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Who Cares? Women and Children in Chess Commentary in five parts, from TheParrot
7-29-2006 Months ago the Parrot wrote to the USCF board via Bill Hall Executive Director of USCF, asking after standards in place to avert offense to women and children in chess. These concerns, although according to Hall were delivered to the board, have not been addressed nor even acknowledged. Perhaps this is a cultural thing, but in some cultures is not dishonorable nor some game of politically correct words, to actively protect women and children from offence - in fact it is considered manly. The issues before the board were about the treatment of women and children, and the lack of standard evident in the works of USCF agents paid and unpaid – and who even sometimes wrote anonymously, but let it be known that they wrote as USCF agents. And what happens if you don’t … Now we have a collision of speculations about new board member Sam Sloan's standards with these non-existent USCF standards. Anyone with the slightest psychological nous can notice that some of Sloan's distracters seem far more into 'a little dirt' than he is himself. And actually as likely to act out their repressed adolescent fantasies by continuously exciting the subject. This is not quite the proper place to discuss such material – but a nod to the wise! Similarly, this is no endorsement of Sloan - and not a commentary on any specific individuals at all. So what is the point? ETHICS ANYONE? What is essentially addressed is the highly personalised culture in which chess operates in the USA. USCF could have acted to make standards that were observable by all - and to limit unwonted and gratuitous offense. But it shirked the task - and such people as mocked Larry Evans’ journalism, Jennifer Shahade's memoir on women in chess, now mock this care of women and children.
Part 2, 8-5-2006 Jerry Hanken, President of the Chess Journalists of America, has suggested relieving a newsgroup ‘discussion’ with a serious address to the issues raised in it. I agree, or rather acknowledge that he seconds a widespread attempt to do so, which I raised here a few days ago. The fact that it does not seem widespread is that it is a dirty subject! And, since many people who read in that newsgroup also report chess, perhaps understandably they don't want to broadcast negative associations to do with chess. However oriented one may be to this topic I assert that a considerable sociological concern exists in the general public. We only see some surface factors represented - but the subject is a substantial one, and I hope that CJA will want to investigate this factor of decency properly in Chicago, for it seems to me to be a significant factor of the modern chess scene. I contrast this with any chauvinism or overly friendly approach to chess organizations, since, to paraphrase Susan Polgar, - it's about the welfare of children contacting the chess scene - a point quite distinct from the welfare of chess organizations or adults engaged in them. Two aspects seem necessary to properly address the issue: (1) The first must be to admit there is a problem! - and while I am aghast that the USCF board has not chosen to notice my letter to them [which contained several references to highly questionable standards of behavior, as well as sexually explicit ones], neither have I seen them address the issue with any other party. Does USCF actually care enough to act? (2) It is essential that the issue be depersonalized. A serious address to standards of behavior cannot be confounded with political differences or matters of personal taste relating to what is sometimes juvenile braggadocio, which is otherwise a legally permitted expression, no matter the age of the writer. A considerable psychological point is that people likely to occasion offense [to act on their fantasies] are not those most obvious persons who initially excite issues. Therefore standards are necessary which relate to all people, otherwise the result is that a stalking-horse for these issues will be transmogrified into a scapegoat for them - removing surface tension, but doing nothing to address what lurks beneath. ------- Those are some elements which I would hope CJA might discuss among themselves, and then press the attendees in Chicago to acknowledge then make response to. By doing so, CJA as a news organization reporting chess, would at least contact people’s interest! It is merely an aside, but I notice that in the newsgroup interchange, the question why SPF could initially [and regularly] generate the $300k for chess scholarships, and why USCF cannot, has been glossed as if of no importance. But I think it is one of the most important factors that USCF with all its resources and relatively huge staff compared to SPF, cannot even attract that sort of money, never mind deploy it better. I am suggesting the reason for this is the EVIDENT standards between the two organizations, and as they say, the sincerest form of flattery is money! As Larry Parr has often pointed out in this and other forums, the amount of money in the chess system is minute! Mainstream education where chess could be deployed is where the action is; but mainstream education has standards, entirely necessary standards, about the interactions of adults with all our children.
Part 3, 8-12-2006 What we need to do about chess education in the US and worldwide is to have a debate and a conference to confront some current issues in chess education and chess-culture in by a series of discussion I here propose would involve the active agents of scholastic encouragement in this country and overseas – and these people would be called the kids, with some wise old owls who previously encountered all these issues, and who would reflect and feed-back on the efforts of the 'kids'. Kids team: to include Susan Polgar, Sunil Weeramantry, Maurice Ashley, Joel Lautier, Nigel. Short [who currently heads up the Commonwealth Chess Scene.] Owls team: Ray Keene, Larry Evans, Sam Palatnik, T. Braunlich, Bessel Kok and Mikhail Kornenman & Anatoly Karpov.
Part 4, 8-26-2006 1) An ethical issue I anticipated 4 months ago about the /then current/ lubricious activity of certain USCF officers was ignored by the USCF board. Therefore current comment in respect of new board member Sam Sloan's moral stance are confounded with his recent political success, to the degree that they become inseparable.
2) I should
like to suggest that the basis of resolution for these issues be attended to
by these means: that the perspective taken be by persons affronted by
lubricious materials - and I understand these to comprise the constituencies
of (a) women in chess, and (b) children in chess. Women should of course
speak directly to the issue themselves, but as with a general orientation in
our society I understand that they resent inclusion and representation of
themselves from an [immature] male point of view, and particularly dislike
being represented as sex-objects.
