Why are people in figure skating so concerned about perception?

I haven't subjected myself yet to the interview where Tessa Virtue wishes people would not focus on the scandal, the better to bring credibility to the sport.

Tessa Virtue, ladies and gentlemen.

You know what would bring credibility to the sport, Tessa? If the sport had credibility.

The language used when skaters talk about how the public sees figure skating is always so sketchy and WTF.There was Sinead Kerr jumping onto twitter complaining that VM interrupting their 4CC's Carmen hurt the "perception" of the sport.

What actually hurts the perception of the sport, and will continue to hurt the perception of the sport, is that it's fucked up and corrupt, secretive and shady, and lacks all accountability.

What hurts the perception of the sport are communiques as dead honest and earnest as this one, from South Korea:

"We had to be extremely careful with our action because filing a complaint may adversely affect our relationships with the ISU and international figure skating judges, which could put our athletes at a disadvantage at future competitions," the statement read. "However, after deliberating over what would be the best course of action for our people, we decided to appeal with the ISU."
The ISU Constitution and General Regulations state that "no protests against evaluations by referees, judges and the technical panel of skaters' performances are allowed." The ISU also states that protests against results "are permitted only in the case of incorrect mathematical calculation."
However, under Article 24 of the ISU Constitution and General Regulations, complaints may be filed with the ISU's Disciplinary Commission "within 60 days of learning of the facts or events which constitute a disciplinary or ethical offense." The KSU and the KOC said they believe the composition of the panel in Sochi was in violation of the ISU's ethical rules.

What? WHAT? Is South Korea saying that if its complaint is taken amiss, the ISU may see to it that South Korean figure skaters skating according to the rules of CoP will have their scores fucked with in retaliation? South Korean skaters' levels and GOE and components  - the stuff that quantifies what a skater did on the ice, and nothing more or less - will instead actually reflect the ISU's displeasure with South Korea filing a complaint?

Tell me more, South Korea! How does the ISU get this done, exactly? You file a complaint, suddenly your skaters aren't making the final flights. Who issues the directive? It's not "The ISU". It's not a whole bunch of judges individually reacting as one to this complaint and individually deciding to jack your skaters' scores. It's a person. Somebody has to tell them to do it. Who?

Why are the public faces of the sport - the skaters -  more concerned with how the sport is perceived rather than how it is? Why are they eager for a disconnect between perception and reality?

Perception: Tessa and Scott interrupted their program and were allowed to go back and finish! How is that fair?
Reality: Tessa and Scott interrupted per the ISU's own rules.

Why wasn't THAT explained instead of all the oh oh oh oh oh oh hurting the perception! The ISU has/had a rule. Tessa and Scott were within that rule. Instead of the incredibly shady shade thrown left and right immediately suggesting Scott and Tessa were faking, how about explaining that they acted according to the ISU's rules on interruptions?

Why so assbackwards, skaters who threw shade? A little quick-triggered and oversensitive, are we?

Desired Perception: Judging is fair, DW brought it and skating is a wonderful, legitimate sport.
Reality: The results in ice dance have been predetermined for at least the past two seasons (and probably more). Any comparison between what DW did on the ice and what the ISU rules say they ought to have done on the ice in order to get the scores they received demonstrates that without a doubt. The sport is corrupt.

If figure skating were a real sport, staffed by officials who didn't use the mafia as their role models, someone like David Dore would register a strong objection/protest to South Korea's suggestion that the ISU would ever ever retaliate against a Federation's skaters for that Federation filing a complaint about a competitive result. But I bet it doesn't bug them. I bet nobody in the media who followed DW/VM and Slotnikova/Yuna Kim is going to go - wow, a whole entire Fed just announced, humbly, that the governing body of this terribly legitimate sport will possibly retaliate against the Federation's athletes on the score sheet if it doesn't like that the Federation filed this complaint.

They'll just let that statement sit there, and continue to tell us how on point DW's scores were versus VM. Scores that have no relationship to what was skated only happen when Russians are on the ice or on the judging panel.The ISU itself is A-Okay.

Obvious relational associations and logical implications are disregarded in the media coverage of these events. Just leave em there on the ground.

To conclude, let's note that the Korean Skating Federation has just told us that the ISU is perfectly capable of controlling/directing the international judging community to score a skater and event per an agenda that has absolutely nothing to do with the skater's performance on the ice (retaliation, or say, directing a particular team towards a gold medal at the Olympics). Not at one event, but systematically, going forward. However did South Korea receive the impression this was possible?

I can understand why a liar like Tessa would be reality averse, valuing perception over truth but I don't think she should be doing psa's about it on Strombo.

__________________
P.S. I found this 2011 article: David Dore and figure skating that quotes both David Dore and Christine Brennan. David Dore is described thusly: "One of the smartest and most profound international officials in figure skating today."

Gee I wonder what THAT pre-interview was like.

The topic is the International Judging System.

"Everybody has an agenda and you have to play your own game."  explained Dore.

"The new system is still undecipherable for civilians" said Christine Brennan.

