Aussie Pro Rugby
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Opinion piece by Alan Jones in The Australian
It’s been another week in which rugby continues with its self-inflicted wounds.
It is not believable that the only thing Raelene Castle seems to have done, after months in charge of Rugby Australia, is to haul in Israel Folau for comments that he made about homosexual people and the Bible. And then Castle couldn’t wait to rush out to the media after the meeting, as if this was a defining moment of her leadership.
Here was a leader, she wanted to suggest, who could take action. What’s that famous line from The Castle? “Tell (her she’s) dreamin”.
This is not where rugby-lovers expect action to be taken.
This issue has nothing to do, in my opinion, with gays or with the Bible.
It is simply called freedom, in this case freedom of speech, and Folau, along with every other Australian, ought to be free to express his views.
But of course Rugby Australia, leaderless and often gutless, are terrified of losing a Qantas sponsorship.
Qantas objecting to what Folau is saying about homosexuality is beyond laughable.
I don’t agree with Israel but I’ve told him most explicitly that he must not back down.
He is entitled to his views.
Or are Rugby Australia going to next tell him what to eat and what time to get up?
Qantas says that it supports LGBTI rights and acceptance. Then we hear from a Qantas spokesman (oops, should that be spokesperson?) and note how such a person purports to speak for the whole of Qantas and believes emphatically that they have a right to have their views accepted, a right they will not extend to Folau.
What is worse, Qantas is saying that it condemns Folau’s comments. Qantas finds the comments disappointing. I beg your pardon? Aren’t Qantas in partnership with Emirates Airlines and aren’t the Islamic injunctions against homosexuality in the United Arab Emirates totally oppressive of homosexuals?
Indeed, some of the militant Muslims urge homosexuals should be put to death.
So do I have this right? It’s OK for Qantas to have a partnership with such a company, yet they want to beat the drum about something Israel Folau has said.
I’ll tell you something Castle didn’t tell the media when she rushed out to meet them after the meeting with Folau.
My understanding is that Folau told Rugby Australia that if they were worried about the sponsorship and the money and they couldn’t accommodate his views, he would be happy to walk. He certainly will not yield to this kind of bullying — my words, not his.
Interestingly, if Israel was a Muslim rather than a devout Christian, I wonder what Qantas would have to say. We should be grateful that it has taken a talented and courageous young athlete to stand up to all this rubbish and affirm his entitlement to freedom of speech.
All sorts of things are said about you and me and we could bawl our eyes out about being hurt or a “victim”. It is time we all took a spoonful of cement and toughened up.
If along the way we might have to pay a price to defend critical freedoms, then so be it. Folau seems quite prepared to pay that price.
Raelene Castle, if you’re not going to be a failure before you’ve even begun, start doing something about the mess that the game is in and forget grandstanding about Israel Folau.
Rugby is drowning in problems. I’ve written in this column about them.
Schoolboys rugby is nothing more than an old boys’ club. Our best schoolboys are going either to other franchises such as the Crusaders or to rugby league.
People in charge of high performance, as with cricket, are unable to secure high performance.
Yet the first big play under Castle’s leadership is to summon Folau to explain comments he’s made. Quite frankly, who cares?
As one rugby international wrote to me: “These Rugby Australia people in power, not to be confused with powerful people, are making a mockery of the past, the present and of course the future”.
Well, what about the future? Rugby supporters are voting with their feet.
Haven’t Rugby Australia lost BMW, Lion Nathan and Buildcorp as sponsors in recent times? What are you doing about that, Raelene?
Does Rugby Australia spend more time checking with its lawyers than it does with checking the wellbeing of the game? And what about this National Rugby Championship? The competition is a nonsense.
Most rugby people have their kids playing at school or with a club. Then there’s Super Rugby, the provincial competition with more than 15 matches a year. Then there are the Wallabies, our national team, with often more than 15 matches a year.
Add to that the men’s sevens and the women’s sevens, international events with more than 15 matches a year.
And someone wants to add a national domestic rugby competition with another 10 games. There is neither room nor money for such a meaningless rugby event. This outfit folded before. It should never have been resurrected.
The European model is instructive. There, you can follow your team at club level via an English Premiership or a French Top 14 team. The same teams kick on to play in the European competitions, like the Champions Cup, which was the Heineken Cup.
