Play Nice Hawthorn culture and Fagan

[dlanod]

This is going to be a very touchy subject.

There will be a very broad range of opinions about the correct way to handle this.

I'll remind everyone to post respectfully at this time - sniping at each other is not going to help.

Any continued pointless back and forth will get a day or more to cool off. If you want to avoid this fate, let it go.

 

[Tassie4ever]

Politically speaking I'm very much a leftie and can't stand Murdoch. Not sure how ones political leaning is relevant to this discussion.

My advice, as frequently relayed to my leftie brothers is- don't watch Fox, don't buy his newspapers, and don't listen to his radio.

Too easy.

Or, we could do as Putin does, and stick them all in jail. Or arrange for them to have an "accident". Like falling out a hospital window. Or a flat door to be impaled on the fence spikes below.

Personally, I prefer a variety of news sources. But even the venerable BBC can be excrutiating at times.

 

[Brett C]

Your example are a false equivalency, no one has been booed on the scale Adam Goodes was in the AFL, or for the same reasons.

Are you sure you want to die on this hill?

Except you ignore the many years of his not being booed.

Him blasting a 12-13 year old girl and the ensuing carry on resulted in him being booed.

I have no doubt over the years he was racially abused many many times and that what the girl said was acceptable but the booing wasn’t racism.

This whole die on a hill bullshit is as ridiculous as it comes.

 

[Lions time]

I'm finding it hard to disbelieve him on the basis of that statement.

He just doesn't seem the type to outright lie on a matter that goes deep to his personal integrity.

Perhaps that's my own bias speaking.

That is why Chris comes across as so caring, because he is honest, to a fault on occasion. He preaches honesty to his players and lives and breathes it in his personal and professional life.


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[Sausages]

Fair and equitable is not really achievable when privilege and power between these two groups- the accusers and accused- is very asymmetrical. Fagan and Clarkson are well off individuals with the backing of powerful organisations. Do you think the accusers are in the same situation, or will have anywhere near that support? Anonymity protects them from targeted harassment from the supporter bases of each of the clubs involved, racists who want to have a swing and the institutions themselves in previous eras.

Whistleblower laws are also designed to protect identity from harrassment. No one would come forward ever if they had to confront the full force of this harassment.

Yassmin Abdul-Magied was harassed out of Australia, Goodes was hounded out of the game.

Do you see why anonymity is important?

I honestly don't know the situation of the other party. They could be anybody. I can, at this moment, insert any idea in there to support my position.

Hence why I feel anonymity shouldn't be required.

Permit me a brief tangent for a moment. Eddie Betts isn't a whistleblower and if he was, his message would probably be minimised. He is a voice for change precisely because he is a vocal, recognised public figure, and yet still is subject to casual racist remarks and behaviour.

And this is a perception shift we have to have, because the notion of being a whistleblower is somehow negative in this scenario, with the notion they require protection. To be clear, I am talking about the specific acts as have occurred here. The notion that this is whistleblowing undermines the importance of the statements and, in my mind, the attached requirement they be verified or discarded. As a sport, we confront the issue over and over again. And as Eddie shows, a public profile is not a defence against the behaviour. Hence this is in the national interest to broadly identify and respond in similar visibility the relative outcomes. If Eddie was vilified on social media or indeed had the opportunity afforded to him to record and call out occasions where he was the subject in public, you can be reasonably sure he world receive support and backing. If you give someone a positive public profile, that is really all the endorsement you need to further advocate for change. Which seems to be the intent of the actions undertaken by the instigators thus far in this troublesome scenario.

Again, this isn't just casual racism we are talking about here. It's not sufficient to simply say "oh, here's a payout, go away" in this case, imo. The grievous nature of the accusations ratchet the appropriate responses up quite a few notches.

I have no idea if Goodes feels he was hounded out of the game in all honesty - I haven't read any of his reflections on footy, but am aware of the general noise on the subject - I feel he was, but that's not the issue.