Let me ask you Christine. Did you ever make a first-hand attempt to understand the new system or did the word "factored' pull you up short. Did you ever give yourself a boost by learning anything about blade work, steps and turns? Or did you look at it and go shit, that's a lot of decimal points and small type, nobody's going to understand it cause I don't!

"These are really difficult times for figure skating in terms of the sports media," said Brennan. "[Coaches and officials] need to think about ways to make it [more] interesting."

The thing with Brennan is she gets all her stuff from the people whose perspective is overcooked from being inside the sport too long. She doesn't act like a journalist and get that bird's eye view.

Does the "Ice Challenge Competition" discussed in this article actually happen?  It seems to be a competition for former champions and medalists, like the old pro comps.

Like any community, the inner workings of the ISU are complex and sometimes challenging, but it can work if you know how to work with it.  "The culture and concept of the ISU is that it’s a team," said Dore, who urged coaches to be smart, innovative and creative in terms of utilizing the IJS.

Uh huh. I don't exactly understand what is being said in this paragraph.

Okay, I figured out why that last paragraph is a WTF. This article isn't making sense. It's not explaining, connecting, or linking the supposed issues it's addressing into a coherent statement.

Let's look:

1. As I understand this article, it's saying the "new" judging system is a marketing challenge because the general public doesn't understand it and it takes longer for the scores to pop up when skaters are in the kiss'n'cry.

Okay, I see. But then there's this:

2. "Everybody has their own agenda and you have to play your own game."

What does that have to do with the UJS. Agenda in what respect? Agenda about what? Play your own game about what?

and let's look at this:

3. "Like any community, the inner workings of the ISU are complex and sometimes challenging, but it can work if you know how to work with it."

Yeah, no. That's not "like any community." Furthermore, complex generally means there are multiple components, not that nobody knows what the fuck is going on. How come this author (and Dore) aren't laying out what the "inner workings" are, what is so complex about them, and telling explicitly what the challenges are? How does one learn to "know how to work with it." What are examples of people who have successfully worked with it? What did they do? What challenges were presented? What is the wrong way?

I understand that might be a tough challenge when nobody's telling us what "it" is.

IOW, bullshit bullshit bullshit. They're telling us nothing here.

P.S. I also suspect it's likely that the Letter of Inquiry the ISU sent after Virtue Moir interrupted Carmen at the 4CC's was the ISU simply capitalizing on the event to throw shade on VM and enable the DW narrative. If the DW trajectory weren't the agenda, no letter of inquiry would have been sent.

Russia and LGBT

I would feel weird not having a post about this since in the past the blog has beaten up Skate Canada and some Moirs about all things skating and gayness.

Some skaters have been asked about Russia's discriminatory policies against LGBT people and for the most part their answers are miserable. Even Johnny Weir, while reaffirming his beliefs, sort of solutioned the whole thing with "So go over there and be fabulous!" I may be selling him short.

First out of the gate was Jeremy Abbott on twitter who compared criticizing Russia's LGBT policies to insulting a host's drapes and taste in decor. Naturally one wonders if he'd have made the same analogy about Nazi Germany. Oh hey, not the choice I'd have made, but if that's how they roll over there, it's not our place to say!

Considering Abbott, one wonders if he'd have been a Jewish athlete saying that about Nazi Germany for fear if he spoke out against it, the US would boycott and he'd lose his Olympic moment. (The U.S. did not boycott the Berlin Olympics, so I don't know what Abbott is fussing about. They're not going to boycott Sochi, and if he speaks out, nobody's going to spike his Borscht. If it's courtesy that concerns him, how about courtesy towards Russian LGBT people and those that have put themselves on the line to protest and defend?) Abbott got his ass whipped for being such a pusillanimous little punk, but he can relax now, he has company among his teammates.

Then there's Lysacek who punted it to the IOC. He's not wrong - it's the IOC that needs to loudly clarify and reaffirm its position and policies, and it's the IOC that needs to acknowledge that the Olympic athletes are being asked to address it. In the artificial construct that is eligible Olympic athletics, the IOC is the parent.

The IOC needs to acknowledge there's a situation and recognize it publicly and address it more proactively than they've done to date. It needs to make a clear statement that the athletes can strongly get behind without looking as if they're passing the buck, which is how Lysacek looks, and how most of them look. Not all of them. Most of them.

I don't want to do much defending of the athletes. I know they lead circumscribed lives with a narrow focus and I know the Olympics means everything to them but give me a fucking break already. If you are intelligent - and certainly not all of them are - you don't need to study political science for years in order to formulate a position on discrimination. You know what that is if you dropped out in grade school. They all act scared to touch it.

Charlie White and Meryl Davis's response sucked so much I hope with all my heart neither Scott nor Tessa address this issue. White and Davis are two INCREDIBLY privileged people who answered like this:

“I don’t think we can speak because we haven’t really talked about between the two of us very much,’’ White said.

“I don’t think the Olympics is really the right place for an athlete to make a political statement,” Davis said.

Asked if this was not a political issue but a human rights issue, White said, “Unfortunately, it’s semantics. To Russia, it is a political statement. And they are the host country. I think that is probably all we will say on the subject.”