I should like USCF
and any other chess organization, to consider a formal requirement that
scholastic teachers and also administrators in scholastic chess be required
to undergo background checks – and clearly represent in public if they have
or have not undergone such a test - as indeed one is required to do simply
to run a chess club in a public school.
6) Four months after raising the issue, no action has been taken to even acknowledge the complaint.
Part 5, 9-9-2006 According to Jim Hopper, Ph.D. who is a researcher and therapist with a doctorate (Ph.D.) in clinical psychology, for Federal fiscal year 2004, an estimated 3 million children were alleged to have been abused or neglected and received investigations or assessments by State and local child protective services (CPS) agencies. Approximately 872,000 children were determined to be victims of child maltreatment. This means that on average, 50 children per DAY per STATE are upheld in their complaint. These abuses are not necessarily sexual in nature and may simply involve beatings or sufficient neglect [often starvation] that causes authorities to hear and to investigate. So to whom are you entrusting your children? Do these people in chess teaching and mentoring have background checks? After several successful prosecutions in the past few years of sexual predation in chess mentoring/tutoring activity including that of a Grandmaster there is a mixed reaction from various agencies concerned with this issue, as well as in the consideration of denigrating treatment of women in chess. Some people ask, “Problem? What problem?” and decline to look. A majority of rated chess players are in the ‘Scholastic’ age group. And to reiterate: four months ago I made a specific complaint to the board of USCF and was assured by the Executive Director in an hour-long conversation on the telephone that it had been placed before the board, and zzzzzzzz … not even an acknowledgement. Perhaps these things are only resolved in court-rooms these days?
Part 6, 9-16-2006 Cassandra here! And reporting horrible news – do we admit a problem yet? You don’t have to like reading the following, or like the reporter for speaking of it, but if you like kids you really do have to read it : 13 September, 2006: An organizer who had just recently [August] advertised in Chess Life Magazine [name and location of accused suppressed by the Parrot], is a teacher and faces 30 Charges of Incest and Rape. The head of ** High School's math department, and a prominent chess player, has been ordered held on $1 million bail today after being arraigned on 30 felony rape and incest charges. The accused was arrested Tuesday on 19 counts of incest and 11 counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault. He is accused of sexually assaulting three young women, two now in their teens and one in her early 20s. Police said one of the women had reported that ** began assaulting her five years ago when she was 10. In addition to teaching, ** organizes chess tournaments around the region, and runs the high school's chess club. His daughter and two sons all are nationally ranked chess players, according to various chess Web sites. The accused has a doctorate.
9-23-2006 Part 7 - Lay down your weary head. After writing for 2 weeks in public and private newsgroups about the perils of scholastic chess, as illustrated by recent events, there appear to be two schools of thought concerning future action: (1) the first is concerned with the liability of the organization which sponsors, promotes or advertises scholastic teachers, and (2) the second centers on the welfare of the child, itself. Viewpoint #1 is characterized by very sensible and practical concerns, which seek to reduce liability, especially over things which it views, rightly or wrongly, as beyond its control. The result of this policy of inaction is to secure the chess organization, but completely at the expense of what is addressed by Viewpoint #2, the young chess-player. Arguments for #1 utilize a business model of restricted liabilities to its main market, the scholastic one. Arguments for #2 suggest that non-profits are established for something beyond strictly business functions, and for the benefit of the chess community – therefore Qui Bono? Does anyone benefit from this divorce between functionality and ethical concern? If anyone did care – anyone with deep pockets – they might consider conferencing on this subject, not only on predators in the chess community, but on broader aspects of integrating chess into mainstream activities, in schools and in the media. As chess players we all know the certain benefits of the activity, and have read hundreds of pages of encouragement and recommendations which are pro-chess as a healthy social activity, especially for children. But what is the current state of the game? Are social benefits to the child so completely divorced from the social responsibility of organizers? Apparently so. If Mr. or Ms. Deep Pockets is reading this, and feels moved to engage this topic further, please send the Parrot a line or two, otherwise this series of inquiries titled Who Cares? about the welfare of children on the chess scene, can lay down its weary editorial head, and we can all continue with business as usual.
9-30-2006, Part 8: It’s not over ‘til… After abandoning this subject last week, correspondence on the subject revived, with the following results, not only in chess, but of other American youth institutions. The serious issues of abuse troubling the scholastics world in chess, and indeed in very many forms of youth leadership in American life, which have been addressed by USCF’s pundits only to the degree of organizational liability - and addressed with a misplaced confidence and assurance - since there are existing lawsuits with Little League and the Boy Scouts which have found against these institutions, either in neglecting their charges entirely, or for failing to deploy existing safe-guards. In the chess world there is virtually no address to this subject from the abused person's point of view, as if the scholastic scene in chess were nothing other than a market to which businesses make money, and have no other responsibility toward. It is harder for non-profits to claim the same limited [and false sense of] liability, yet in other forums this is precisely the case that has been made for USCF itself, it being argued to be a business, and that it should proceed in respect of the scholastic community only as a market as other businesses do, and that it has no other obligations whatever. Nobody feels any pain - and some writers have committed thousands of words to trivialize and divert the issue, and suggest why offenses should not be fairly assessed, by actually looking at the extent and momentum of abused women and children.
What do you think? Come on, write to The Parrot and let us know your thoughts!! Return to Alekhine's Parrot
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