and whether or not the MAAP guidelines are really necessary because they will create even more boundaries between athletes and coaches or other adult mentors should take some time to read.

I attempted earlier to try and give voice to the notion that the psychological and emotional harm done to a victim/survivor of sexual abuse or sexual assault is NOT actually correlated in a direct proportional way to the violence/severity/extent of physical violation involved in the facts of the crime.

It seems like my point was lost in this discussion on some. So I am trying to make it again.

We use the term “trauma” to cover the emotional and psychological harm done to people who have experienced abuse and assault. Someone posted earlier that “trauma is trauma” and we should all just accept and support it whenever someone says they have been “traumatized.”

I feel like that is a major over simplification of something really really fundamental to these stories that have led to the creation of Safe Sport, and the MAAP guidelines.

Someone’s experience with “trauma” after going through sexual abuse or assault is an ONGOING challenge for many of us. Most ESPECIALLY for people who were abused or assaulted as minors or young adults. As we grow and mature, we look back on certain incidents with additional life experience and perspective… and put them in context more, and make more sense of them. There are many people out there who were sexually abused or sexually assaulted as minors or young adults in a different era… who have been uneasy with their experience for years and years… in some cases decades… but were struggling silently trying to figure out what to label that experience. Was it even abuse/assault at all? If it wasn’t that big of a deal, why do we still revisit it in our minds and feel anxious and feel compelled to stay quiet and keep it a secret? We struggle with what to make of it. We struggle to figure out why this thing happened - the secret thing that we don’t even want to acknowledge or label - and the secrecy and silence causes us to wonder over and over if it was our fault somehow… We struggle with trying to accept and make sense of what it might mean about ourselves if it wasn’t REALLY a big deal, and wasn’t REALLY abuse or assault, and was in some way our own fault. When we keep secrets like this and turn them over in our own heads… over and over and over… it becomes very much about us blaming and shaming our own selves, and much less about the person who PERPETRATED the abuse or assault.

When you are someone coping with this secretly, privately, without external emotional and psychological support… it’s a unique sort of hell. The men in this story from ESPN that Poltroon linked too went through that sort of hell.

By and large, it sounds like they identify as heterosexual, and were essentially subjected to sexual assault by fraud and coercion at the hands of another man. It is absolutely human, and common, for a heterosexual man to feel a great deal of shame and have trouble even acknowledging to themselves that they went through that experience. It does not mean these heterosexual men are bigoted or homophobic… it does mean that the predator in this story had a unique way of abusing and violating and dominating other people, and ensuring secrecy. Many of these men grappled with what happened alone for years and years…

That is an experience that most DEFINITELY will result in a great deal of emotional and psychological trauma. One of the victims of this monster who was abused at summer camp lost his life. Possibly as a result of suicide, although the report is unclear. That story broke my heart to read. I am a mother of an 11 year old boy… I can’t imagine how the mother in this story feels. Heartbreaking.

But if we want to go back and judge and get into the specific physical details of the abuse and assault tactics that the predator in this story had as his MO of choice? Well… a case could be made that it just “wasn’t that severe.”

I think it’s a really important story to read concerning things like Safe Sport, having an anonymous place to make a report about something that is shameful or confusing or questionable, having an outside organization that can investigate and connect multiple cases to identify obvious predators who re-offend over and over… and having a way to put these people on a list so that young ambitious folks with big dreams are not repeatedly exploited in the context of sports.

Additionally… the story speaks to the importance of BOUNDARIES in terms of the coach and athlete relationship. Firm, clear, professional and personal BOUNDARIES. Predators violate boundaries in sneaky, systematic ways. I wish we heard a lot less about mentor type relationships and how great that is, and a lot more about teaching young people how it is totally important to understand BOUNDARIES. I’m glad SafeSport and the MAAP guidelines are finally taking us in that direction, and changing the conversation in terms of sports.

[poltroon]

@Virginia Horse Mom thanks for your reply. I too was struck - aside from my personal connection to this case - by how this is yet another very important case for understanding MAAP and SafeSport guidelines.

Over 40 victims over 40 years and two countries are known; the pieces only came together by accident through comments on a blog post. Each person thought they were alone. One university is known to have complaints and dismissed him because of it, but told no one why, and he continued his predation through other schools. There are probably more than the 40.

When the pieces came together, it was hard to do anything because most of the cases were either too old and/or involved young adults. They had to find a current victim, and one willing to prosecute. Which, unfortunately, they did. Even though, for those of you in the back saying Person X Is Too Old To Be Abusing now, Mainwaring is disabled and in his 60s.

So let’s talk about some of the elements of this case:

• "special training regimen" sworn to secrecy
• lots of one on one time with athletes in private locations
• "I won't coach you if you aren't dedicated enough to do this."
• no clearinghouse of complaints that could have connected the dots
• long history of many victims, in every place he landed
• once two victims started saying his name on the internet where he could be googled, person after person came forward. This is exactly why SafeSport publishes names of people when they get a nucleus of a credible accusation.