Goodes had a profile and used that to educate matters as he saw them. I trust that was done so with pride and elegance, qualities he suggests to me as a person.

 

[Requiem]

Goodes played for over a decade without being booed . It only started after he pointed out the girl in the crowd.

I remember Carl Ditterich being constantly booed and I think the club at the time played a bit of a racist card saying it was his German heritage and we should get over the war.

But basically he just belted the opposition at a time when you could and was considered a really dirty, vicious player.

What the Krakoeur Brothers suffered from the crowd back in the day would be unimaginable today so we have made some progress.

Except you ignore the many years of his not being booed.

Him blasting a 12-13 year old girl and the ensuing carry on resulted in him being booed.

I have no doubt over the years he was racially abused many many times and that what the girl said was acceptable but the booing wasn’t racism.

This whole die on a hill bullshit is as ridiculous as it comes.

The preceding years of Adams Goodes' career prior to the booing doesn't negate the fact that once a series of events took place late in his career, he was subject to multiple year of periodical booing, culminating in the 2015 season where the occurrences of booing significantly intensified and had racial undertones, resulting in his retirement and self imposed exile from the AFL community.

I don't want to derail this thread too much more with this issue, but I think it's disingenuous to dismiss Adam Goodes' experience of racism when he has clearly said otherwise.

 

[Toffee Lion]

I disagreed due to this para

“Otherwise if there is no proof, there is every chance the 3 accusers conspired to lie in hopes of receiving monetary compensation. Innocent until proven guilty people, let’s not lose sight of that.”

The problem with this issue is the difficulty of proof. if Fagan can’t prove he wasn’t at the meeting is he lying to save his career? In what arena will proof be offered. A court of law? A formal AFL investigation? The court of public opinion?

the alleged victims were asked to tell their story. They did and appeared to describe at the very least a lack of cultural sensitivity. if they can’t prove what happened is their every chance they lied for financial gain?

It's a sensitive subject, as evident by the posts in this thread and peoples opinions will always differ. I appreciate your reponse to my post to reflect your opinion and honestly do not disagree with you.

If anybody feels they have been mistreated, they have the right to to speak up and should not feel that without evidence, they cannot speak and therefor watch as their abusers go unpunished. The reality is though that without evidence/proof, it is also increasingly difficult to prosecute and receive justice. It would be a total disaster in society if every person gets immediately punished on word alone.

I believe in following the investigation and receiving more facts/details/evidence. I don't agree with discrediting the reporter, who is just doing their job and I don't believe in discrediting the accusers as it would create an incredibly unhealthy issue of people being afraid to speak up. I would retract my last paragraph in my OP if I could, it probably detracted from my post and is unfair on the accusers to essentially accuse them of something they may not be doing.

My hope as a human being is that this can be resolved for all parties involved. That if people are lying, they are punished. That if people have been hurt, they are taken care of. Too many lives are affected in this now, it goes beyond Chris & Alastair. Their partners are affected, their children, their families. The people they work with etc. This includes the lives of the accusers as well, who will be honestly terrified right now. It's just a horrible situation.

I still feel the two options I provided in my OP are the only outcomes I envision, either is scary. The only possible third outcome is a total, and I mean TOTAL misunderstanding of events where all parties walk away content.

 

[Sausages]

How do you think disclosing the names of these people will allow us to 'know all the facts' so that we can pass 'judgement'. Personally, I believe vulnerable people who report serious allegations about conduct that has happened in settings like the workplace and which have caused them (for instance) psychological trauma should be afforded a level of public anonymity if that is what they choose. It does not prevent the allegations from being tested.

I will put it simply for you. If you knew the name of one of the people who has made an allegation in this matter right now, how would this assist you?

I could verify everything that I am presumed to know thus far - namely everything related to their footy career.

I fail to see how that is in any way dramatic.

 

[MacMum]

When people start claiming they are druggies or that we should hunt for dirt on them, sure I'll delete it.

