Victims of sport
While Canadian Football League fans stock up on munchies and arrange parties, women's shelters in the Greater Toronto Area are preparing for an increase of abused women walking through their doors.
Studies indicate domestic abuse spikes during major sporting events. For academics such as Ryerson University's Vappu Tyysk?, the connections show a troubling trend.
"The studies that I do know about and the reports from different women's shelters, and so on, show that there are peak times in the use of shelters and it tends to be major competitive male sports that have been noted for shelters going on high alert," says Tyysk?, who teaches a course on violence and the family.
"Any violence that's presented in media goes towards someone justifying and normalizing violence," she explains.
Studies such as Sport and Media and Domestic Violence, completed by the University of Windsor in 1999, support her claims.
Joan White, director of housing and support for the Young Women's Christian Association (YWCA) of Toronto, stresses the need for public support on this issue.
"There is a major connection (between) sporting events and domestic abuse," she says. "It's certainly something that we've heard over the years and there's lots of good reason to believe that that's the case."
Jenny Robinson, director of advocacy and national initiative for YWCA Canada, says anything that normalizes violence contributes to violence against women.
"Anywhere where we have situations where men or women see violence as normal -- on the hockey ice or on the football field -- it tells us that violence is okay," Robinson says.
"We do have anecdotal evidence from our shelters saying that women are being abused after major sporting events," she adds.
Robinson stresses the importance of awareness and action with regards to matters of domestic violence.
"There's a need to understand the issue more completely, which includes examining media and sports and how they affect the incidence of violence.
"But more importantly, it's about not just doing studies, but actually taking action."
Alexis Redmond, director of communications for the Canadian Football League (CFL) says the league doesn't have any programs tailored to curb domestic abuse.
"Specifically, the CFL doesn't have any programs that target awareness around women's abuse or any other type of abuse," Redmond says.
"I don't think there's a reason for it one way or another. We don't currently have a program that's tailored to that topic, that's all."
Statements like this upset Ann Whiteside, a discrimination and harassment prevention officer at Ryerson, who stresses the importance of public information campaigns.
"Advertisements that would be geared towards getting the message across...to the women that they don't have to take this would be very effective," she says.
Lorna Kozmik, domestic violence co-ordinator for Toronto Police Services, says in many reported cases of violence, intervention is necessary.
"As long as we have reasonable grounds to believe a criminal offense has been committed, then we react accordingly," Kozmic says. "The important thing is to identify the risk and realize that with something like sports, alcohol is one of the main precursors."
Tyysk? says violence stems from larger issues than alcohol, saying gender issues and patriarchal beliefs do more to propagate abuse.
"In society, although it is not all men who abuse all women, it is the men who really accept and buy into the patriarchal ideas about...showing the woman her place," Tyysk? says.
"One of the responsibilities (of sporting organizations) is to make sure the sport itself is violence-free and then that will encourage the notion that the violence...is confined to the actual sport, and doesn't then get spilled over onto the environment of the general public."
"It starts with the way we socialize our male children," says Whiteside. "It's also a problem of power because they're socialized to think that...being masculine, being bigger and stronger is regarded as respectable even though it's not, in reality."
"When we hear a lack of commitment, like the unwillingness to create campaigns from the CFL, it contributes to the problem rather than remedies it," Robinson says.
And as the Toronto Argonauts prepare to defend their CFL title, shelters across Toronto offer support to victims of domestic violence.
Tyysk? believes the public has a responsibility to address issues of social dysfunction -- domestic abuse in connection with major sporting events is one of them.
"This whole hierarchical structure in sports and this whole idea of male loyalty to one another, it goes towards encouraging (abusive behaviour).
"If you have a society that's built on power, inequalities between women and men, then any sort of activity that encourages male bonding and aggression is likely to have the spill-over effect towards women."
This article has been changed to correct attribution. Statements formerly attributed to Chrislyn Ramsubick should be attributed to Ann Whiteside.
-- The Eyeopener masthead, November 7, 2005
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