"This is biased. I hope they're videotaping this." - Skater
"[The officiating crew] stole the game. [The officiating crew] ruined what should've been a good game for us." - Bench Coach
"Worst. Officiating. Ever." - Skater
The above is just a sample of comments made during and/or directly following a recent game for which I was the head referee. It was a WFTDA regulation game between B teams. The purpose of this post is not to sling mud. It's not to call out individuals so that they, specifically, are held accountable for their behavior. The purpose of this post is to raise awareness of issues that exist within the roller derby community: perceptions of bias and skater behavior towards officials. For these purposes, anonymity is sufficient, though I'm under no false pretenses that people who are sufficiently diligent can't find out the game and team to which I'm referring. There've been posts recently about treating volunteers with respect, and hoping to retain them, and all that good stuff. Those are fantastic posts, but my goal is a bit different here. I want to point out some of this behavior, point out some of the flaws in reasoning, and also offer some helpful suggestions along the way.
I'll start by saying that in the ~3.5 years that I've been officiating roller derby I've been fortunate to be affiliated with two great leagues, first the Mad Rollin' Dolls of Madison, WI, and now Boston Roller Derby in Boston, MA. I've officiated exactly 203 WFTDA games (as of the time of the game in question). In all of that time, and all of those games, I've never encountered such horrible, misguided, uninformed, and vitriolic treatment of officials as I did in the aforementioned game. Ever. And, to get this out of the way early on, please don't trot out the all-too-familiar "stuff like this shouldn't bother you" and "officials should have thicker skin" lines. To be clear, none of this impacts how I call a game, and doesn't really register when I'm officiating. However, being able to deal with something, and having to deal with something are two entirely different, although related, things. A great many derby officials, myself included, can (and have) deal(t) with this behavior; zero derby officials should have to deal with this behavior.
Good calls and bad calls are made. Good no-calls and bad no-calls are made. Sometimes illegal actions are missed. Sometimes legal actions are penalized based upon the viewpoint and judgment of the official who makes the call. These things happen. It sucks, but it happens. Such is the nature of officiating any sport. However, these are questions primarily dealing with the quality/aptitude of the officiating crew, along with right/wrong place/time considerations (e.g., a perfectly great official cannot - and should not - call a penalty if it happened in an odd position such that they couldn't see the penalty occur). It's obviously offensive to question the quality/aptitude of an official, much less an entire crew. Perhaps it is warranted, perhaps not; but, at a basic level, I think everyone can agree it's offensive.
Accusing an official of being biased is a completely different animal. It is the most serious accusation one can levy against an official - a shot across the bow of the cornerstone of officiating: impartiality. The team I refer to above repeatedly and pointedly insinuated, in unambiguous terms, that I and my entire crew was biased in favor of one team. Their evidence? The officiating crew called more penalties on their team than the other team. After I emphasized in the captains meeting that I wanted both teams' skaters and coaches to have completely open communication of the officials, and to ask questions about actions and their impact as they arose in gameplay, I had zero rules or impact questions from the team that accused my crew - me, personally - of being biased.
To recap, because the team had more penalties than their opponent, the first and most logical conclusion that they came to was that the officiating crew was biased against them. This is a problem. To be clear, I don't believe the problem is endemic to all of roller derby. But, the fact that a team within a league with a long history within the WFTDA exhibited this behavior is troubling to me. It couldn't have been that the team simply committed more penalties, had more aggressive play, didn't know the rules as thoroughly as they should, or any other possible explanation. It couldn't possibly be a problem with anything other than the officials having an agenda. As a prime example, a jam ended and the team's Jammer slammed into the back of an opponent after the fourth whistle, knocking her to the ground. I called her for a late hit misconduct penalty. The jammer threw her hands up, rolling her eyes and shaking her head as she skated to the box. The coach threw up his hands and started yelling at me "these penalties are out of control." I skated over and calmly stated "she hit an opponent after the fourth whistle and knocked her down...that is a late hit penalty." In response he simply reiterated his claim that the "calls were out of control." At halftime, when he stated that his team was called for more penalties, I informed him that all of the calls that I observed were legitimate penalties. He said "I'll give you that they're all legitimate calls, but it's out of control." Do with that statement what you will.
To put this in perspective the penalty totals for the game was 37 for Team A (the team which I've been discussing) and 26 for Team B. Was there a discrepancy in penalties between teams? Yes. Team A had 11 more penalties than Team B. Does that mean the officials had a bias against Team A? No. A higher penalty count does not necessarily imply bias (I fully realize that it can). Put differently, having more penalties than another team is not a sufficient condition for concluding that the officiating is biased. I cannot state that more simply than I just have.
