Kyle Beach Forces NHL to Confront Themselves With Abuse Accusations


An investigation commissioned by the Chicago Blackhawks top officials ignore a player’s accusation of sexual assault It was revealed by a coach during the 2010 playoffs that this player was Kyle Beach.

a interview on national television In Canada on Wednesday, Beach was asked if the 16-year-old had a message that video coach Brad Aldrich was later convicted of sexual harassment in Michigan in 2013.

“I’m sorry,” Beach said. “I’m sorry I didn’t do as much as I could to make sure nothing happened to you. To protect him.”

Beach was the victim of both Aldrich’s inappropriate behavior and the National Hockey League’s indifference, as the investigation report makes clear. As a 20-year-old minor league player whose career was in the hands of Aldrich and other coaches and members of the Chicago organization, he had the least power, but still did his best to draw attention to Aldrich’s behavior and was one of the best. a few people who said they were sorry.

The results, NHL Florida Panthers Coach Joel Quenneville, who led the Blackhawks in 2010, resigned after meeting with NHL commissioner Gary Bettman on Thursday. On Friday, Bettman decided not to punish Winnipeg Jets General Manager Kevin Cheveldayoff, who became assistant general manager at the Blackhawks in 2010. owner of the Blackhawks Wrote a letter to the Hockey Hall of Fame He wants Aldrich’s name removed from the Stanley Cup.

The entire hockey culture, from the children’s divisions to the NHL, is once again under the microscope. It’s a familiar location for a sport that has been flooded with accusations and lawsuits centered on harassment, abuse, misogyny and racism in recent years. But hockey’s cultural problems seem to come at a time when it’s impossible to ignore and the results are calculated – albeit belatedly.

“I hope he can make a systematic change to ensure this process never happens again,” Beach said.

Beach’s accusations were first made public in an ongoing lawsuit against the Blackhawks in May, but an investigation commissioned by the team immediately revealed that he had told a coach he had been assaulted in 2010.

Fourteen former players in an amateur Canadian league have recently filed a lawsuit. sexually and physically assaulted while being harassed when they were young. A former coach for a Pittsburgh Penguins minor league member accused the team of firing him after he reported that a boss had sexually abused his wife. An Instagram group chat leak among a number of top actors has revealed what they’re up to. misogynistic comments about sexual conquests and other players’ girlfriends and wives. a former NHL player born in Nigeria accused a coach of referring to him with a racial slur and described a former teammate who broke his teeth as a “racist sociopath”.

Sheldon Kennedy, a former NHL player who disclosed that he was sexually abused by a coach while playing junior hockey in the 1990s, said these seemingly disparate issues are all interrelated. “All these things are basically under the same umbrella. It’s about discrimination, it’s about inclusivity.”

The typical setting – dreams of being a hockey star, extreme power imbalances, the pressure to point out tough, and the culture of sweeping it under the rug – is an incubator for toxic behavior.

Or as Kennedy said during a phone call while doing chores on his farm in Saskatchewan: “All one has to do is raise their hand as a Timbit hockey coach and they are the God of under-8 kids.”

Organizations that ignore or cover up reports of sexual assault are not unique to hockey. But these problems may be exacerbated in hockey or other sports that Loretta Merritt, a Canadian lawyer who represents victims of sexual abuse, describes as “more macho boys’ club type sports.” Merritt wondered if the hockey culture had led Aldrich, who said his sexual contact with Beach was consensual, to think there was “more tolerance or willingness to turn a blind eye to some kind of connivance. Probably.”

After the investigative report was released Tuesday, the NHL fined the Chicago team $2 million for “inadequate internal procedures and inadequate and untimely response,” and further consequences followed, including the resignations of two senior Blackhawks officials and Quenneville. But that’s not the hard part, said Kennedy, who believes talking about difficult issues and reporting abuses should be embedded in a team’s ambitions, just like trying to win the Stanley Cup.

“These are easy answers,” he said. “We’re going to punish you. You have to resign. These are the norm. That’s your attorney’s advice. To me, it’s about culture change.”

His message was echoed by Ken Dryden, Hall of Fame goalkeeper for the Montreal Canadiens and a former Canadian cabinet minister in recent years. leading critic About how the league handled concussions.

“Often on big questions like this, only the voices of the commentators are heard and the decision makers are off the hook,” Dryden said in an email that declined to be interviewed. “To me, someone else’s voice is just a distraction,” he added.

Statements have been plentiful in recent days from the NHL, the Blackhawks, the players association, Quenneville, and Blackhawks president Stan Bowman, who resigned on Tuesday after the investigation report was released. There were fewer apologies and admissions of guilt.

“Today’s penalty represents a direct and necessary response to the Club’s failure to follow up and address the 2010 incident in a timely and appropriate manner,” Bettman said. Declaration process-oriented and full of law.

Despite the constant rhythm of episodes showing the powerhouses failing to root out abusive behavior in hockey, there have been tremendous cultural shifts on sexual abuse and other issues. Merritt has filed dozens of lawsuits against the Toronto Maple Leafs and their employees and owners. Maple Leaf Gardens sexual abuse scandal of the 1990s.

“What institutions did when I started to practice in this field in the 90s is different from what institutions do today,” he said. “Twenty or thirty years ago, people wouldn’t even come forward because they wouldn’t believe it.”

No matter how badly his accusations were handled by the Blackhawks, Beach was believed. He was told by an ice skating coach, by a former Blackhawks assistant coach, by several former teammates and family, who raised the alarm. “I knew I wasn’t alone,” she said in a television interview. “And I could never thank them enough for doing that because it gave me the strength to keep moving forward.”

Merritt noted that widespread disclosures about sexual abuse in the Catholic Church and the Academy Award-winning film “Spotlight” help change how this type of abuse is culturally viewed. In hockey, people like Kennedy and Theo Fleury, who say it’s him. harassed by the same teacher Martin Kruze, who was the first to report the abuse that would become the Kennedy and Maple Leaf Gardens scandal, and then he killed himselfhelped create the conditions that would make it easier for Beach to report his abuse in 2010, with some consequences in 2021.

However, substantial change usually only occurs when mandated by law. “You don’t see radical changes in laws or people’s behavior very often,” Merritt said. “Things tend to move gradually. But when they are held to account, their wallets are hit with fines or other penalties, their behavior starts to change when a lawsuit is filed in the courts.”

In the unemotional and often damning language of newspapers and websites covering hockey, Beach, now 31, was a hit. The 11th pick of the 2008 draft, he never made it to the NHL and has spent the last few years bouncing around in the European leagues. The Canadian was not seen as tough enough, talented enough, or hard-working enough.

Now we know you’re dealing with trauma. “The shame and guilt, the effect is real,” Kennedy said. “I wasn’t ready to answer these questions. When these things happen, you’ll never be able to live up to your potential, not just in sports, but in life.”

So Beach’s legacy is being reevaluated in hockey. But will this reassessment and questioning spread to the rest of the sport – and will it stick?



Source link

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *