{"id":548,"date":"2021-06-22T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-06-22T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/sport-business\/reports\/the-pride-of-football-in-conversation-with-joanie-evans\/"},"modified":"2023-02-28T14:57:18","modified_gmt":"2023-02-28T14:57:18","slug":"the-pride-of-football-in-conversation-with-joanie-evans","status":"publish","type":"article","link":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/sport-business\/articles\/the-pride-of-football-in-conversation-with-joanie-evans\/","title":{"rendered":"The Pride of Football: in conversation with Joanie\u00a0Evans\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
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\n Jun 22, 2021 <\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/span>Articles<\/a>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t

The Pride of Football: in conversation with Joanie\u00a0Evans\u00a0<\/h1>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n \n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Category<\/div>\n Equality, Diversity & Inclusion<\/a>, Technology & Innovation<\/a> <\/div>\n
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https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/sport-business\/articles\/the-pride-of-football-in-conversation-with-joanie-evans\/<\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/section>\n\n\n\n\n
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The Co-President of the Federation of Gay Games talks football, inclusion and Pride.\u00a0<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Joanie Evans is a hugely influential figure in\u00a0LGBTQ+ advocacy in sport.\u00a0The founder of Hackney Women\u2019s Football Club,\u00a0<\/span>Europe’s first out lesbian football team, in 1986, Evans\u00a0was a top ten nominee for \u2018Outstanding Contribution to LGBT+ Life\u2019 in the British LGBT Awards\u00a0in 2019. She has been Co-President of the Federation of Gay Games since 2014.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

To mark Pride Month this June, we ask Evans to chart how far sport has come in its journey towards equality and the creation of inclusive environments, and how far is left to travel.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

How are you feeling now on a scale of 1-10?<\/span><\/b>\u202f<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ll say a\u00a0seven.\u00a0I think no one is really 100% at the moment because there\u00a0are\u00a0so many things going on in the world, but I try and keep myself up.\u00a0I don\u2019t ever want to get below\u00a0seven.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u202f<\/span><\/b>Why?<\/span><\/b>\u202f<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

At the moment I\u2019m dealing\u00a0with\u00a0grief, so naturally that doesn\u2019t put me on a\u00a0ten, but what keeps me at the\u00a0seven\u00a0is knowing that there\u2019s things that I can do;\u00a0that keeps me going on a daily basis;\u00a0and some days it can go up to\u00a0eight\u00a0or\u00a0nine, and it\u2019s just a case of trying to manage for now.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Can you name a personal triumph within the D&I space during the last 12\u202fmonths?<\/span><\/b>\u202f<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been able to have a few little triumphs due to the connections\u00a0that have been made throughout the pandemic, and I don\u2019t know if a lot of those would\u2019ve happened if we weren\u2019t in this current situation. I think a lot of things have come\u00a0up and been highlighted within EDI, and we\u2019ve seen more emphasis on\u00a0women\u2019s sport, which has been a great thing.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

There\u2019s also been a downside, because what it has done\u00a0is shown\u00a0up where there\u00a0have\u00a0been gaps\u00a0in everything, and now that people are seeing the gaps, we\u2019re now actually trying to fill them, but that process has been very slow. You just hope that when the world opens up, people don\u2019t forget about what\u2019s been going on. So, I don\u2019t think I\u2019ve made any personal triumphs because some of the opportunities just haven\u2019t been there, but one of the things I said I wouldn\u2019t do would be to say no to anything. I had to shield throughout most of the pandemic.\u00a0When we do eventually open\u00a0up, I want to connect more.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Can you speak to the significance of Pride in 2021?<\/span><\/b>\u202f<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I think this time round, I\u2019ve seen everything on social media, I\u2019ve never seen it picked\u00a0up so much. Literally every advert, with businesses that you wouldn\u2019t have even thought to think about it, are thinking about it. It would be great if it was a continual thing and not just for a month, like we could say for any of our month celebrations, Black History Month, for example. What it does is highlight that particular community at that time, and I think now\u00a0more than ever people are learning more about what people have to go through when discriminated against.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

For me, having Pride was like that permission to just go wild, you could be yourself that day. I remember the times when you only had a day for Pride, and now we have a whole month, and it is that whole act of a celebration of a community and yourself, and I have a couple of months per year that I can hang on to. I have Black History Month, Pride Month,\u00a0International\u00a0Women\u2019s\u00a0Day, and it\u2019s a slight shame you have to mark things by date, but what you would hope is that people will have Pride awareness all year round, and black awareness all year round.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