But here, why would our best young Australian schoolboy players hang around to perhaps play eight games in a national domestic rugby competition for $5000 a season when the NRL teams are offering fulltime training, contracts of up to $100,000 and even a place in their 36-man roster.
The national rugby competition deal of $5000 for players means Rugby Australia value these players at about $20 an hour. A good tradesman wouldn’t work for that.
In the US, you have school footy on Friday, college footy on Saturday and pro footy on Sunday. Football people can engage and consume the game at every level over three days each weekend. Why wouldn’t Rugby Australia think about these options?
Then again, Cameron Clyne is the guy who said it would take 72 hours to sort out the Super Rugby mess in relation to the Western Force. It turned out to be well beyond 72 days.
Do these people have enough experience to run our game and make the big calls needed for our game to survive, let alone grow?
How could anyone in a decision-making position think there would be enough room for a national domestic rugby competition? It was a dud and it is still a dud and changing the name from ARC to NRC won’t rescue it.
If Castle has a 100-day plan, she needs to communicate it to the rugby public and she needs to get a move on. Getting rid of the NRC would be a good start. Straightening out schoolboy rugby would be a better start.
Rugby people are voting with their feet. In the year 2000, the Wallabies played New Zealand in Sydney in front of 109,000 supporters at ANZ Stadium. In 2017, we were lucky to get 50,000 for the same fixture at the same venue.
The drop in support for the Wallabies is more a vote of no confidence in the current administration than it is in the players.
In club land, where genuine rugby people have roots, the ARU, now Rugby Australia, stink. And nothing is being done to dilute the anger that the clubs have for the national governing body. Neglect the clubs, as administrators have done, and failure will follow.
So what’s the big play of the week with rugby drowning in problems?
Summon Israel Folau to explain comments he’s made about gay people. The worst you could say about Folau is he has an opinion.
Rugby leadership in this country barely has an opinion on anything, let alone one you’d agree with. They go missing. They’re silent. Yet now they’re buying a fight with one of their finest employees.
As I said to Israel Folau this week, I disagree with what he said, but I’d be happy to be appointed as his counsel and I don’t charge a fee.
It’s time someone took on some of these no-hopers who are running the game. Running it into the ground.
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Possibly the most Alan Jones article ever.
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@mikedogz when referencing Alan Jones, please use "coach" or any derivative in quotes as I have done. It makes more sense that way.
Jones makes some good points, if at times tenuous (the Qantas-Emirates thing). As usual, sport blurs the lines into whatever you'd like to make them.
Folau can say what he fucking likes about gay people. And people can say his religious beliefs are laughable. The end.
I did have to laugh at this tho
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It's a bullshit article. It's that classic lie that politicians use: 'you spend ALL your time talking about X, but neglect Y which is FAR more important'.
They had one meeting with Izzy. Hardly taking up all of their time. And there has been huge public outcry about the issue, so I think a meeting was definitely warranted.
And then he just goes into the usual 'get off my lawn' patter, where the solution to everything is to get in a time machine and go back 25 years. Get rid of the NRC, bring back Bob Dwyer and Ealesy and the boys because things were simpler then and you could call winger a fag and an Islander a coconut and everyone would just have a beer and a laugh and go out there and beat the bloody All Blacks without the PC brigade whinging because we're Aussie blokes and that's just what we do.
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@barbarian said in Aussie Rugby in general:
And there has been huge public outcry about the issue, so I think a meeting was definitely warranted.
I wouldn't confuse a few people making noise with numbers of public who actually care to the point it would change their relationship with rugby.
All the ARU had to do is say "we have an inclusive policy, we don't share his stated position, but he's entitled to it."
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@antipodean said in Aussie Rugby in general:
@barbarian said in Aussie Rugby in general:
And there has been huge public outcry about the issue, so I think a meeting was definitely warranted.
I wouldn't confuse a few people making noise with numbers of public who actually care to the point it would change their relationship with rugby.
All the ARU had to do is say "we have an inclusive policy, we don't share his stated position, but he's entitled to it."
Yep, this.
I'm with Alan on this - I don't agree with Israel, but FFS he's entitled to be a christian and believe what he likes. Heck, most christian churches are split on this too
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@antipodean said in Aussie Rugby in general:
I wouldn't confuse a few people making noise with numbers of public who actually care to the point it would change their relationship with rugby.
