NFL
By: Zachary Draves
Michael Jordan once said, “I got to go to the bathroom just like everyone else”.
He was making the point that even with his hyper exalted facade he was still a human being at the end of the day.
From one GOAT to another, Simone Biles has carried that banner in extraordinary fashion to compliment her already superb legacy in the world of gymnastics.
Her decision to pull out of competition in Tokyo due to mental wellness is more valuable than any gold medal and the reason is that achievement at the expense of one’s well-being is never something you can get back.
Some have already accused her of being “weak” or that she “quit on her team” when in reality she was listening to her mind and body and she was strong enough to let the world know that even as the GOAT she is still human and that she would not push herself to such an extraordinary limit to where it hurts her and her team in the process.
So in that sense alone she was not only looking out for herself but for her teammates and it is also worth mentioning that she was there rooting for her fellow gymnasts unlike five years ago in Rio where Ryan Lochte left his teammates hanging at a gas station.
Simone is also showing the world that black women and girls are human too.
Too often black women are portrayed as superhuman and incapable of vulnerability and that includes black sportswomen.
My colleague and friend Dr. Letisha Brown outlines that aspect perfectly in First and Pen https://firstandpen.com/simone-biles-and-black-sportswomen-are-amazing-but-not-unbreakable/
Then you have to look where sports has come to when it comes to fans and media treatment of athletes and especially black athletes at that intersection of society and mental wellness.
When fans have gotten to a point where they feel enabled to verbally and physically assault as well as to publicly denigrate athletes whether it is throwing a water bottle, popcorn, or a baseball and place unrealistic expectations on athletes to where if they don’t perform at such a level that they can unleash very pathological wrath on social and traditional media, we have to seriously examine the state of fandom as we know it.
It has gone from I hope my team wins to my team must win or else.
Already the rhetoric leveled at Simone and others who have the audacity to act in their own best interests reflects that and if I can be blunt, that says more about the sad state of reality for some of these so-called “fans” than it does about the athlete’s performance.
Honestly, how sad is their life at this point where they feel they have to take the worst aspects of themselves onto those who don’t even know they exist or really care what they have to say?
I would love to see these people put themselves in Simone Biles’s shoes and see what it’s truly like to be at the top because while the glitz and glamour is intoxicating, it comes at a price that they won’t ever pay.
It got too much for her to live up to everyone’s expectations of her and she has the will to admit that which again epitomizes strength.
Finally, we have to look at the ongoing conversation around mental wellness in sports and the ever-growing need for athletes to take that aspect of their being seriously as much as their physical wellness.
What Simone, Naomi Osaka, Sha’Carri Richardson, Kevin Love, Royce White, and a host of others are doing is reminding us that it starts at the top.
Our mental wellness trickles down to the rest of our being and that’s it Ok to not be OK and that there is no shame in admitting that.
For too long people struggling have been rendered into obscurity and made to feel alone but what Simone and her contemporaries are doing is saying no more.
Also, there needs to be a broader examination of the societal and social conditions that create these anxieties and look at mental wellness from a structural lens rather than just an individual lens.
If you look at what Simone has had to live through over the last few years you can understand where she is coming from such as being victimized by Larry Nassir, judges trying to clamp down on her abilities, the COVID-19 pandemic, and racial injustice.
Simone Biles’ legacy is unmatched in the world of gymnastics and her ability to be unapologetically herself makes her the GOAT in every way imaginable.
She’s not perfect but in the words of Brandy “she’s perfectly human”.
