Truth Be Told: The Fight for Women’s Professional Soccer

ESPN Daily

ESPN

Sports

4.6 • 3.9K Ratings

🗓️ 4 October 2022

⏱️ 54 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Nearly a year ago, the National Women’s Soccer League faced a crisis. Explosive allegations from players of abuse, sexual harassment, and unrelenting coercion by one of the NWSL’s most successful head coaches set off a reckoning across the entire league. The commissioner resigned. Games were canceled. Players had no collective bargaining agreement and the specter of a canceled season loomed, all while governing bodies opened investigations into misconduct and toxic work environments. And on Monday, a long-awaited report investigating the failures of the NWSL was released by former acting attorney general Sally Yates, which detailed systemic abuse within the league, and specifically “a culture of abuse, silence, and fear of retaliation” that perpetuated the misconduct. Jennifer Karson-Strauss directed the new E60 film, “Truth Be Told: The Fight for Women’s Professional Soccer,” and joins the show to discuss the film’s investigation into allegations of abuse, sexual coercion and a toxic work environment in the league, as well as the lack of action taken by NWSL leadership. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	A highly anticipated report finally dropped yesterday from no less than the former acting
0:09.7	attorney general of the United States.
0:12.8	Sally Yates detailed the failures and the toxicity of the National Women's Soccer League after
0:18.6	a year-long investigation.
0:21.0	A culture of abuse, silence, and fear of retaliation perpetuated a misconduct.
0:28.3	In this environment, many players and team staff members have believed that reporting
0:33.5	misconduct would be fuel and it would actually be detrimental to their careers.
0:38.2	Normalization of this conduct allowed teams the League and the Federation to ignore their
0:43.8	respective responsibilities of addressing abuse of conduct.
0:50.4	That conduct and the NWSL's refusal to address it happened to be the focus of both the
0:55.5	episode you are about to hear and a new E60 film, Truth Be Told, the Fight for Women's
1:01.9	Professional Soccer that's been in the works for months now.
1:06.0	And so we should note that today's show contains depictions of sexual coercion and abuse.
1:15.0	Jennifer Carson Strauss, we're here to discuss a specific year inside the National Women's
1:19.8	Soccer League.
1:20.8	That is really just unlike anything else that's happened in a professional sports league
1:24.6	that I can recall.
1:26.2	And the film you directed about it for E60 with Lisa Salter's reporting, it begins at
1:31.2	one very specific moment.
1:33.4	So what was it and when was it?
1:36.6	Yeah, October 6, 2021, almost a year ago, all games across the country in the National
1:45.1	Women's Soccer League stop play in the sixth minute, which had never been done before.
	...

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