Read my post properly and actually think about what I said.....I was not the 1st person to mention drugs for a start.....secondly, I mentioned the different ways if the person/persons involved were on drugs things could have misconstrued events etc.....drug affected people do get confused. I know because we had a family member on drugs oh and he was white too...but I suppose thats acceptable to mention he did all those things but its not possible for an Indigenous person?

...thirdly, I then said these were different possibilities or none. Meaning what I said might not be the case at all, just throwing scenarios around as others have too. But hey, I'm the racist! Can you not work that out or do you jump down someones throat before thinking?

I also said I don't believe people automatically either, until all facts are known....we've heard one side not the other.

I love how you and others have insinuated or blatantly called me a racist on here....geezuz, I mentioned vegemite in one post and two posts questioned my use of the saying "happy little vegemites"

...now why would that be? Because vegemite is black? . Get lost! God help this world is all I can say!

We've heard the victims story, sounds horrific and mind blowing so I am very interested in hearing what Fagan has to say because of the fallout and the ramifications for our club....couldn't care less about Clarkson.

Any wonder people, good people drop off our board...like it or not mods, there is a distinct agree with us or you are not one of us on here. Always has been.

I'm done.

 

[martinson]

I honestly don't know the situation of the other party. They could be anybody. I can, at this moment, insert any idea in there to support my position.

Hence why I feel anonymity shouldn't be required.

Permit me a brief tangent for a moment. Eddie Betts isn't a whistleblower and if he was, his message would probably be minimised. He is a voice for change precisely because he is a vocal, recognised public figure, and yet still is subject to casual racist remarks and behaviour.

And this is a perception shift we have to have, because the notion of being a whistleblower is somehow negative in this scenario, with the notion they require protection. To be clear, I am talking about the specific acts as have occurred here. The notion that this is whistleblowing undermines the importance of the statements and, in my mind, the attached requirement they be verified or discarded. As a sport, we confront the issue over and over again. And as Eddie shows, a public profile is not a defence against the behaviour. Hence this is in the national interest to broadly identify and respond in similar visibility the relative outcomes. If Eddie was vilified on social media or indeed had the opportunity afforded to him to record and call out occasions where he was the subject in public, you can be reasonably sure he world receive support and backing. If you give someone a positive public profile, that is really all the endorsement you need to further advocate for change. Which seems to be the intent of the actions undertaken by the instigators thus far in this troublesome scenario.

Again, this isn't just casual racism we are talking about here. It's not sufficient to simply say "oh, here's a payout, go away" in this case, imo. The grievous nature of the accusations ratchet the appropriate responses up quite a few notches.

I have no idea if Goodes feels he was hounded out of the game in all honesty - I haven't read any of his reflections on footy, but am aware of the general noise on the subject - I feel he was, but that's not the issue.

Goodes had a profile and used that to educate matters as he saw them. I trust that was done so with pride and elegance, qualities he suggests to me as a person.

The preceding years of Adams Goodes' career prior to the booing doesn't negate the fact that once a series of events took place late in his career, he was subject to multiple year of periodical booing, culminating in the 2015 season where the occurrences of booing significantly intensified and had racial undertones, resulting in his retirement and self imposed exile from the AFL community.

I don't want to derail this thread too much more with this issue, but I think it's disingenuous to dismiss Adam Goodes' experience of racism when he has clearly said otherwise.

Just to be clear I wasn't dismissing it ,simply saying why it occurred. What started as the mob's reaction to perceived intimidation of a young girl merged into full on racist hounding IMO.

 

[Full Wingspan]

It appears to be common practice for journalists to provide parties a window of 24-48 hours to provide comment to detailed questions. The industry appears to hold the belief that this timeframe discharges their duty to provide a right of reply to an accused party.

