There is silence that is thunderous, whose enormity rumbles louder than any sound. There are silences that signify the present absence, the immeasurable weight of whatever comes to one’s mind – and the body – as one attempts to fill that space with what is known to be there. These are the silent ones who suffocate.
“Have you ever walked into an empty stadium? take the test Stand in the middle of the square and listen. Nothing is emptier than an empty stadium. Nothing is more silent than the stands without someone.” In Soccer in the Sun and Shadow, Eduardo Galeano describes with enviable clarity the weight of some silences, the presence in the absence. I do the Uruguayan a disservice by using his clear expressions to convey something so awkward and dark, but it’s difficult to describe the image or the sound. Perhaps the lack of the latter is the most difficult thing to convey, how do you explain a deafening sound through silence? Some have used the analogy of stadiums or arenas to explain dynamics and behaviors in relation to social networks and public discourse. Ok, let’s use it then. At this stage, where everything is at stake: opinion, (dis)information, (dis)qualification, harassment, (dis)connection and so on, there is also nothing less stupid than putting down the cell phone and so on do that the voices heard there – at least symbolically – do not speak.
Digital violence is a new challenge that didn’t come with the Women’s League but has brought conversations that didn’t happen before into focus. It’s not that footballers or male journalists aren’t being attacked, it’s just that they just haven’t made it their mission to talk about it, make it visible and fight it. The normalization of violence between men means that when women point out the same situations, we are labeled as exaggerated or these statements may only catch the eye at first glance. It is not surprising, therefore, that the accompaniment and understanding of loved ones, the institutional processes, the police accompaniment, the legislative pathways and everything that must be considered to combat and eradicate this violence are so archaic and advance on an ice step . Legal and institutional loopholes have allowed great talent to flee, although this permeates even more severely among those who may not have as much attention or opportunities to position themselves.
This is why digital violence is so gruesomely and, paradoxically, so visibly hidden. All of us who are in this stadium – sometimes as spectators, sometimes as protagonists – can witness it, and yet we ignore its consequences. We see the punches but not the bruises. Such were the blows for the footballer (now ex) from America Scarlett Camberos, who announced her departure from the club and the country. The personal and digital worlds had merged, online bullying had moved into their physical space. Many other of their peers have come out to speak about the situation they are going through. Given their participation in such a masculinized and violent environment, we might think that the case of soccer players or sportswriters experiencing violence of this kind is unique. Unfortunately, this is only an enlargement of what the figures recently presented by UN Women show.
38% of women worldwide have personally experienced online violence and 85% of women online have experienced digital violence against other women. As I said, in the arena we are sometimes protagonists and sometimes witnesses, but mostly we are both. What pedagogy and what message are we giving to other women? That silence is always a better option, that self-censorship is the way not to end up like the others. What pedagogy and message are we giving to other men? That impunity is their great ally and that the violence they inflict on other men can easily be repeated and intensified without consequences in order to gain respect in the eyes of other men.
I imagine the footballers coming home after a game. The exhaustion that doesn’t end in deep sleep, too much adrenaline and the screams of the sold-out stadium still in my head. Recap every move, every salient moment of the meeting. Like everyone else, they take their cell phones with them when they are in bed and looking for a bit of rest. They enter the social network of their choice and begin to check what is being said in their “absence”. And there it is.
It means reading the lyrics in silence but listening to those millions of voices in your head. The words that go in like knives, the voice that tells you on the other side not to pay attention, this is internet stuff, that you have to do what they’ve been told so many times that “you do it must take from where it comes”. . The exit to the real field also brings with it an exit to the symbolic field. Unfortunately, there are no rules, no teammates, no referees and no timer in this one. It’s an eerie game that changes every moment and in which there is a new owner in the distance – Elon Musk – who has decided to turn this room into the Hunger Games and leave everyone to their fate.
Pain is more acute when expected, when the preamble of what is already known is present. Before the game begins, emotions are lived more intensely, all the possibilities of what is about to happen bubbling within, but there is one that cannot be erased, one that is there with the same clarity that you know it is it will kick off and close: the insult that ignites, the statement that’s ready to feed the fuse, running like the gunpowder thread in cartoons until it all explodes. The only thing we know for sure is that violence will fall again like poison rain. These voices ring out in the stillness of the solitude of the cell phone, the ride in the van, the attentive gaze while putting the fork to the mouth, or the idle time waiting for the other person to arrive. Before each new interaction, each time off-screen life resumes, you must restart the machine, clear the disqualification memory and move on. Or at least that’s what’s expected, because when it comes to digital violence, it seems to stick with “they bother you online” for a lot of things.
Ana Paola López Irigoyen, a former women’s league soccer player and perhaps one of the few to speak publicly about the challenges and problems of the sport in which she recently starred, mentions that the players speak little because she is afraid losing their position and not those who sacrifice their careers to bring about change.
“Football is a bubble, also in the women’s field. They live in isolation, albeit perhaps a little more realistically than men. Also in women’s football, the longer you live in the bubble and the more ostracized you are, the better because it’s a model closer to men’s football, which is desirable,” he said. “It’s a matter of preparation and penetrating this type of subject. The football environment in this country is characterized by great inequality and the more international – generally more middle-class – visions on these issues are scarce. That’s why players who think that way mostly choose to go out with or without reflectors.”
The deafening silence of this metaphorical stadium grows vastly in the face of the literal silence of an audience that has accepted it into its normality to see a game with no referees, no timekeepers and, if not careful, possibly no players.