Before you accuse an official of being biased, ask a simple question: why would they be biased? Are we being paid off? Nobody is paying us (I have never been paid, nor do I ever want to be paid, for officiating. I've been given gas money a few times to help with travel expenses, and have received a stipend in the past for officiating WFTDA Playoffs, in full disclosure). Do we want to call in favor of teams with which we are affiliated? Are officials calling penalties in a way to curry favor and become better friends with people in their league? I, personally, wouldn't want to be friends with someone who wanted officials to be biased, so that's a non-starter for me. Fun story: I officiated games when my (now ex-)wife was skating for one of the teams. Weeks after the game I was looking through Facebook pictures of the game, and saw a picture of me (as an OPR) watching her (as a Jammer) get knocked out by a Blocker about 3 feet from me. Until that point, I had no idea that she had even jammed in that game, much less that I'd witnessed it with my own eyes. So, please just stop with the "officials are biased" talk. Most officials don't even have a vague sense of the score or penalty count in any game they officiate. If you don't believe me, ask the officials in your league.
Team A also sent a single skating official who officiated the game. One of the most troubling aspects of this whole experience, to me, was that this official expressed shock when the other officials were remarking on how inappropriate the Team's behavior was towards the officials. This official, apparently, has experienced this treatment on such a regular basis that it's routine for them. That is troubling. A Division 1 league within the WFTDA has an official who is accustomed to being treated in this manner. Let that sink in for a second.
I promised some helpful suggestions. If these are obvious, good, they should be. But, apparently, they're not obvious to everyone, so they bear repeating:
- Educate yourself (or, if you're a bench coach, your skaters). Read and understand the rules. Thoroughly. Some skaters view rules tests as a formality, or something to cram for and then "data-dump" afterwards. Take the opportunity to read through the rules in-depth, to really study them. Then, do it again. Then ask your officials about them. You'll find yourself becoming a better skater as a result. Alternatively, if you have the time, money, and dedication to so passionately pursue a game that you love, why wouldn't you spend the time to learn the rules in detail?
- Ask questions (respectfully) of your officiating crew. "Why was that a back block penalty?" "Because, while you didn't knock anyone down or out of bounds, you passed two opponents' hips as a result of the illegal contact." "Why wasn't that a cut?" "Because you, the initiator, were knocked down, and the person who tried to draw the cut didn't have superior position when she was knocked out." These are questions not only for scrimmages but for games as well. Skaters need to get better at asking them, and officials need to be better about not being defensive and answering them without simply spitting rules out at a skater. Take the time to describe what you saw and how the rules apply to what you saw.
- Make yourself, your teammates, and everyone within your league accountable. Do not tolerate unacceptable behavior. It flows from the top down, from the coaches to the skaters. It flows between skaters, and from captains and leaders to the rest of the team. As someone who has played professional sports all my life, and been a lifelong fan of various teams in various sports, it is so so easy so displace blame. Don't blame officiating for the outcome of your games. It's a crutch. Don't accuse officials of being biased. It's a crutch. Work as hard as you can and play the best that you can. If your understanding of the rules, as they're being applied in a game, is different than the officials, ask why.
- Most importantly, change your default. The default should be communication to resolve any discrepancies in understanding. The default should not be assuming that officials are wrong, incompetent, or biased. This is a systemic problem and it needs to be addressed. Trust that your officials know what they're doing, and if there's a discrepancy between what you think should have been called and what was/wasn't called, respectfully discuss it. The opposite of this is making hotheaded, emotional comments to the officials. At the end of one jam a skater from Team A crashed into a teammate, hitting her in the face and sending her to the ground. Another skater who was coming onto the track for the next jam immediately yelled loudly "where's the call on that?!" I calmly explained "her own teammate hit her after the whistle in the face." The skater (the captain of the team) turned to argue with me, and was only silenced by her teammate assuring her that yes, that was what happened. The fact that a skater was immediately and 100% distrustful of the head referee's account of what happened and only trusted her teammate is an enormous - and, in my opinion, disgusting - problem.
The roller derby community is enormous and incredible in its universal support and empowerment of people. That support should extend to officials as well. If you think officiating is poor, do your part to help improve it via discussions with officials. If you think officiating is poor, imagine what it will be like if experienced officials stop offering their time, dedication, and passion, not to mention training the next wave of officials. I can't say this strongly enough: this is not a big ask. The status quo of distrusting officials needs to change. We are roller derby. We are better than this. We all need to make this change. Be a part of that change.