I find this practice, for the most part, disingenuous, particularly in circumstances where there is no time sensitivity or other compelling reason to provide such deadline. Equally, I can understand how you may want to limit the opportunity for co-accused persons to strategise and corroborate their stories to strengthen their version of events, however providing a window of 30 hours by sending an email to a generic email is hardly affording someone ample opportunity to provide any sort of meaningful response.

Given my background, I probably place more emphasis on affording parties natural justice and procedural fairness. Russell Jackson appears, on balance, to be a respected journo who holds himself to a much higher standard than most. However that does not mean he is perfect.

I will say this - life and its experiences are not always black and white. It is possible for multiple people to hold very different versions of the same event or interpret it in vastly different ways based on their individual experiences, traumas or emotional state.

 

[Requiem]

Just to be clear I wasn't dismissing it ,simply saying why it occurred. What started as the mob's reaction to perceived intimidation of a young girl merged into full on racist hounding IMO.

I wasn't referring to you in that response, I was refering to Brett C's comment "but the booing wasn’t racism."

I should have made that clear.

 

[Elixuh]

I could verify everything that I am presumed to know thus far - namely everything related to their footy career.

I fail to see how that is in any way dramatic.

So you think it is in the public interest to know their names so that you can assess their footy career.

Righto.

 

[Dom PC]

No, I think it shows I have a healthy respect for the journalist in question to not be making stuff up and I'm showing sympathy for those involved who allegedly have been through something truly awful. Your default seems to be that it isn't true. That's fine if that it is your opinion but equally I'm entitled to mine.

What I will call out is attacking the journalist/media organisation on spurious grounds. Or the notion that we must have a criminal trial level of proof of guilt for it to be ok to have an opinion - that is a ridiculous standard.

OJ Simpson, for example, didn't get convicted at trial but was found liable on the civil standard. Completely different situation of course that shouldn't be compared, but I feel comfortable with my personal standards, even if you want to call me wanting to 'react to a juicy story.'

I also don't think De Goey should have been playing while there was a serious criminal charge against him, and if we were to recuit him I'd cancel my membership too. So if you want to discount me as reacting to 'juicy stories,' so be it.

Nope, my default is to wait for both sides of the story to be told before getting my pitchfork out. Wish generally good posters like yourself would do the same.

In a situation where a good person with no history of poor behaviour is accused of terrible acts with no physical evidence produced to date. I just think that person deserves the chance to give their version of events also before we start writing him off as guilty.

You are assuming the version of events given to the reporter is 100% accurate, well based on Fagan's version of events he wasn't involved... not sure this is comprehensive or fair reporting. Arguably its quite disingenuous to Fagan and Arguably you are being disingenuous to Fagan also by not acknowledging this.


You are within your rights to not believe Fagan, for me, I'm prepared to defend him (and the accusers if the shoe was on the other foot) if someone is willing to make unfair conclusions based on one side of the story.

 

[Mighty Lions]

Indigenous people do have increased representation, but representation does not protect them from a pile on if their identities were exposed.

Goodes was hounded out of the game because he was indigenous and he had the nerve to call out racism. “I’m not racist but I just don’t like the way he plays” was a fig leaf for racists for the most part.

You could say that about anyone...indigenous or not. I dont understand your arguement then. Please elaborate.

I loved the way Adam Goodes played. One of my favorite players. I didnt particularly like the way he behaved but that again had nothing to do with him being indigenous....no fig leaf involved.

 

[martinson]

Read my post properly and actually think about what I said.....I was not the 1st person to mention drugs for a start.....secondly, I mentioned the different ways if the person/persons involved were on drugs things could have misconstrued events etc.....drug affected people do get confused. I know because we had a family member on drugs oh and he was white too...but I suppose thats acceptable to mention he did all those things but its not possible for an Indigenous person?

...thirdly, I then said these were different possibilities or none. Meaning what I said might not be the case at all, just throwing scenarios around as others have too. But hey, I'm the racist! Can you not work that out or do you jump down someones throat before thinking?

I also said I don't believe people automatically either, until all facts are known....we've heard one side not the other.