And yes, "wasn't that severe" is exactly the kind of thing people might have said. Still probably led to the death of one child and personally destructive behavior by a score of others. Severe enough that it needed to stop, and needed to have been stopped decades earlier. Note that the only place where he was stopped was where his role was not that of an athletic coach.

[Virginia_Horse_Mom]

@poltroon

@Virginia Horse Mom thanks for your reply. I too was struck - aside from my personal connection to this case - by how this is yet another very important case for understanding MAAP and SafeSport guidelines.

Over 40 victims over 40 years and two countries are known; the pieces only came together by accident through comments on a blog post. Each person thought they were alone. One university is known to have complaints and dismissed him because of it, but told no one why, and he continued his predation through other schools. There are probably more than the 40.

When the pieces came together, it was hard to do anything because most of the cases were either too old and/or involved young adults. They had to find a current victim, and one willing to prosecute. Which, unfortunately, they did. Even though, for those of you in the back saying Person X Is Too Old To Be Abusing now, Mainwaring is disabled and in his 60s.

So let’s talk about some of the elements of this case:

• "special training regimen" sworn to secrecy
• lots of one on one time with athletes in private locations
• "I won't coach you if you aren't dedicated enough to do this."
• no clearinghouse of complaints that could have connected the dots
• long history of many victims, in every place he landed
• once two victims started saying his name on the internet where he could be googled, person after person came forward. This is exactly why SafeSport publishes names of people when they get a nucleus of a credible accusation.

And yes, "wasn't that severe" is exactly the kind of thing people might have said. Still probably led to the death of one child and personally destructive behavior by a score of others. Severe enough that it needed to stop, and needed to have been stopped decades earlier. Note that the only place where he was stopped was where his role was not that of an athletic coach.

I think it’s incredible that they were able to prosecute him. So sad that it went on for so long and he was still engaging in the behavior… but hopefully the last survivor of the abuse knows what an important thing he did in terms of coming forward and working with prosecutors. Without that young man, charges would have been really challenging.

The whole case reminded me a lot of several cases involving the Catholic Church as well. The shuffling around, and lack of institutional responsibility.

I’m sorry you had any interaction with this monster, Poltroon, but glad you shared the article on this thread. I shared it with my husband as well, and we had a really good discussion about being protective, supportive and aware parents of our son, as well as our daughter.

[mvp]

@McGurk

@ohmyheck

What you’re missing is that minimizing and discounting sexual assault is so normalized in our culture that people don’t even realize they’re doing it.

Decent people, who believe they’re supporting victims and are sympathetic to them, still internalize the crap they’re heard all their lives and repeat it.

Which is why I had to do the post with the multi-quote above.

This is why the #metoo movement is so worthwhile. What has never been a decent ought to finally be named as such. Too bad that this is what it takes.

[McGurk]

Just a friendly reminder, though - clearly the Safe Sport Overhaul group is reading this thread.

Which is great, I’m glad the members there are interested in opinions outside their group.

[Pennywell_Bay]

@TooManyBays

I’m pretty sure my original post answered your question.

Safesport is alienating the community. False. Fact: alienating friends of perpetrators or apparently people afraid of being caught or people who refuse to embrace change. USEF and safesport have been extremely vague and this has caused panic.False. Fact; if you read it is is relatively clear. Someone who was given a lifetime ban appealed and got 7 months. SafeSport could ruin careers instantly, false. Fact: investigations go on. and yet there seems to be little information on what they consider to be strong enough evidence to punish someone. Ok-- if it calms the masses but I think that multiple victims coming forward and an investigation finding it credible is good.

Many of the newly released rules are vaguely explained, False. Fact: they put out a PDF that actually lists situations and says “how does this related to the USEF” or “how it applies” at best, and as some COTH members have pointed out some seem to blantantly contradict each other. It feels like these new rules were slapped on to every NGB out there, with no real look at how they would fit the actual sport, and so people were panicking over that already. Now they are panicking even more! False. Fact: read the document that explain how rules are applied.

This panic is causing some of the most horrid comments about victims. False. Fact: they make horrible comments because they are being A holes who can’t resolve in their minds that a good person whom they love did terrible things. Some Facebook posts feel like you are stepping back into the 1800s. If nothing else, that shows that something failed along the line here. Is it Safesport? Is it USEF? I can’t say. But the amount of panic and backlash this has gotten has to tell you something isn’t working. Fact: it tells me people are either not reading for comprehension - such as the OP Ed author who stated misfacts. We, as equestrians, are not so elite or special that we can’t abide by the rules. Other sports are doing it- why aren’t we? Oh- because we still have a plethora of people saying " it isn’t that bad" or “that’s the way we’ve always done it”.

