Name: Soccer Star Hope Solo Weighs in on Sexual Harassment
Uploaded: 2017-11-14
Duration: 4 min 52 s
Description: And equal pay

I have to say just working in the sports industry for a long time covering all sports, I noticed a little bit of a similarity I think with Harvey Weinstein in this way which is, I'm gonna be honest, a lot of people thought this about Sepp Blatter. There were always these kind of just, it was a reputation that he had, not just because in 2004 he said the women should wear tighter uniforms To try to attract a bigger audience. You heard Leah Gallagher say, that their World Cup win was the most watch soccer game in the United States ever male / female. So I don't think they need uniforms that are going to be tighter. But, there was that sort of thing that everyone knew that he was just kind of disgusting and a bad guy, I mean how much did you guys talk about this amongst your own peers. I mean, I'll just go back to what I've been saying this whole time. He's not the only one. It's just part of human culture, it's what we've taught boys growing up, it's what we've accepted as women. As part of the normalities in the workplace. And I'm guilty as much as anybody else for not doing something sooner. So it's not just the Sepp Blatters of the world. Yes, we heard stories about him. But there are so many other executives that work for FIFA, for US Soccer, coaches, trainers, as I said, and even teammates. So we all have to Have more of an awareness on our own actions and behaviors, and like I said, you know its not just men, yes it happens for the most times with men, powerful men, yes. But sexual harassment Has been normalized in our society. And I've seen it in the locker room and I've seen young players be very uncomfortable about our own locker room environment which is not conducive to respecting the female anatomy. It becomes a locker room similar to a men's locker room and women's locker rooms. So we have to be cognizant of that as well. We're not innocent either. So Like I said, yes it happened with Seth Ladner, but it is all across the board. We're gonna open it up to questions in just a moment, so have them ready. But I think most people would wanna say, I mean, how does this change? I know that is a massive question that might not even be able to be answered on this stage. But you've been in the US Women's National Team system for 17 years, as you said. And you know the ins and outs. What is a step they can take? What are couple steps to try to eradicate some of this? Well, I mean I think we all know that, creating dialogue is the first step than we've been pushing for equality and equal pay in women's football. We actually have a law suit against our employer Myself and four other teammates we filed going on two years ago with the equal employment opportunity commission, and that started with just dialog, it started with us saying look we're the best team in the world and we've been the most successful team for the United States Soccer Federation We brought in 20 million dollars for the federation 2016 and the men lost 5 million dollars for the federation in 2016, yet we're getting paid 25 cents to the dollar. So this isn't just about, you know the overall concept of equality, its also based off on math, we're bringing in 20 million dollars and they have a negative Loss of 5 million dollars and then you fast- forward to just this year, 2017 ticket sales alone, the women are supposed to bring in 5 million dollars, ticket sales alone, and the men are projected to have a negative loss of 1 million dollars. So this started, we, just conversation and then suddenly we got the fans behind us, we got the media behind us, we got Congressmen and women behind us, we got. Former president Barrack Obama behind us, we've got Clinton behind us, all of a sudden we have so much support from men and women across the globe, and we're still waiting to see what happens with our law suit obviously the court system takes some time but like I said it's been close to two years and we're hoping for a ruling any day now Perhaps a settlement. I don't intend to settle for anything short of what is equal. Because, for me, when you file for equal pay, you don't want to settle for less. Because it's law. This is American law. This law was passed in, 60 years ago, in 1962 or 1963, by John F. Kennedy. And yet we're still pushing to have equal pay. It was past 60 years ago but who's going to enforce it? We have to enforce it ourselves and that's what I've learned, it's people don't wanna give up power, you know, you can't just ask nicely for somebody to give up power, whether that's the US Soccer Federation or FIFA or even, you know, the men wanting the women to be paid equally, nobody wants to give that up. So I always say you have to take it, and sometimes it's an ugly fight. It's not asking to play nice. It's not being agreeable. You have to take what is rightfully yours! [ BLANK_AUDIO ]