Fury, disbelief and trauma: Why women bear the brunt of the Swans crisis

It should be a day of celebration for the Swans. Instead, walking into the SCG this Sunday will feel more like a funeral.

It’s a history-making day for the club. Its first double header, the AFLW team’s opening home game for the season and the first time the women have played a game on the SCG.

Sydney president Andrew Pridham admits it will be a difficult day. He may find it harder to watch than most.

Some fans are planning to boycott the men’s game (a dead rubber against North Melbourne) which follows the AFLW clash against Essendon.

Long-time Swans fan Tim Isidro is one of them. He will take his four-year-old son Freddy to the women’s game, but they won’t be sticking around to cheer on the men.

“I thought numbers would be down because of what some of the men have done and I wanted the women’s team to look up and there be bums in seats,” he said.

“I didn’t want to hang around for the men’s team because I thought what happened is gross. I wanted to show my daughter and family that as a man I step up and don’t just say things, I’m doing something, even if it is just small.”

The Swans will need to heed clearly the disappointment, disbelief, and anger being felt by the general fan base and what it has done to the reputation of the club more generally. These blokes were at work, for goodness’ sake.

“I love the women’s team. I feel sorry for them. I want them to know that we’re proud. I hope others come and appreciate them and support them,” said Isidro.

As for the women, they are not only bearing the reputational damage caused by some of their senior male colleagues, but they have also been silenced. For now, the club has told them not to speak publicly.

Can you imagine how they must be feeling? Furious. Disappointed. Distressed. Muted.

Some will even be traumatised. One in five women in Australia have experienced sexual violence since the age of 15, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics .

Let’s think about that. Six women in a AFLW team. If the MCG were full of women, that means 20,000 of them would have been the victims of sexual violence.

How does the club convince these players that they still belong? How do they make them feel proud to run out in red and white on Sunday? That their female fans can throw the scarf around their neck and feel respect and belonging?