All the ARU had to do is say "we have an inclusive policy, we don't share his stated position, but he's entitled to it."
He's the biggest player in the game, by a country mile. His comment has affected his standing with sponsors, and with fans of the game.
While I agree that it won't cause people to walk away, I think it's been big enough to warrant a meeting. Not to silence him, or condemn him, but to see if steps can be taken to avoid any further backlash or comments that may be perceived to be divisive.
I'd say that's a pretty standard step that an employer would take when an action by an employee has caused a reaction like this one has.
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@barbarian said in Aussie Rugby in general:
He's the biggest player in the game, by a country mile. His comment has affected his standing with sponsors, and with fans of the game.
Which of his sponsors have publicly distanced themselves from his comments? The ARU may have to field some uncomfortable calls from sponsors but the answer writes itself:
- This has got you media coverage you don't have to pay for.
- He's entitled to his beliefs, just as you're entitled to yours.
- Make an unnecessary issue of it and he's likely to walk, reducing the return on your investment.
Quite frankly a mature organisation that engages in sponsorship would write the same type of response I wrote earlier. And it goes a long way to placating people like me; who actually spend money on the product rather than people who couldn't give a shit about the game and are too poor to fly anything other than Jetstar.
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No sponsors publicly, but I have heard there have been some moves in private.
And I think you underestimate the depth of sentiment on this issue. Whilst nobody is trying to silence him, the comment has alienated him to a fair chunk of the fan base.
The sentiment hasn't been whipped up by RA at all. Their initial response mirrored yours, in fact. But as the issue continued to dominate headlines, I think it's appropriate that they had a private discussion with him.
They have done OK to navigate a pretty tricky issue IMO, with a wide array of opinions on the subject - ranging from yours to some who think he should be thrown out of the game.
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@barbarian said in Aussie Rugby in general:
They have done OK to navigate a pretty tricky issue IMO, with a wide array of opinions on the subject - ranging from yours to some who think he should be thrown out of the game.
That's not a wide array. My opinion is bang in the middle of the extremes that want to tell other people how to think and what to say.
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Firstly, if anyone has read the Politics forum you'll now how critical I am of Islam, but I really hate the "if he was a Muslim then X, Y, Z" argument. He's not a Muslim, this has nothing to do with Islam, so fuck off with that shit.
As @barbarian says it's a pretty tricky time to be an organisation like the ARU. If anyone associated with them says something the lynch mob feels is out of line, then the media picks it up and plasters it all over the headlines for clicks/revenue, and the idiots on social media work themselves into a lather.
@antipodean also makes a good point that those idiots on social media are rarely representative of the wider population, who generally have better things to do then get worked up over things like this.
So it's a pretty fine balance and I don't know that there is an obvious "right" way to handle the outrage mob. Personally I'd look to push the line that we are not a political organisation, our employees views do not represent ours, but we believe in their rights to freedom of speech and expression as per the law.
Then I'd try and say nothing more on the issue and let it blow over. The outrage mob will soon find something else to complain about as they have very short attention spans, and this will all be a distant memory. The worst thing you can do is continue to comment which effectively just pours fuel on the fire.
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@barbarian said in Aussie Rugby in general:
It's a bullshit article. It's that classic lie that politicians use: 'you spend ALL your time talking about X, but neglect Y which is FAR more important'.
They had one meeting with Izzy. Hardly taking up all of their time. And there has been huge public outcry about the issue, so I think a meeting was definitely warranted.
And then he just goes into the usual 'get off my lawn' patter, where the solution to everything is to get in a time machine and go back 25 years. Get rid of the NRC, bring back Bob Dwyer and Ealesy and the boys because things were simpler then and you could call winger a fag and an Islander a coconut and everyone would just have a beer and a laugh and go out there and beat the bloody All Blacks without the PC brigade whinging because we're Aussie blokes and that's just what we do.
Huge public outcry? That's simply not true.
What I'm interested in is the blatant hypocrisy between a sponsor being concerned about their image because a player said something homophobic but having no problem entering into a multimillion (billion?) dollar partnership with the flagship carrier of a nation where homosexuality is illegal. You also have sporting bodies cracking down mercilessly on players who might say something in the heat of the moment on the field, but who also have no problems taking millions in sponsorship and naming rights from companies representing nations where you are imprisoned if you are homosexual.