[ladyj79]

@Pennywell Bay my only quibble is the idea that many of these honorable people can’t reconcile the good people they knew doing terrible things. Many of them don’t think that their friends’ actions were terrible. If you look back on some of these friends’ statements you get a lot of

we were hot and banging moms and daughters and everyone wanted us

junior whores were chasing these heroes

screwing for blue

on this thread, a girl who goes to a party at a friends house is asking for it

Like, they don’t just think the actions of their friends weren’t wrong, they place the blame on the victims, or fail to comprehend at all why sexually assaulting minor children is even a problem.

These are not people who will be persuaded by any rules or laws. These are the “old people” we just have to wait to die, and actively shun in the community so they can’t spread their disgusting beliefs to the next generation. Someone said it way earlier in the thread, suggesting the influence of Jimmy Williams and that culture on Rob Gage’s behaviour throughout his life. I don’t think that’s insignificant.

Shun these people.
Don’t go to their clinics, don’t pay for lessons.
Appeal to venues and media not to use them as commentators or judges.
Cut them off.

[Pennywell_Bay]

@ladyj79

@Pennywell Bay my only quibble is the idea that many of these honorable people can’t reconcile the good people they knew doing terrible things. Fair enough and I agree. I made that point in a post of mine a few back. Many of them don’t think that their friends’ actions were terrible. If you look back on some of these friends’ statements you get a lot of

we were hot and banging moms and daughters and everyone wanted us

junior whores were chasing these heroes

screwing for blue

on this thread, a girl who goes to a party at a friends house is asking for it

Like, they don’t just think the actions of their friends weren’t wrong, they place the blame on the victims, or fail to comprehend at all why sexually assaulting minor children is even a problem.

These are not people who will be persuaded by any rules or laws. Preach it. These are the “old people” we just have to wait to die, and actively shun in the community so they can’t spread their disgusting beliefs to the next generation. Someone said it way earlier in the thread, suggesting the influence of Jimmy Williams and that culture on Rob Gage’s behaviour throughout his life. I don’t think that’s insignificant.

Shun these people.
Don’t go to their clinics, don’t pay for lessons.
Appeal to venues and media not to use them as commentators or judges.
Cut them off. Here is the kicker. We already KNOW they won’t do any of the above- as long as they are winning. We have seen it time and time again- drugging, name changes, “lost papers”, “oops it was an accident with the age”. Growing up on the circuit, at an A barn and still show and have connections (and an 11 year old daughter) I am so disheartened. And disheartened by people who I am FRIENDS with and really respect(ed) comments on FB. .

[YankeeDuchess]

@McGurk

I joined the Safe Sport Overhaul group on FB out of curiosity.

The reactions to this article on that page are unbelievable and classic victim shaming. Bonnie Navin’s and Vanessa Brown’s responses in particular are awful. “I’m still stuck on she went to a house party to drink at 17. She was old enough to know she was violating a law.” and “This reads like retired athlete who longs to be back in the spotlight and is feeling left out of the #metoo movement.”

So that’s what’s at the bottom of the slippery slope that starts with “It wasn’t that bad.”

I’m pretty sure I am blocked from the SafeSport Overhaul group due to a couple of mild FB posts that declined to share the immediate RG hysteria.

Brushing off an assault because she made the choice to attend a house party where alcohol was present when she was 17 reminded me of people 20 years ago who would say that if a woman choose to walk down a dark street at night and was raped, well, she shouldn’t have been walking alone down a dark street. Blaming the victim for the rape.

[nsterrett]

Anyone else get the email from George Morris disputing SafeSport’s findings? Apparently they made a decision today that he has appealed. Permanent ineligibility for sexual misconduct involving a minor.

[ladyj79]

@nsterrett

Anyone else get the email from George Morris disputing SafeSport’s findings? Apparently they made a decision today that he has appealed. Permanent ineligibility for sexual misconduct involving a minor.

And he will still make plenty of money until the day that he dies.

(I believe this is why his normal WEF pageants were curtailed this year because there was already an ongoing investigation)

[Peggy]

@nsterrett

Anyone else get the email from George Morris disputing SafeSport’s findings? Apparently they made a decision today that he has appealed. Permanent ineligibility for sexual misconduct involving a minor.

No email, but I just checked the USEF Safe Sport Sanctions web page and he is listed under permanent ban for sexual conduct with a minor, subject to appeal.

Link - https://www.usef.org/compete/resources-forms/rules-regulations/safe-sport-sanctions (not sure if you have to be a USEF member to access that)

[ladyj79]

And the George Morris commentary illustrates every issue named in this thread in what? an hour?

And also why we desperately need safe sport, and how shitty we are as a community.

[Denali6298]

@ladyj79

And the George Morris commentary illustrates every issue named in this thread in what? an hour?

And also why we desperately need safe sport, and how shitty we are as a community.

What’s even more insane is I would assume (could be wrong hence assume) the minors in question are not females. So if females couldn’t come forward in the 60’s and 70’s these people think males would?

It took my Mom until she was in her late 40’s to come out and that’s only because I asked. That was in the mid 90’s. She came out to me and that’s about it.