That's pretty damn close to keeping your mouth shut about the drapes, Charlie White and Meryl Davis. You can't criticize the host. (Again, Nazi Germany hosted the Olympics - would White think the same about that? Jews schmews, it's all semantics.).

What kind of reasoning is that? To Russia, it's politics, so to Charlie it's politics? To Russia, it's important to discriminate against LGBT people, too. Is Charlie deferring to official Russia there as well? When in Rome.

It's not semantics. Human rights isn't fucking politics, Charlie and Meryl.

They don't want to give offense, that's what it's about. They don't want to "offend" official Russia. Maybe they don't want to offend Kelloggs. Yep, don't criticize human rights abuses, you might offend someone in power (or someone who will sponsor you) who supports those abuses. It's such a tricky line to walk.

In this situation, Russia is hosting the Olympics in accordance with IOC policies. The IOC has clear anti-discrimination policies, including against LGBT persons. These skaters have been media trained within an inch of their lives and they can't re-affirm that? They can't say that they condemn Russia's discriminatory policies and practices against LGBT persons, but it's in conflict with the IOC's own position, and the IOC governs how the Olympics are conducted, and how everyone connected with the Olympics are treated, and Russia agreed to abide by IOC policy when they were awarded Sochi?

That's a basic diplomatic turn it around, how hard is it? How hard is it to say they're aware these policies are no reflection of the attitudes held by many Russian athletes and much of the citizenry, including the citizens of Sochi, many many of whom deplore these practices as well?

Why doesn't the IOC, and the North American Federations - Skate Canada and the USFSA - get out in front so the athletes can get behind it. Instead the athletes are coming off enabling and mealy mouthed, appeasing, and frankly, creepy. Yeah, I'm human rights positive and everything but you gotta understand, my whole life is this skating stuff so you know, not really my problem.

It's not POLITICS, Meryl, but this is a woman who was famously (in my head it was famous) puzzled on twitter when Detroit was named the worst place to live in the United States. What about Ann Arbor?

By the way, here's Bode Miller:

"I think it's so embarrassing that there's countries and people who are that ignorant. … As a human being, I think it's embarrassing,"

That's more like it. There, he's standing with some of the athletes who have made scathing comments against discrimination while playing the notoriously LGBT-friendly game of football. If I were figure skating I'd be fucking embarrassed that football has a better track record of speaking out against LGBT discrimination, but maybe if they thought the Super Bowl was at stake some of those who have been outspoken would have reconsidered, I don't know.

Here's what bugs. What if Russia were, out loud, proclaiming, legislating, institutionalizing, making no bones, discriminating against Jews? Declaring it was going to arrest people who made a point of their Jewishness, who showed they were Jewish, who acted Jewish (in how they dressed or prayed in public, for example). What if it were aggressively discriminating against women - arresting women? Pick another category of humanity.

The creepy part is it's gayness, so it's "different" and it's okay to hedge. These athletes are acting like gayness policies are cultural. Was Nazi Germany cultural? Are some of the policies against women in the middle east and elsewhere cultural? Drapes and decor?

Athletes are not being asked to solve the issue. I think the athletes are asked their opinion vis a vis Russia's discrimination against LGBT persons. I think what is turning so many people off when they read what the athletes say is that many of the athletes who are equivocating appear to be doing so because they're afraid if they come out against LGBT discrimination they'll cause offense somewhere among people who support LGBT discrimination. Better not take sides. Fair to both.

That sucks.

I know they feel all hot potato and uncomfortable. In that case, don't comment. These people sound like they don't give a fuck, just please God, don't give the US or Canada ideas about boycotting Sochi!

Canada and the US won't boycott the fucking Sochi Olympics. If the USFSA and Skate Canada have told its athletes to say nothing, then the athletes should say nothing, and Skate Canada and USFSA should say something that represents them. Not point to the policy book - SAY something. Don't act so freaking terrified of the topic. Pull the stick out. Act human. The IOC should as well.

However, I don't think the Federations or the IOC have told the athletes to say nothing, because the athletes are saying stuff. So why is THIS what they're saying? What the hell are they scared of? Are Meryl and Charlie afraid of rocking the boat with Kelloggs? Neither one of them hesitates to tweet when they're chomping on a Nutrigrain. What's next - instagrams of Fiber Plus in their intestines?

Are the skaters afraid the US or Canada will boycott?

Is "figure skating" at large leery of turning off close-minded parents who will keep their sons from skating because they don't want their kids to be thought gay or turned gay, and speaking out against Russia's policies will just affirm that skating is gay? That's historically how cultures have handled discrimination, right? That's how change is effected. Wait til the scared and prejudiced people are comfortable - wait til the military is comfortable! Wait til this or that state's citizens gets used to having African Americans in the same restaurant.

What the hell do these self-styled role models think a role model is? Well, I already know - a sanitized smiley cipher that can lend its image to a corporate sponsor.

No comment is better than trivializing this and sounding like complete collaborators. There's the old saw about the only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good [people] to do nothing. I don't expect the athletes to DO anything, but words are also actions. They're not responsible for this, how it's handled isn't their call, but PLEASE stop fucking acting like a fucking weasel. Shut the fuck up and just let Ashley Wagner and Bode Miller talk.