The horrible affair that has been stirring the Canadian world of junior hockey in general and Hockey Canada in particular for more than a week teaches us to what extent cultural changes take place in resistance and blindness in certain sclerotic circles. This is apparently the case of the world of junior hockey, whose culture of unhealthy mistreatment and the reign of omerta are illustrated in a lamentable way in this latest scandal revealed by a sports journalist from the TSN network.
Journalist Rick Westhead revealed on May 26 that Hockey Canada has settled an alleged gang rape involving eight junior hockey players who attacked a young woman in a gang after a Hockey Canada gala in June. 2018. The court documents consulted by the reporter Westhead tell a horror story: going up to a hotel room with a player, the complainant then found seven others who allegedly gang-raped her. The story did not make it past the courts, and neither the victim nor the players are known to the general public. We know, however, by resuming the junior roster this year that it is certain that of the eight alleged sexual abusers, a majority would currently play in the National Hockey League (NHL). What to be “discouraged and disgusted”, to use the expression of the federal Minister of Sports, Pascale St-Onge. But there is more to incite ire.
Added to the scandal is an apparent attempt by Hockey Canada, one of the parties sued in civil proceedings by the plaintiff, to hush up the affair without demanding that the facts speak, the truth triumph and, if necessary, punish the culprits: by stifling history under a secret deal, the organization has miserably passed the test of dignity. She is out of her time, and drags her feet in a backward-looking culture that disrespects rights.
Since this story was revealed, the political world has not taken off. Minister St-Onge skilfully pulls the only strings she has: by asking for a financial audit, she wants to know if the national sports federation used public funds to crush a story that could have tarnished its image. The case would be very serious if that were the case. The NHL says it wants to investigate, and we can easily understand why: of the 22 players who made up the junior roster in 2018, only 2 did not play games in the NHL during the last season. If sex offenders are puck-and-stick in the league, the league needs to know who they are in order to take action. This situation would be untenable. We need only remember the outcry that was provoked last summer by the draft by the Montreal Canadiens of player Logan Mailloux, convicted in Sweden of sexual misconduct. If the world of hockey has not evolved, society is elsewhere.
The most ossified environments are slow to understand the importance of cultural changes, and even more so to implement them. In 2020, a report commissioned by the Canadian Hockey League, responsible for junior hockey, concluded that “misconduct” existed off the ice and that the systemic culture embedded in the league had made it an impossible “cultural norm”. to denounce. “Abuse that, outside of hockey, would not be acceptable is now an ingrained behavior in this hierarchical organization, and its degree of acceptance is too great. Has Hockey Canada responded to that same outdated code of conduct? She has to explain herself.