At the start of December I received a message from one of the Factory women wanting to talk about opportunities for People of Colour in the club. She doesn’t know this but my initial thoughts ranged from “Oh do we really need to throw a party for every different person in the club?” to “So many Asians play Ultimate!” - real classy, Laura.
I tell this story not to announce my bigotry to the entire Australian Ultimate community, nor to compare opportunities for PoC in Ultimate and the issues I raise in this article as like for like. Rather I tell this in the hope of demonstrating that, whether we see it or not, we carry our privilege in our right (dominant*) hands, ready to defend ourselves against any and all squeaks from those who dare to say “Oi can I get a bloody look in?”.
For the rest of this article, especially if you come from NSW or VIC - but there are always snakes in the disadvantaged pack too “She needs to get over herself, I just get thrown to more because I can actually catch” - let’s just pop our privilege in our back pockets. Just for 5 minutes, I promise we’ll be ok without it.
With that lengthy preamble in place, I can now ask the question that this article will answer. That is:
“Are we selecting the most fair Representative Teams and, if not, does it even matter?”
I will argue that no, we’re not selecting the most fair Representative Teams. And yes, it matters. The stats below show that a huge portion of our National teams across the years have come from NSW and VIC. And these are just averages. Some teams we see are absolutely flooded with players from one state or another, often in line with the state that the head coach is from.
But Laura, you asked whether we’re selecting the most fair teams, not the most equally geographically represented across all states and territories every year for eternity teams! What about a coaches’ vision? What about the sheer player numbers from NSW and VIC? What about TeAm CoHeSiOn?! This is sport, woman, not kindergarten show and tell where EVERYONE GETS A GO! The whole POINT is that people miss out!!! DO YOU WANT TO GIVE EVERYONE A BLOODY JERSEY AND PARTICIPATION MEDALS SO THEY ALL FEEL GOOD ABOUT THEMSELVES?! HUH?
Woah haha calm down man why are you so worked up? Yeah great questions though glad you brought them up let’s have a look.
The AFDA lays out their commitment to fairness and anti-discrimination across their policies. In the AFDA Code of Conduct sections 4a-c, it states that
“The AFDA is committed to the fair treatment of all players involved in Ultimate Frisbee [...] regardless of gender, place of origin, colour, sexual orientation, religion, political belief or economic status.”
While this statement likely aligns more directly with Federal anti-discrimination law, as AFDA eludes to in its Member Protection Policy, it nevertheless echoes a sentiment that can be found in its Representative Teams Policy, U22 Ultimate Championships Policy, Youth Ultimate Championships Policy, Australian Ultimate Championships Division II Policy, Gender Equity Policy, and within the goals of the Member Protection Policy, where the AFDA lays out a consideration of timing of tournaments, the location of tournaments, the provision of elite pathways for young players, and the recognition of systemic and cultural biases within and outside of Ultimate. Upon reading these policies, it’s clear that the AFDA 1. Recognises that inequalities exist and 2. That they are committed to combating them.
One statement from section 1.3.3 of the Representative Teams Policy appears, however, to be particularly relevant to the initial question posed. It reads “The AFDA will select Players for the above tournaments with the aim of entering Teams that: achieve the best possible result in the competition, and play with Spirit of the Game.”
So, as a sport, we’re committed to fairness and equality but, at the end of the day we’ll be picking the best to represent us. Seems pretty legit and, after all, I love to win as much as the next “overly competitive” family member.
But, with our privilege sitting squarely off the table for this particular conversation, I have a few questions to ask.
Does the player arriving from WA at 8am directly off a red eye have a fair go at playing their best? Does the player from SA who knows almost no one at the selection event have a fair shot at showing their best? Does the QLD player who’s never met the coaches and selectors (instead of being good mates with them) actually feel like they will play their best? Does the player from ACT who’s driven 4-9hrs to get to the event because they had to save money on flights really have the same chance as someone who’s slept in their own bed the night before Day 1 to be their best?
Pause.
Fight the urge to say “It’s not my fault that I’m better than them, if they want to make a team then they should just be better.”
Let’s take a break - BREATHE - from looking at fair representation and move on to whether it even bloody matters.
Well, firstly, as I’ve already described, the AFDA has laid out in its policies that literally govern this sport that they are committed to fairness and equality. It’s not just a warm and fuzzy sentiment that the bloody spirit of the game warriors love but actual cold hard policy. Boom. One point for Laura. Fairness matters.
You’re not from Canberra so don’t care much about policy? Fine.
Let’s break down how our Representative Teams are aiming for the best.