When I was at Hackney FC, we were a group of\u00a0women, and all lesbians, and when it was Pride month\/day, we would\u00a0march as a team, not just from Hyde Park to Trafalgar Square, but from Hyde Park to Brockwell Park, and it was much more of a statement back in the day, and at the time when Hackney FC was an out team, we kind of became celebrities\u00a0–\u00a0it was crazy.\u00a0Nowadays, I personally don\u2019t enjoy going\u00a0to\u00a0Pride now, as it doesn\u2019t seem to have the same feeling, not based upon community, and seems very commercial.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Looking specifically at the sports industry,\u202fboth on field\u202fand off, what bridges have\u202fbeen crossed during the past year\u202fin support of\u00a0the LGBTQ+ community?<\/span><\/b>\u202f<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

There\u2019s been a lot of discrimination which has now been connected to not allowing athletes to excel.\u00a0In women\u2019s football,\u00a0which is now coming to a point where it\u2019s on par with the men\u2019s game,\u00a0it\u2019s deemed perfectly acceptable to be an out player, and as the platforms\u00a0for female sports grow, so will its messages and morals, which for me, is one of the biggest bridges we\u2019re currently crossing.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We\u2019re also seeing an increased conversation around trans-athletes, and I think that will be the biggest\u00a0bridge to cross moving forward.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What are your\u202fplans for marking Pride Month\u202fat the Federation of Gay Games?<\/span><\/b>\u202f<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We will have various pieces of messaging across our social\u00a0media and\u00a0would hope that we have a presence at Pride all over the\u00a0world and\u00a0see the Federation of Gay Games marked at Pride in New York, Mexico, and elsewhere, but we currently don\u2019t have the resources to do what we really want, which is a\u00a0Catch-22 as our reach is so widespread, but resources are really limited.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What we\u2019re actively doing and able to support across various major sporting events, is work with an agency called Pride House, and offered assistance on some of the work they\u2019ve done.\u00a0They create safe spaces for LGBTQ+ athletes. 40 years going, and we\u2019re just about holding our heads above the water!<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u202f<\/span><\/b>What does allyship mean to you?<\/span><\/b>\u202f<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Allies:\u00a0you need them;\u00a0things work better when you work in unison with everybody. Having somebody who can speak up is so important, and we have to rely on allies because\u00a0they have\u00a0access, and can allow us to cross that bridge, which without their support we wouldn\u2019t be able to.\u00a0We also need to believe and realise that we can\u2019t do it on our own, and an important part in our role is being able to change people\u2019s hearts and minds around difference.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

When you have someone from another community stand\u00a0up for you it will have a great impact, because the people who believe in that person will then start to believe. As a community we know what we need and what we go through, which is why it\u2019s so important that when an ally speaks\u00a0up on our behalf, it carries so much power\u00a0and delivers\u00a0more of an impact. It\u2019s very simple, globally we need to be working for the same thing and understand how it spans across all areas of life.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What do you feel has\u00a0<\/span><\/b>been the key<\/span><\/b>\u00a0driver in creating a \u2018safe space\u2019 for the LGBTQ+ community in sport?<\/span><\/b>\u202f<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I think agencies need to have policies;\u00a0the thing we need to establish is that policies make change.\u00a0Take for example the\u00a0FA;\u00a0I\u2019m sure\u00a0they have\u00a0an equalities section, and they do a lot of work around discrimination, racism and working with organisations such as Kick It Out, which again demonstrates allyship.\u00a0But down to club rules, they need to include something which is anti-discriminatory in their\u00a0policy, because it safeguards not only the officials, players, and anybody involved in that organisation.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Having good policies and procedures will help at any level, and the thing that you\u2019ll hope for is that the message is fair and worked into their constitution.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We need to be very open, and ensure knowledge sharing is commonplace, as with a lot of\u00a0work within this space, it comes with a preconception that a lot of effort and resources will be required, when in actual fact, you have so many organisations such as the Federation of Gay Games who are willing to share frameworks and ways of work, which means there isn\u2019t always a starting from scratch mentality, which is off-putting for some.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What more needs to be done to\u202fby\u00a0sport\u2019s\u00a0key stakeholders in their\u202fadvocacy for inclusion?<\/span><\/b>\u202f<\/span><\/b>\u202f<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I think there still needs to be the creation of spaces for things to happen, and\u00a0we need people checking in to ensure the work is getting done.\u00a0Everybody\u00a0wants\u00a0to get involved with sponsorship etc around event time, but as soon as the event stops, so does the support. There needs\u00a0to be a continuum which runs from one event to another, because the money and resource is out there.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Added to this, more investment needs to go into grassroots stuff so that they can maintain and be in a position to ensure the correct messages are being communicated to shape a legacy, one that the next generation can pick\u00a0up and continue to advocate for.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

People need to take themselves beyond Pride\u00a0Month, and\u00a0give the necessary time and resources, whilst moving away from seeing it as just ticking a box. We have to do\u00a0this for 365 days of the year!<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/p>\n <\/div>\n \n \n \n <\/div>\n

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