Every person in sport, in every role, has the right to participate in an environment that is fun, safe and healthy, and is treated with respect, dignity and fairness.
Bullying denies participants these rights and can result in feelings of disgrace, embarrassment, shame or intimidation.
Bullying can also affect an individuals athletic performance, level of enjoyment, work or school life, academic achievement and physical and mental health.
Research has shown that one in six Australian students are bullied every week and are three times more likely to develop depressive illness.
Bullying can occur both on and off the sports pitch and can involve athletes, parents, coaches, spectators or umpires. It is prohibited in most sporting organisations under their code of conduct and can result in penalties and punishments being applied. Some forms of bullying constitute assault, harassment or discrimination under federal and state legislation and are therefore illegal.
What is Bullying?
Bullying is deliberately hurting a specific person either physically, verbally, psychologically or socially. It involves a power imbalance where one person's power or strength over another. It can be carried out by one person or several people who are either or passively involved. Ina sports context bully can take many forms
- a parent telling their child that they are incompetent, hopeless, useless etc
- a coach alienating an athlete (adult or child)
- several people ganging-up on an individual team member
- spectators verbally abusing players from the opposition
- an athlete calling a referee names and using put-downs
a parent intimidating a young coach
Types of bullying
Physical - Pushing shoving punching, hitting, kicking, taking away a persons's belongings (this may also constitute assault).
Verbal - name calling, banter, threatening, teasing, intimidating, yelling abuse, using put-downs
Psychological - ganging -up, preventing a person form going somewhere, taking a person's possessions, sending hostile or nasty emails or test messages.
Socially - excluding, alienating, ignoring, spreading rumours.
Bullying behaviour is damaging to all involved : the bully, victim, family member, those that witness the behaviour and the sporting organisation involved. Athletes, parents, coaches, administrators and sporting organisations all have an ethical (and Possibly a legal responsibility to take action prevent bully occurring in sport and manage it should it occur.
The effects of bullying
People who bully may
- pick a victim randomly, or carefully choose their victim.
- find that they get what they want by bullying (power, acceptance, admiration)
- have been bullied them selves
- be arrogant, aggressive or impulse
- enjoy having power over others
- believe that some people deserve to be bullied
see their behaviour as justified or 'pay-back for some treatment they have received.
Signs a person is being bullied
A person , especially a child, may not always ask for support when being bullied They may feel afraid, ashamed or embarrassed and that the person they tell will think they are weak. victims of bullying may thing that they deserve to be bullied or are 'robbing' by telling someone what is happening to them
the following are signs that a person may be being bullied
- Finds excuses for not wanting to attend training or games (e.g feeling sick, has an injury, has too much work to do)or talking about hating their sport
- wants to be driven to training or matches instead of walking
- regularly the last one picked for team or group activities
- alienated from social or shared activities.
- has bruising or other injuries
- becomes uncharacteristically nervous, worried shy or withdrawn
- repeatedly 'loses money or possessions
- suddenly prone to lashing out at people physically or verbally
MANAGING BULLYING
THE LAW
Bullying that involves physical assault is against the law. Bullying that involves, harassment or discrimination can be against the law under certain circumstances (e.g. racial and sexual harassment) because bullying can contribute to psychological injury it may be covered under occupational health and safety legislation.
(Play by the rules www.playbytherules.com.au)