A message to our community Pt2
We messed up, we hurt a member of our community in the process, and we are sorry.
We’ve taken the last couple of weeks to better understand the harm we caused and what accountability can look like, and start creating a foundation for action steps towards that. This apology and statement is our start.
On July 11th, we asked Stephonne Singleton to take over our Instagram account for a day to highlight his experience playing with Stonewall Sports. We made a number of missteps: we did not promote his takeover in advance, we did not send the guidelines for the takeover, we did not share the password and login until the game day was underway, we deleted his posts without an explanation, we didn't follow up after he inquired about his deleted posts, and our initial apology did not address the missteps above. These actions and inactions caused significant harm to Stephonne and by extension, our entire Black and Brown community. A piece of what Stephonne has requested for our steps of accountability is providing full transparency into what happened and how we caused harm, so we are providing a much more detailed account than we did in our initial statement.
Prior to an Instagram takeover, players are supposed to receive the password and login to the SSKC Instagram account, a promotion for their intended takeover, and a set of guidelines outlining the scope of the takeover, which is intended to include Instagram story posts and up to one Instagram feed post. However, after making our first statement we looked to find the message that our Director of Communications, Ryan Fortney, would have sent Stephonne prior to his takeover and realized he hadn’t sent it. With Stephonnes feedback, we also realized no one had promoted his takeover or sent him the login information until after games had started that day, despite Stephonne requesting it several times. These were several of our mistakes not promoting Stephonne’s takeover, not providing login information prior to gameday, not sending the guidelines, and not confirming these steps were completed before we attempted to address the situation.
Stephonne made several posts to the Stonewall Instagram feed during his takeover, and later that day, Ryan deleted all of the feed posts, intending to be in line with the guidelines, but without leaving the single allowed post, and without providing a warning or any communication around why the posts were deleted. Stephonne then reached out to several members of the board asking for an explanation for why his posts were removed. The board members responded that they would investigate further and get back to him with more information. Another member of the board did have a conversation with Ryan the next day and discussed the racial dynamics of effectively silencing Stephonne via this action. However, no one from the board contacted Stephonne to relay any of this information until Stephonne reached back out two weeks later, and still, then there was no discussion of the guidelines or a clear explanation of what had happened. This was another mistake dropping the ball on ensuring someone followed up with Stephonne until he had to initiate further communication, and then still not being fully transparent with him. We have also come to realize through engaging with SURJ, Moon Glassgow Brown, our community, and unpacking things for ourselves that we tokenized Stephonne by asking him to represent our organization as one of the few Black players in the league, and without providing him with proper support or follow-through.
While Ryan is responsible for failing to communicate with Stephonne about the guidelines for an Instagram takeover, the entire leadership team takes full responsibility for failing to follow up with Stephonne in a timely manner. We also take responsibility for failing to have a formal process in place to support members of our community when they reach out to the board with critical concerns. Furthermore, in an effort to address the situation quickly, we failed to gather all of the details regarding the incident and released a statement without full knowledge of the events that had transpired, causing more harm in the process. Put simply, we failed to support Stephonne by silencing, invalidating, and disempowering him.
With this apology, we are holding ourselves accountable to Stephonne as well as the harm that we have caused him, the entire BIPOC community, and everyone else who has placed trust in the mission of our organization to create a welcoming and inclusive environment for all. We failed to follow through this time, and we are committed to learning from our mistakes and doing better moving forward.
We recognize that taking accountability is the first step toward healing and that our actions moving forward will count even more. In the spirit of transparency, we would like to share some of the actions we have already taken as well as the actions we plan to take over the next month or so:
As of August 12, Ryan has stepped back from his role as Director of Communications and all other board-related responsibilities while we take steps to determine what accountability looks like in our organization.
We have hired Moon Glasgow Brown with Zekes Freedom Foundation to help our organization accomplish three primary goals:
First, facilitate accountability using their frameworks for healing and transformative justice. With Moon’s guidance, we have focused our efforts on centering the person most impacted, and therefore Stephonne’s input for our accountability has been a driving force in our action items. We have also taken time to reflect individually and take responsibility for the role each of us played in perpetuating the harm caused.
Second, we commit to ongoing anti-racism and inclusivity training and consultation for our board, our captains, and our volunteers.
Third, we are working with Moon to develop an accountability framework, which will inform how we hold ourselves accountable in our efforts to support the most marginalized members of our community. The accountability framework we develop with Moon will be a living document that evolves with the changing needs of our community to ensure we create intentional and lasting change for our organization.
We are in contact with Showing Up for Racial Justice (SURJ) to seek support in holding ourselves accountable, and to discuss opportunities for training with the entire board.
As we start down this path toward healing and growth, we are committed to being transparent with the actions we are taking and the progress being made. We understand that this apology is only the beginning of more work that must be done in order to deliver on our mission to create safe and inclusive spaces for all who care to be a part of the Stonewall Sports KC community. As this work begins, we value your input and encourage you to submit your feedback using our Feedback Form linked on our website or if you prefer, you may send your feedback via email to the League Commissioner, Jared Horman, at kc.commissioner@stonewallsports.org. Thank you for your time and patience as we navigate these next few months with the intention and a commitment to rebuilding trust with our community.
Stonewall Sports KC Leadership Team:
Jared Horman, Commissioner
Ricardo Salabarria, Director of Operations
Brooke Leisinger, Director of Administration
Shannon Madden/Lori Schlatter, Treasurer
Eric Thomas, Sponsorships Director
Chris Lara, Events Director
Stephanie Wagner, Kickball Director
Robyn Cottin, Kickball Division Leader
Ryan Fortney
