The Tokyo Olympics should have started in four days. They have been postponed for a year due to the coronavirus pandemic. "Japan therefore has a year to take convincing measures," Human Rights Watch said on Monday, denouncing, in a detailed report, the mistreatment suffered by child athletes in Japan during their sports career.
This 67-page report, titled "I've been hit so many times that I can't count", documents a practice known in Japan, "taibatsuen", or "corporal punishment", but which should have disappeared after being denounced several times.
In 2013, as Japan applied to host the Games in 2020, a series of videos highlighted the abuse inflicted on top athletes. The Japanese Olympic Committee (JOC) then launched a survey of all its federations, which revealed that more than 10% of athletes had been victims of intimidation or harassment. Faced with indignation, the JOC pledged to take drastic measures. He had notably reduced his funding to the judo federation in which coaches had sexually abused judokats.
800 athletes questioned
This new survey shows that the practices persist. Of the 800 or so athletes questioned, many of whom participated in the Olympic or Paralympic Games, 50 responded to the NGO in interviews and 757 in an online questionnaire.
Of these volunteers, 381 were 24 years old or younger, which means that they were child athletes at the time of the “taibatsuen” scandals. 19% said they had been slapped, punched or kicked, thrown to the ground, or beaten with an object, such as bamboo kendo sticks, whistles or rackets, or deprived of water, when of a sports activity. These experiences occurred in at least 22 different sports, according to the report. 18% say they have been verbally abused. And 5% say they have been sexually assaulted or harassed.
Today professional, Daiki A. - a pseudonym - played baseball at a very high level in the Kyushu region: “The coach told me that I was not serious enough with running and I was punched in the face in front of everyone. I was bleeding, but he kept hitting me, ”he says in the report. “We use a cap for water polo. The athletes were dragged out of the pool by the cap strap, suffocating us. Another punishment was pushing the kids underwater so we couldn't breathe, ”said Keisuke W, a 20-year-old former elite water polo player. Chieko T., an elite athlete, told the association how her trainer sexually assaulted her while telling her that he treated her dislocated shoulder, "almost every day after the training. Every time I wanted to throw up. His scent, his hands, his eyes, his face, his voice… I hated everything about him ”.
Human Rights Watch cross-checked the testimony by scanning the press, interviewing academics, journalists, parents, and coaches. These interviews demonstrated, according to the association, that child abuse in sport remains accepted in Japanese society, which often prevents young athletes from filing a complaint. Especially since, when they do, schools and federations rarely punish abusive coaches. Similarly, while the scandals had led to the establishment of hotlines to report abuses, the result is today uneven, depending on the goodwill of the federations, and does not give rise to any restitution or control.
"Protect millions of child athletes"
“For decades, children in Japan have been brutally beaten and verbally abused in the name of winning trophies and medals,” said Minky Worden, director of global initiatives at Human Rights Watch. “As Japan prepares to host the Olympic and Paralympic Games in Tokyo in July 2021, the global spotlight offers a unique opportunity to change laws and policies in Japan and around the world to protect millions of child athletes. "
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The association advocates the establishment of an independent administrative authority responsible for combating child abuse in Japanese sport. It could support athletes and their parents and withdraw their certification from coaches convicted of abuse.