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I hopefully can watch with my daughter, but I know it will be hard. Almost started crying watching the trailer...Reminds me of the movie Spotlight.
 
Did anyone get a chance to watch it today yet? Do you think it is appropriate to show and 8 and 10 year old or should I watch it alone?
 
I watched it today. I think your question is really hard to answer.....I mean mine was very mature at that age and I think I would've let her watch (with me) and had an open discussion. I'd recommend that you watch first and decide for yourself whether your dd can/should watch. Jennifer Sey made great points on the culture...how your feelings (as a young gymnast in an abusive environment) was belittled to a point that you don't trust your own judgement. That your told you're not hungry, or hurt....you're fat and lazy and weak and not dedicated.........so that when obvious abuse happens (like sexual abuse), you don't trust your own judgement and don't believe that it is in fact abuse....you normalize it. I think it's a message that all girls need to hear, to trust yourself!!!

As to the overall review of this -- I think it was very well done. I think it might've actually been even better as a docu-series. Only surprise really was that they delved into almost all aspects of this...except Geddert/Twistars. Agree or disagree on whether he's culpable/negligent/innocent, doesn't matter........he and his club play a huge part of the story of nassar. They don't even mention him or Twistars. You really only even see their name when they show a document listing all the places that Nassar is a team dr, on a board or has access to minors. That I found surprising.
 
My daughter (about to be 11) really wanted to watch it and I have talked about Nassar with her. She did watch the first part with me, and I fast forwarded through a couple very short parts that were more graphic than I was comfortable with. Even though it makes me uncomfortable and I always question myself, I do like watching these things with her because she is used to in-depth discussions about big concepts, and I hope that by being aware of what things help enable a culture of abuse, and how someone can be led to doubt or deny their own feelings, she'll be able to recognize it if she ever sees it happening to herself or friends. Like even though I have talked about grooming and what it looks like - hearing the athletes talk about how the doctor was the only nice adult, and how he left them treats, etc really make an impression. She was surprised by that.

I also hope that because my views on this have never been a secret, if the unthinkable ever happens she won't have a second's worry about how I would react.

Most parents I know would not have let their kids that age watch it though. 8 would probably have been too young for me, and even now my kid would be too young to get anything out of it if I weren't a chronic pause-and-discuss-er

I wish all adults had to watch this and read "The Girls." There was a mom at our last gym who point blank said, "It was the girls' fault. There is no way they didn't know what he was doing was wrong." Some people are so unbelievably stupid about grooming. And of course at least one of the moms she was shooting her mouth off to had been victimized by a trusted authority figure when she was a child. The moms tried to educate her but she wasn't having any of it. "It was their fault." I desperately hope nothing ever happens to her kid. :(
 
I have never wanted to just reach through a screen and punch someone like I wanted to punch Steve Penny when he was refusing to answer questions at the end. That is the most horrible thing about all this. Not that one monster existed - there are always monsters. But that he was allowed to flourish, protected, by many, many, many adults who could have stopped it.

I won’t be letting my eleven year old watch it. It contains some graphic descriptions of abuse, and the videos of Nasser doing ‘treatments’ (that used to be on YouTube) are gut churning. We have had the necessary discussions about safety, touching, and consent. But I would like to leave her with the belief, for now at least, that most of the adults around her are acting with her welfare in mind. (While of course knowing myself that this isn’t always true and that we can’t drop our guard.)

This documentary focussed on the details of how the story initially broke. The dogged persistence of the Indy Star, the incredible bravery of Rachel Denhollander, and the absolutely Scandalous gaslighting of the Nichols family.

There is a very good, HBO documentary about this called ‘At the heart of gold’ that goes into the Twistars/MSU side of things much more. It is probably even more harrowing as those events doubled down on adults failing to protect their charges, and make it clear just how many people even outside USAG knew and were hushing things up. I think it is completely uploaded to youtube.
 
WARNING— I forgot to mention that they (for no purpose I can agree with) decided to include the awful footage of Rebecca Bross’s devastating knee injury. It’s somewhere between mins 11-15 (can’t remember exactly). But if you do not want to watch the injury happen, LOOK AWAY. Her cry is heartbreaking.
 
Compared to the HBO documentary this one moves a bit slower, my wife and I found ourselves nodding off about 30 minutes in and will have to finish it later.
 
WARNING— I forgot to mention that they (for no purpose I can agree with) decided to include the awful footage of Rebecca Bross’s devastating knee injury. It’s somewhere between mins 11-15 (can’t remember exactly). But if you do not want to watch the injury happen, LOOK AWAY. Her cry is heartbreaking.
I saw that, and it was horrifying and awful!
 
WARNING— I forgot to mention that they (for no purpose I can agree with) decided to include the awful footage of Rebecca Bross’s devastating knee injury. It’s somewhere between mins 11-15 (can’t remember exactly). But if you do not want to watch the injury happen, LOOK AWAY. Her cry is heartbreaking.
I'm glad I recognized it and looked away in time, but even just hearing her is devastating. I understand why they wanted to include it because of the sound bite of "keeping these women together," but I hate that clip and I certainly hope they asked Rebecca if it was okay, or at least warned her ahead of time.

Overall it was hard to watch, but there wasn't much that most people involved in the gymnastics world didn't already know. I think it's a good introduction to the general public so they can understand the situation beyond the headlines. I was happy they showcased the journalists so much, and I thought the detail about them not filming Maggie's parents at trials was quite telling. Whether or not she "should" have been on the team, it made it obvious that her performance that day didn't matter and they had decided in advance she wouldn't be going.
 
I'm glad I recognized it and looked away in time, but even just hearing her is devastating. I understand why they wanted to include it because of the sound bite of "keeping these women together," but I hate that clip and I certainly hope they asked Rebecca if it was okay, or at least warned her ahead of time.
I agree about the sound bite, but sound bit could’ve been used without the visual. The other issue I have with them using that particular clip is...she has never come forward as a victim of nassar. I really hope that she wasn’t, but no matter if she wasn’t or was and does not want to come forward....that implies to a viewer (esp non gym communities) gives the impression that she is a survivor. And since Rebecca has not come forward I just don’t like that. It’s not fair to her.

. I was happy they showcased the journalists so much, and I thought the detail about them not filming Maggie's parents at trials was quite telling. Whether or not she "should" have been on the team, it made it obvious that her performance that day didn't matter and they had decided in advance she wouldn't be going.

I agree. I liked what the IndyStar people added to this. I found that interesting. I also found what Nichols parents said about the media and not having seats laid out for them quite telling...and that it implied that the team had already been picked
 
From that documentary, Once Maggie made an actual report of the sexual abuse , and when her parents questioned if authorities would be notified (like they should have!) , the die was cast and she was never making that ( or any) Olympic team ....there's no way she wasn't one of the top 8 but she was the ONLY one of that calibre, with her name attached to a report of abuse.

Who would've thought that reporting a crime and trying to protect other children would get her black balled by scumbags Penny, Faehn and Karolyi ....they all should be in jail WITH Nassar for not stopping it and allowing it to continue...
 

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