I think all of us know that we have strengths and weaknesses.. writing is not one of my strengths... I know that... I have know it for a long time... I just can't NOT write about this.
I saw these three tweets from Miriti Murungi last night and they so perfectly stated what I've felt for a long time.
An example: Much of the talk around U.S. Soccer and racism is centered on its reaction to kneeling and protest, which is important, but not as important as U.S. Soccer reckoning with its own systemic racism. A statement or convenient pivot shouldn't absolve you from this work.— Miriti Murungi (@NutmegRadio) June 13, 2020
And that "work" has to be public-facing and transparent. People always want to say sorry when the winds have shifted while refusing to take any responsibility for why the apology was necessary in the first place.— Miriti Murungi (@NutmegRadio) June 13, 2020
This is why a lot of these reactions today are so tiring. They're just statements without any discernible action plan or admission of complicity. There's no accounting for lives already altered while entire institutions were in denial mode. There's literally no hard work done.— Miriti Murungi (@NutmegRadio) June 13, 2020
We have been given nothing but words... we have been given no action attempting to solve the issues that underpin the inequality in the game in the United States.
Back in 2016 there was a great article written about the results of all of these systemic issues that was accurately titled "It's Only Working For the White Kids". Nothing has changed in the last 4 plus years, quite possibly things have gotten worse since then.
'It’s only working for the white kids': American soccer's diversity problem https://t.co/M5eMPQOkSl The story was accurate in 2016, it is just as accurate, if not more so in 2019. Time for change to happen.— Doug Andreassen (@dandreassen) June 14, 2019
The Federation has cared so little about diversity over the last few years that they removed the Diversity Task-force as a standing committee.
I want to remind everyone that currently @ussoccer has a non-existent Diversity Taskforce. It has been removed > https://t.co/JfhbwABbLE— Chris Kessell (@THEChrisKessell) June 8, 2020
This review & possible vote about the National Anthem/Kneeling Policy rings hollow without the revival of this all too important taskforce
I am going to say this as succinctly as I can...
The soccer system in the United States is not "broken" the system is working exactly as designed.
By continually saying that it is "broken" it hides the fact that the system from top to bottom has been purposely designed to work the way that it does by the people in power within the game. The rules and regulations that govern every aspect of the game were not random occurrences. These bylaws and policies were put on paper with the intent of creating the system that we have.
By saying that "soccer is broken" we are stating as fact that "Soccer leadership in the United States designed this system over the last several decades to work in a different way but through things out of our control it ended up giving us these bad results". That just isn't true... the system of how soccer is managed has been designed in the United States to create artificial scarcity from youth soccer through adult soccer along with creating a series of gatekeepers who get to decide who is allowed to participate and in what way.
That is not a design flaw... that is the design.
Until the United States Soccer Federation decides to change how soccer works in this country nothing is going to change.We can not "change gate keepers" our way out of a purposely exclusionary system.
Are you really going to tell me that all the African American, Hispanic, and rural communities that are locked out of the current system wouldn't build something for themselves if we didn't have gate keepers in place & the rules that they built to give themselves power?— Chris Kessell (@THEChrisKessell) June 4, 2020
Having a new person in charge of a league or even the Federation isn't going to magically give access to the game to all the people who want to be participants. It is going to take a redesign of the rules that govern the way the game works in the United States to do that.
Having a SINGLE unified system for soccer in the United States that anyone can join and merit determines your place in is how we fix soccer in the US. If we actually want soccer to be for everyone, we must allow everyone to be able to participate.
Think about the absurdity of this statement here from @Kephern_Fuller— Chris Kessell (@THEChrisKessell) June 4, 2020
"they would laugh if an all black investor group wanted to build a club."
Nobody should HAVE TO ASK to build a soccer club and invest in the game in the US!!!!!!
Think about the rules that exist in soccer in the United States from youth soccer, through amateur adult soccer, all the way to the top levels of professional soccer. A club has to apply and be accepted (and pay an expansion fee!) or you don't get to participate. Those are the rules... that is how the system was designed.
It was DESIGNED to exclude those that the ones in power did not want to participate. It was DESIGNED to create artificial scarcity. It was DESIGNED to limit competition.
That isn't a broken system.
This is how soccer leadership in the United States WANTED it to work.
If you don't want to see soccer in the United States work this way any more please speak up for systemic change, please speak up for #ProRelForUSA, please speak up for changes in the Professional League Standards, please speak up for changes in how membership is decided in your State Association, in your league, in every league, please speak up for CHANGE. We are who are going to have to fight for change. We can't expect changing a single gatekeeper to "fix" whats "broken".
