Gabby Douglas, Aly Raisman, and Simone Biles were members of the US women’s gymnastics team that won gold at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games. But sadly, they got into a dispiriting Twitter spat two months ago.
It stemmed from Raisman speaking about her sexual abuse at the hand of their team doctor on 60 Minutes. No doubt she expected all of her former teammates to offer sympathy and support.
Instead, Douglas victim-blamed Raisman, tweeting in effect that sexual abuse is what happens when women/girls dress seductively. This provoked Biles to chastise Douglas for doing so.
Their tweets are not worth republishing. The point is that I commented on them as follows in “USA Gymnastics Sex-Abuse Shame: Gabby Victim-Blames Aly and Outrages Simone,” November 20, 2017.
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There’s no denying the indiscriminate and prolific nature of Nassar’s sexual abuse. Therefore, I have to wonder if Douglas and Biles reacted to Raisman’s testimonial based on similar experiences:
- Douglas exhibiting a form of Stockholm syndrome by blaming the victim and siding with their abuser
- Biles defending Raisman as much as fellow teammate as fellow victim of Nassar’s sexual abuse.
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Sure enough, the very next day, Douglas claimed #MeToo:
Gabby issued a statement Tuesday which started out by apologizing for her perceived victim shaming of ex-teammate Aly Raisman … and then dropped the bombshell that she, too, was a victim.
(TMZ, November 21, 2017)
Alas, it’s debatable whether she came forward in solidarity with her former teammate or out of shame from the backlash her victim-blaming provoked.
In any event, just as I also reasoned, Biles is now claiming #MeToo … too:
On the eve of former USA Gymnastics team doctor Larry Nassar’s sentencing for sexually abusing girls in his care, American gymnast Simone Biles has come forward to say me, too.
‘I, too, am one of the many survivors that was sexually abused by Larry Nassar,’ she said Monday afternoon in a Twitter post.
(CNN, January 16, 2018)
Reports are that nearly 100 of Nassar’s 140 victims signed up to give impact statements at his sentencing, which got underway yesterday in Lansing, Michigan. Their statements will run through Friday, at which point the judge is expected to add dozens of years to the 60 he’s already serving on child pornography charges.
As of this writing, it’s unclear if any of the “Fierce Five” Olympic champions from 2012 or the “Final Five” Olympic champions from 2016 will be making statements. Rumor has it that non-disclosure agreements with USA Gymnastics might prevent some of them from doing so. But no court would enforce such agreements in the circumstances.
Actually, I’d like to think these Olympic champions appreciate that this might be an occasion to let these relatively unknown gymnasts have the floor. After all, if one Olympian shows up, everyone in the media, perhaps even everyone in Court, might act as if all of the other victims are mere bystanders.
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Sex-abuse shame…