I love how you and others have insinuated or blatantly called me a racist on here....geezuz, I mentioned vegemite in one post and two posts questioned my use of the saying "happy little vegemites"

...now why would that be? Because vegemite is black? . Get lost! God help this world is all I can say!

We've heard the victims story, sounds horrific and mind blowing so I am very interested in hearing what Fagan has to say because of the fallout and the ramifications for our club....couldn't care less about Clarkson.

Any wonder people, good people drop off our board...like it or not mods, there is a distinct agree with us or you are not one of us on here. Always has been.

I'm done.

People have got a little carried away on this thread MacMum. I've been accused of a few things myself indirectly and directly out of the blue.

It seems to have raised the level self importance and outrage to some degree.

I think I'm done myself . Not unhappily btw. Maybe time to close this thread and start a new one. Everything that could be said has been said.

 

[Mighty Lions]

I was hoping some may contact Fagan privately. I wouldn’t expect that there would be any public discussion by the players, particularly at this point.

I also have a general concern for the playing group and how this might be affecting them.

It's affecting everyone who has a love/liking for the club and the person. I'm shattered.

 

[martinson]

It appears to be common practice for journalists to provide parties a window of 24-48 hours to provide comment to detailed questions. The industry appears to hold the belief that this timeframe discharges their duty to provide a right of reply to an accused party.

I find this practice, for the most part, disingenuous, particularly in circumstances where there is no time sensitivity or other compelling reason to provide such deadline. Equally, I can understand how you may want to limit the opportunity for co-accused persons to strategise and corroborate their stories to strengthen their version of events, however providing a window of 30 hours by sending an email to a generic email is hardly affording someone ample opportunity to provide any sort of meaningful response.

Given my background, I probably place more emphasis on affording parties natural justice and procedural fairness. Russell Jackson appears, on balance, to be a respected journo who holds himself to a much higher standard than most. However that does not mean he is perfect.

I will say this - life and its experiences are not always black and white. It is possible for multiple people to hold very different versions of the same event or interpret it in vastly different ways based on their individual experiences, traumas or emotional state.

Absolutely.

 

[Lions time]

So you think it is in the public interest to know their names so that you can assess their footy career.

Righto.

Why couldn’t the names of the accused be “Former AFL Club Officials “ in the article, until the accused were given due process and provided time to give their description’s of events ?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Mighty Lions]

So we just want people to be hesitant or outright unwilling to come forward.

People are acting like the complainants have pushed this. They were the ones approached by Hawthorn as part of the review and (presumably) approached by the journo.

I think people can disagree with how it has come out or w/e, but arguing that there is some public interest in us knowing the names of the complainants is a weird argument to make. Especially when a formal investigation into the allegations is underway.

The identities of the players in question should and probably will come out sooner rather than later. I think they are brave individuals but their names need to be named 100%.

 

[Elixuh]

Why couldn’t the names of the accused be “Former AFL Club Officials “ in the article, until the accused were given due process and provided time to give their description’s of events ?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I've not said they shouldn't. Not sure why you're raising that with me.

 

[Full Wingspan]

Read my post properly and actually think about what I said.....I was not the 1st person to mention drugs for a start.....secondly, I mentioned the different ways if the person/persons involved were on drugs things could have misconstrued events etc.....drug affected people do get confused. I know because we had a family member on drugs oh and he was white too...but I suppose thats acceptable to mention he did all those things but its not possible for an Indigenous person?

...thirdly, I then said these were different possibilities or none. Meaning what I said might not be the case at all, just throwing scenarios around as others have too. But hey, I'm the racist! Can you not work that out or do you jump down someones throat before thinking?

I also said I don't believe people automatically either, until all facts are known....we've heard one side not the other.

I love how you and others have insinuated or blatantly called me a racist on here....geezuz, I mentioned vegemite in one post and two posts questioned my use of the saying "happy little vegemites"

...now why would that be? Because vegemite is black? . Get lost! God help this world is all I can say!

