Sports and gym, good for kids?
Saturday morning on CBC – Gym teacher arrested in Nunavik – Coach accused of sexually abusing minors – High school coach acquitted of sex-related charges (there remains reasonable doubt, says judge) – tell me again why sports and gym are great for kids?
Chris 15:25 on 2025-03-01 Permalink
>tell me again why sports and gym are great for kids?
Is this a serious question? You are making an exception fallacy here.
Kate 16:01 on 2025-03-01 Permalink
It is a serious question.
Hardly a week goes by that my news sweep doesn’t turn up something about kids getting abused in some way while practising a sport. Bullying and hazing are the least of it – often it’s sexual. People are predictably corrupted by having authority, even the small bit of authority that comes with running a kids’ sports team.
I’ve no kids, but if I did, and they wanted to practise a sport, the first thing I’d do is tell them: go ahead, but if anyone else involved, especially any adult, does anything to make you feel uncomfortable, you come and tell me, and you can stop anytime for any reason. And even then I’d be worried, because kids don’t always want to tell parents about incidents they feel are ambiguous or shameful.
Chris 16:16 on 2025-03-01 Permalink
>Hardly a week goes by that my news sweep doesn’t turn up something about kids getting abused
And what fraction of kids do you think this happens to? My point is that it’s very little. It’s like avoiding going for a walk because you might get hit by a car.
jeather 17:36 on 2025-03-01 Permalink
Sports are good for kids. Adults who get to be alone with children are the risk.
Ian 12:18 on 2025-03-02 Permalink
And once again, it’s not drag queens causing the problem.
m 14:48 on 2025-03-02 Permalink
“And what fraction of kids do you think this happens to? My point is that it’s very little. It’s like avoiding going for a walk because you might get hit by a car.”
The numbers I’ve heard are 1 in 6 girls and 1 in 12 boys are victims of some sort of sexual abuse before age of majority. So no, the fraction is NOT small.
Stats Can says 1 in 10 across the board before age 15. Still not a small number: https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/85-002-x/2022001/article/00016-eng.htm
walkerp 21:39 on 2025-03-02 Permalink
Yeah but most of those are not sports coaches.
Kate 22:34 on 2025-03-02 Permalink
Sadly, it’s likely that a lot of those stats are from family members or close contacts of families.
Chris 10:50 on 2025-03-03 Permalink
m, your own link basically proves my point. Although it doesn’t mention sports coaches specifically, the closest is “a small proportion (3.4%) of Canadians stated that the most serious incident of sexual abuse during childhood was perpetrated by a teacher, professor or tutor”.
Kate, definitely. “Stranger danger” is mostly a myth. Sexual assault, kidnapping, etc. is usually done by someone close. m’s link says only about 3% is perpetrated by strangers.
MarcG 10:06 on 2025-03-04 Permalink
These stats are horrifying.