Sideline and Locker Room Views
With MLS and Copa Oro action over the weekend, you may have missed an interesting story that developed on the West Coast. Andrea Canales documents her incident in the locker rooms here and here. I'll let her words speak for themselves, but I find this story interesting. Perhaps it's just that this entire story seems so 1990s...
Here's the simple take from my end. If the Locker Rooms are open to be open to the media, then it's all the media. Manhandling a credentialed reporter out of a locker room is something clubs should not tolerate. Now, I'm not convinced that locker rooms need to be open to the media anyway, but if they are, then it should be everyone.
What I think is that this story will ultimately be more notable for being the exception rather than the norm. But I could be wrong.
posted by D @ 12:33 PM
11 Comments:
"Now, I'm not convinced that locker rooms need to be open to the media anyway, but if they are, then it should be everyone."
I agree with the 1st part, I am guessing this is the only reasonable solution to provide equal access without discriminating based on gender.
That being said, I don't think reporters of the opposite sex should be in locker rooms while athlete's are getting dressed. Look at it from another point of view. How would you feel about a bunch of male reporters in the USWNT's locker room while they are changing after a game?
Some things should be sacred, and a persons right to privacy is one. If he doesn't want to get dressed in front of a woman whio is not his wife, who is anybody to disagree?
Rick: This is something Andrea discusses, and she uses something called a "towel" rule, if you will, to avoid making players uncomfortable. She isn't looking at players while they're getting dressed, they're all fairly dressed (in that Landon Donovan post Gold Cup way) before she thinks of talking to them. It seems like a fair routine.
But still, as you point out, people might be uncomfortable with that. If so, then locker rooms should be off limits to everyone. Only seems fair.
Two things. Gonzales actions were unacceptable, and Bill Archer has managed to piss me off in yet another public forum.
Eric: Point one - Agreed. Point two - Bill Archer pissing you off should be taken as confirmation of your basic decency and humanity.
With all the resources available to professional sports teams these days, wouldn't it be a better option to have a press lounge near the locker room and require players to at least pass through before going home? The players deserve the right to privacy and the locker room should be their safe haven from anyone not employed by the team.
Anon: Well, in general, I agree with you. Such a situation would not provide preferential treatment based on sex and seems like a decent response. However, the issue in play here is locker room access, and how players respond to that. AC had every right to be where she was, and the response was disheartening at best, grossly offensive at worst.
However, I like the idea you propose. Personally, I can't imagine wanting to talk to anyone (male or female) five minutes after a game. I don't usually talk to my wife after my pickup game for about 10 minutes after I get out of the shower. I just need that time to decompress.
I am woman, hear me roar...typical feminist hubris about "rights"...lame.
Anon: It's the square quotes around "rights" that convince me your comment is a finely honed work of satire. Ha Ha! Silly women, believing that they should have just as much access in the workplace as men! Yes, very funny. I hope no one takes your post seriously as some form of troglodytic example of male insecurity. It would be a shame if your Swiftian humor was misinterpreted.
Yes, yes...satire, that is what I was going for. Glad you caught on. Excellent work. Actually it had more to do with one man's right to privacy being violated. However, we all know that any woman's rights in society take precedence over any man's.
What Anon doesn't care about is that all reporters, even female ones, and especially sports reporters, are on incredibly tight deadlines. Game ends at 9, you need to have copy to the editor not long after that.
If AC can't get into the locker room, how is she going to get her player quotes in time? The clubs want to, /need to/ be covered in media, so MLS has its locker room policy so reporters can get quotes quickly and file their copy.
AC's doing her job and being a professional, same as Goff and the rest. Just because she's a woman she doesn't get a longer deadline. Isn't that what equality is about?
I guess to me it's the overall policy of opening the locker room. However, I lost patience with the reporter with her righteous indignation and negative comments about religion.
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