My Kind of Locker Room
There are few things more powerful than witnessing a man call another man out on a behavior that they both understand to be less than right, and for the beneficiary of that reprimand to make an about face, admit he was wrong and immediately apologize. It’s powerful because it just doesn’t happen that often. At least not in a civil, matter-of-fact, “I know you’re better than this” manner of delivery.
But I know of a place like this, where private and public accountability was upheld, and quite frequently so, during my child/young adulthood. It was called a locker room.
I remember being in college 11 years ago — standing in a locker room no less — and attempting to joke with one of my teammates, who happened to be of Italian-American descent and hailed from New Jersey. We had just finished practice, and for whatever God awful reason, I decided it would be funny to try my worst impersonation of an “Italian guy from Jersey” stereotype out on him. I cajoled, “Hey, whatsamatta? Let’s go get a spicy meetaball…” or something painfully stupid and void of any real humor.
The guy was clearly insulted. I remember his shoulders scrunching upwards as if he was responding to a driver leaning on their car horn in the middle of a traffic jam.
Another teammate of ours who had been standing next to us stopped what he was doing and turned to me. All he said was, “Well, that was racist.” That’s it. Just looked me dead in the face and I reflected back all the dumb crap I was attempting to pull. Done.
I immediately felt a wave of embarrassment and shame fold over me. I felt like an ass … because I was one. This kid hadn’t asked for anyone to publicly shame his heritage. I just took it upon myself do it without considering what it would do to him. I didn’t consider that his family might have felt the sting of discrimination in a culture that today celebrates tropes of the imagined Italian mafiosi or “tough guy” but a few generations earlier was referring to his great-grandparents as “sneaking and cowardly Sicilians, the descendants of bandits and assassins.”
More than that, I just didn’t consider how much it was singling the poor guy out in front of all his teammates. Racist for sure; and also next level stupid and insensitive.
“Yeah, you’re right. Sorry, man,” was all I could muster as an apology. The guy just stared ahead coolly and straightened up his locker, didn’t even allow for an acknowledging nod. I didn’t deserve one. I needed to learn my lesson and move the f on.
So, I learned it. Think twice, three, four times before you attempt to box someone into a stereotype that you’ve constructed from a movie theater and then expose them to it. Think about it and then don’t do it. Be better. That’s the kind of locker room talk I most remember.
My dad and grandfather were coaches by trade. Like them, I played high school and college football. So I spent the better part of my childhood growing up in and around locker rooms.
I was raised around locker rooms where authority figures actually talked about “ your love for one another” and preached constantly about “doing your job because the guy next to you needs you to get it done” and “treating people with dignity.” I was raised around locker rooms were these men held each other accountable to the responsibilities that came with those adages.
For sure, it wasn’t always pretty in those locker rooms either. There were barbs tossed around that were tinged with racism, homophobia, and sexism. Despite playing in some pretty heated rivalries in high school and college, one of the most vicious fights I’ve ever seen actually started inside my own locker room. And there was, of course, a fair share of coarse language and even some informal hazing along the way.
But the fact of the matter was that, despite these things taking place, guys did get called out for their crap. Our coaches expected us to hold each other accountable for our words and actions, especially if there were those among us who desired to be thought of as leaders. No one got a free pass on disrespect or crudeness, even if they thought they had.
So, yes. I’ve been in locker rooms where guys were foulmouthed and discriminatory, where I was the same. But none of us ever became a real leader in the eyes of all our teammates. None of us was ever allowed to speak for or stand for the whole. None of us could make a legitimate claim that we weren’t what our actions and words said we were.
This is the lesson I learned about locker rooms:
The garbage or negativity we spew — even once — might not be immediately rebuffed. But someone is always listening. And someday, you’ll get called to the mat for it.
If you want to lead, you can’t walk away from what you say and do. It needs to be evident to everyone else that your actions, especially in private, always carry far more gravity for you than anyone else’s.
Real leaders get this. Locker rooms are where you prove your mettle, not hide it.
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Chris Conroy is the owner of SoGood Inc., a company dedicated to creating more effective diversity and inclusion efforts in all kinds of institutions through human resources management. He is deeply grateful to the men and women of Boston College High School and Amherst College football for teaching him what accountability and leadership actually look like.