If these companies can take this coin then they would be monumental hypocrites if they are willing to drop their sponsorship for what one player (albeit a very good one) wrote on instagram.
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@rancid-schnitzel said in Aussie Rugby in general:
Huge public outcry? That's simply not true.
It's been solid back page content for the past week. I suppose we don't want to get bogged down in semantics, but I'd call that a fair outcry.
If these companies can take this coin then they would be monumental hypocrites if they are willing to drop their sponsorship for what one player (albeit a very good one) wrote on instagram.
I agree totally. We're following a pretty familiar outrage cycle here. It will all blow over soon.
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@rancid-schnitzel said in Aussie Rugby in general:
@barbarian said in Aussie Rugby in general:
It's a bullshit article. It's that classic lie that politicians use: 'you spend ALL your time talking about X, but neglect Y which is FAR more important'.
They had one meeting with Izzy. Hardly taking up all of their time. And there has been huge public outcry about the issue, so I think a meeting was definitely warranted.
And then he just goes into the usual 'get off my lawn' patter, where the solution to everything is to get in a time machine and go back 25 years. Get rid of the NRC, bring back Bob Dwyer and Ealesy and the boys because things were simpler then and you could call winger a fag and an Islander a coconut and everyone would just have a beer and a laugh and go out there and beat the bloody All Blacks without the PC brigade whinging because we're Aussie blokes and that's just what we do.
Huge public outcry? That's simply not true.
What I'm interested in is the blatant hypocrisy between a sponsor being concerned about their image because a player said something homophobic but having no problem entering into a multimillion (billion?) dollar partnership with the flagship carrier of a nation where homosexuality is illegal. You also have sporting bodies cracking down mercilessly on players who might say something in the heat of the moment on the field, but who also have no problems taking millions in sponsorship and naming rights from companies representing nations where you are imprisoned if you are homosexual.
If these companies can take this coin then they would be monumental hypocrites if they are willing to drop their sponsorship for what one player (albeit a very good one) wrote on instagram.
That's the problem with corporate virtue signalling. They claim to "care" about particular issues but if there is $$ on the line for their stakeholders...
They really should just not be political. We have laws around freedom of speech, leave it at that and stop trying to shove ideologically driven ideas down everyone's throats.
I blame it on HR departments. They are just a complete waste of time and money, if I had my way I'd get rid of pretty much the whole department at my work and just hold people leaders accountable for doing their job.
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@no-quarter said in Aussie Rugby in general:
and the idiots on social media work themselves into a lather.
We have met the enemy and he is us!
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@barbarian said in Aussie Rugby in general:
@rancid-schnitzel said in Aussie Rugby in general:
Huge public outcry? That's simply not true.
It's been solid back page content for the past week. I suppose we don't want to get bogged down in semantics, but I'd call that a fair outcry.
If these companies can take this coin then they would be monumental hypocrites if they are willing to drop their sponsorship for what one player (albeit a very good one) wrote on instagram.
I agree totally. We're following a pretty familiar outrage cycle here. It will all blow over soon.
I hardly think that can be used to adequately gauge the level of public outrage. Nor can social media for that matter.
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@chris-b said in Aussie Rugby in general:
@no-quarter said in Aussie Rugby in general:
and the idiots on social media work themselves into a lather.
We have met the enemy and he is us!
The Fern is different!! Just don't mention the Cookie Monster...
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@rancid-schnitzel said in Aussie Rugby in general:
I hardly think that can be used to adequately gauge the level of public outrage. Nor can social media for that matter.
OK. Well let's go a different metric - I've had more than a few conversations at work about it. My girlfriend (not a huge rugby head but understands the game thankfully) has wanted to chat about it. My mum brought it with me yesterday.
Now this may not constitute 'outrage' but I certainly think there has been a very high interest.
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@no-quarter said in Aussie Rugby in general:
@chris-b said in Aussie Rugby in general:
@no-quarter said in Aussie Rugby in general:
and the idiots on social media work themselves into a lather.
We have met the enemy and he is us!
The Fern is different!! Just don't mention the Cookie Monster...
I'm afraid not. We are all now "Internet Personalities".
We should be fucking ashamed!
