Gymnastics Ireland suppressed a personal apology letter to young gymnast whose treatment at a medal ceremony sparked international outrage, and have refused to acknowledge or tackle systemic racism in the sport, her family say.
Video of the event in March 2022 shows a judge handing out participation medals to a line of young gymnasts, but ignoring the only black girl. A photographer, coach and other officials look on without intervening. There is an audience hundreds strong in the stands.
Despite the official setting, Gymnastics Ireland officials declined to attend mediation, effectively casting the incident from March 2022 as a purely personal dispute between the family and one woman, the gymnast’s family said.
GI, the sport’s national governing body, did not make any commitment in public statements to investigate the incident, implement anti-racism policies, or improve protection for athletes of colour. For 18 months, it did not apologise to the family.
“Its unbelievable that you treat a little girl this way,” her mother told the Guardian. “It’s a systemic problem, because when you [GI] don’t speak out, the message is that you are happy for it to go on.”
Her mother is not being named to protect the privacy of the girl, who is a minor, and because of concerns the family could become targets of racist abuse. The official in question has denied any racist behaviour, and had wanted to apologise to the family for the snub. The girl did eventually receive a medal.
Soon after the incident, Simone Biles, the American gymnast considered by many to be the greatest of all time, contacted the family and sent the girl a private video message of support. This month the footage went viral again and Biles went public with a message of support for the girl and condemnation of her treatment.
It “broke my heart to see … There is no room for racism in any sport or at all,” she said on X, formerly Twitter. Her teammate Jordan Chiles, an Olympic silver medalist, also condemned the video. “This is beyond hurtful on so many levels.”
As international outrage mounted, GI put out a statement saying it had “expressed concern” to the family, and “issued” a written apology from the judge. That was widely misreported as an institutional apology from GI. “I don’t understand why media kept saying they offered an apology,” the gymnast’s mother said.
GI said on Sunday they had initially handled the incident as a “member-to-member complaint”, and “only recently became aware that the family wanted a public apology” from GI. The board sent a letter of apology to the family on Sunday, and would make it public on Monday, they added.
In response, the girl’s mother said the letter came too late and did not address core concerns, saying: “After this horrendous incident, who wouldn’t think they should apologise? They have just sent me a letter this evening. It took well over a year, and after millions of people internationally have been…
2023-09-24 15:34:59
Link from www.theguardian.com
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