Joan Ryan

Joan Ryan is the author of the 1995 book, Little Girls in Pretty Boxes: The Making and Breaking of Elite Gymnasts and Figure Skaters. From her interview with Isaac Chotiner for Slate:

Isaac Chotiner: Was any aspect of the Nassar case surprising to you, and how do you think it fits in with the thesis of your book?

Joan Ryan: I think it fits in exactly, tragically, with the thesis of my book. It’s a culture where abuse is normal. The abnormal becomes normal. I was surprised by the scope of it, frankly. That it’s upward of, it could be 200 girls and young women over the course of 20-odd years. That’s almost unfathomable. But the fact that it happened is not unfathomable. I say that because pedophiles … and I actually didn’t really know this, but the word grooming, you know how they groom their victims to trust them? The girls are like, “This isn’t right, but I trust this guy.” That’s what happened with the culture in gymnastics. As I say in my book: You train when you’re injured, you starve yourself, so a coach can say to you, “No, you’re not injured. You’re not in pain. Get back up on the balance beam. You’re just being weak and lazy.” And they get back up on the balance beam.

For people who haven’t read your book or don’t know what the culture of gymnastics is like, can you talk a little bit more about how it is different from other sports that young people, or young women, engage in?

First of all, unlike any other Olympic sport or any sport I can think of in which these athletes are training to be the best in the world, you’re dealing with children. In men’s gymnastics, these guys are adults. They’ve gone through puberty. They’re usually not on the Olympic team until after they’ve gone to college or are in college. That’s not true for female gymnastics, so that’s No. 1. They’re children.

No. 2, they have a small window of opportunity to be the best in the world, often before they hit puberty. In the United States, it’s a culture that has been so influenced by Eastern Europe, really because of Bela Karolyi. He came over here after Nadia Comaneci, and he brought his system with him, which was a system of abuse. His job, and he says this, his job was to create gymnasts, not to create healthy young women. And other coaches...[read on]

--Marshal Zeringue