As above, inequality is leading to an inability for coaches and selectors to see the best that Australia at large has to offer. Apart from all of the tangibles of travel, costs, relationships, and sleep, we non-NSW/VIC players are fighting against a prejudice towards NSW and VIC. Every selection event you go to, the fact that you’re from ACT, QLD, or WA (oh shit, SA too, don’t forget SA) is a silent strike against you. That’s called internalised bias. You must prove that you’re worth a look in and there’s no room for mistakes.
The NSW and VIC players are kinda like a cis-gendered, white, male executive: You feel very confident that they’ll get the job done because they look like what we’re used to seeing in that role. If it comes down to picking a NSW/VIC rookie or an ACT rookie, you’ll pick the NSW/VIC one because you feel more secure in that choice because “all our best players come from NSW/VIC.” At Nationals, these players wear the right jersey so selectors feel like surely they’ve made the right decision. Don’t get me wrong, these players will do a great job. But we’re not aiming for great, we’re aiming for the best.
This is what the kids call privilege and it’s within our scope as a sport, and our scope as moral individuals, to work to close the distance between the have’s and the have-not’s. Boom. Two points for Laura. Fairness matters.
You don’t care about morality? Fine. You seem to overwhelmingly be in the majority of the human race.
To finish my crusade to demonstrate that we need fair Representative Teams in order to be our best, I pose the question, if no one feels represented, is the team truly representative?
Representation is integral to the growth and promotion of our sport. While we’re a long way from the days of all mixed tournaments with a 5/2 gender split, we’ve got a long way to go before we’re a big sport. And if we want to get there, we need to act with the professionalism and integrity deserved of a big sport. Never mind that we’re still an amateur sport that relies on the volunteered commitment of otherwise fully complete adults to perform on the world stage simply in their free time. Our player base is not guaranteed.
Straight up, the players outside the big states do not feel represented. So why on earth would we show up? For the pleasure of sharing sweaty air with the country’s “greats”? Because “even just going to these events is a massive achievement”? Well yeah but we want on the teams too. And as much as our little internalised belief that NSW/VIC players are inherently better than us might scream and shout, we deserve to be on the teams too (every non-NSW/VIC player should have this written as an affirmation on their bathroom mirror).
For multiple Australian U24 women’s campaigns, the general feeling in the ACT was that some of our best players got shafted. Whether or not this is true is somewhat beside the point. What matters is that this sense of injustice and lack of respect for our incredible growing players means that ACT women are far less likely to try out for Stingrays as compared to Bluebottles, which have historically hosted a number of ACT players.
In the last AUL, Canberra Freeze announced their team. Notable local omissions are Caitlin Grange and Bill Foreman who each have clear non-ACT counterparts who have been chosen over them. It suffices to say that basically no one in Canberra cared about the AUL that season. We didn’t have anyone we wanted to cheer on. The team didn’t feel like ours and even the Canberra players on it felt disengaged from the season.
Disengagement, as demonstrated in these two examples, means that we miss the step, the integral step, of inspiration. Without inspiration, there’s no moment that makes a player go “I’m going to go out and throw every day so that I can throw like her”. Without inspiration, the next Liz Edye, the next Abbie Dawson, the next Jono Holmes, the next Monambi Wiya might just decide to stay home. And then our Representative Teams do not contain Australia’s best.
Boom. Three points for Laura. Fairness matters.
In this article I discuss issues of inequality, privilege, and internalised bias in the context of selections for Australian Representative Ultimate teams. While this discussion is located within the context of geographical inequalities in an amatuer sport, it also touches briefly - explicitly and implicitly - on inequalities and discrimination in wider society. I therefore find it appropriate to recognise my own positionality for the purpose of transparency, honesty, self-reflection as I write this article.
My positionality is important in recognising my own experiences in this life, and where they are limited. I am a straight, white, cis-gendered woman who has gained greatly from what society has historically determined to be favourable. I have lived the majority of my life in Australia which has a unique social, political, and economic history, just as each country, city, town, and village equally has their own. This history has shaped my views and life experience. I have educated myself both formally and informally on racism, gender diversity, sexuality, privilege, and socioeconomic disadvantage, though recognise that this understanding is not comparable to the lived experiences of others.
I don't quite follow the bit about unfair travel times. The Canberra players have shorter drives to both Melbourne and Sydney than their counterparts. If the trials are held in Perth, wouldn't the vast majority of people trying out have the same issues regarding jet lag as the WA players flying to the east coast?
Australia is a large country and ultimate players are generally located in the capital cities. Any selection event held in any city, regardless of which one, will benefit the players who live there. I'm not sure what can be done to solve the complexities of distance.