We've heard the victims story, sounds horrific and mind blowing so I am very interested in hearing what Fagan has to say because of the fallout and the ramifications for our club....couldn't care less about Clarkson.

Any wonder people, good people drop off our board...like it or not mods, there is a distinct agree with us or you are not one of us on here. Always has been.

I'm done.

It's really strange that you're even mentioning drug use or speculating on 'what ifs' when there is no evidence or suggestion that drug use has been raised as an issue or was a contributing factor in this saga...

Whilst I'm sure it is not your intention, it appears you are unfairly linking drug use as a factor seemingly because the victims are indigenous. Particularly when there is a myriad of other factors or explanations you could speculate on, for some reason you've decided to analyse the impact of drug use. Simply saying it could be a possibility or not does not absolve you from the fact you've brought it up (without any reasonable basis) in the first place.

And your "happy little vegemites" comment came off as more condescending than anything.

Hope you take this feedback for what it is.

 

[Requiem]

It's really strange that you're even mentioning drug use or speculating on 'what ifs' when there is no evidence or suggestion that drug use has been raised as an issue or was a contributing factor in this saga...

Whilst I'm sure it is not your intention, it appears you are unfairly linking drug use as a factor seemingly because the victims are indigenous. Particularly when there is a myriad of other factors or explanations you could speculate on, for some reason you've decided to analyse the impact of drug use. Simply saying it could be a possibility or not does not absolve you from the fact you've brought it up (without any reasonable basis) in the first place.

And your "happy little vegemites" comment came off as more condescending than anything.

Hope you take this feedback for what it is.

It's like hearing a Sexual Assault victim's testimony and asking "what if she was drunk"?

 

[Mighty Lions]

It's really strange that you're even mentioning drug use or speculating on 'what ifs' when there is no evidence or suggestion that drug use has been raised as an issue or was a contributing factor in this saga...

Whilst I'm sure it is not your intention, it appears you are unfairly linking drug use as a factor seemingly because the victims are indigenous. Particularly when there is a myriad of other factors or explanations you could speculate on, for some reason you've decided to analyse the impact of drug use. Simply saying it could be a possibility or not does not absolve you from the fact you've brought it up (without any reasonable basis) in the first place.

Hope you take this feedback for what it is.

What a crock of s**t. Come on man. Drug use is rife in the AFL...you inferring its only rife in the indigenous players is a laugh. MacMum definitely isnt doing what you accuse her of.

 

[Stars align]

I've not said they shouldn't. Not sure why you're raising that with me.

If Fagan and by association Clarkson and Burt truly believe they are in the right is there the possibility of them going the nuclear legal option by serving defamation writs on their accusers and usurping the AFL investigation?

 

[Sausages]

So you think it is in the public interest to know their names so that you can assess their footy career.

Righto.

No.

I think its reasonable for me to be able to establish whatever facts I see as relevant to a broader discourse on institutionalised racism.

And that starts with confirming the presence at the time and place of the accusers and accused.

I can do that with one.
But not the other.

No weirdness about it

Imagine, if you will, that it was subsequently established by the AFL report that Fagan was completely innocent of the accusations, and was exonerated. Due to the uncovering of further information, which put the players beyond his duty of care...say, internally at Hawthorn he didn't look after reserves' players and the players in question were current reserve team players, for example He would therefore never be in attendance at meetings with said playing group, in any capacity.

Well, when the AFL release this exoneration, they don't mention that fact - all we see is "circumstances" or "findings". Because there is an acceptance of narrative, uncritical of the genesis of that narrative and thus the admissible facts can be obscured or left simply unspoken.

In this issue as it stands now, is that the "how" of Fagan's exoneration is likely the only lever that lets him keep his job. If that how is not fully explained and documented, his position is untenable irrespective of anything else. And it needs to be publicly dispersed, irrespective of any other facts that come to light.