In Blue and Yellow Heroes, national team athletes from different sports talk about racism they have been exposed to, both in and outside of sports.
Basketball player Kalis Loyd is one of the participants.
In the program, she says that over the years she has experienced that there is racism in Swedish basketball.
Kalis Loyd believes that diversity is not sufficiently represented in positions of power and that it permeates the entire business and that, for example, team selections are affected.
- People are excluded because of their skin color and it happens again and again, she says.
Loyd also says that skin color is never the official explanation for a pimple.
She therefore finds it difficult to give examples.
"There is always an excuse"
- There is always an excuse for why you can not choose.
For example, in the national team, there is structural racism where you can opt out of players.
You could say that it is because of game understanding, or whatever.
The player is dominant but is not selected due to his skin color.
Nobody says you are not chosen because of their skin color, but you know.
When asked if it will continue in 2021, Loyd answers:
- Yes.
You want people who stand in line.
The basketball association's general secretary Fredrik Joulamo says that the association has for several years started work on dismantling old structures.
He does not agree that skin color affects team selections.
The basketball association does not agree
- I am of course appalled to hear Kali's picture of it.
That her image is that it happens today as well.
Because we have, among other things, in the round table talks (the union's podcast "Roundtable talks") been drawn to testimonies that it has happened historically.
- Then I will also say that I do not share that image at all, that skin color is a decisive factor in national team selections.
But just the fact that the issue is raised is a sign that we have not come out with how we work to prevent racism and how we counteract such things.
The national team troops are taken out by the national team captain Marco Crespi.
But a total of six people, including Joulamo, are involved in the selection process and according to the general secretary, it is a guarantee that decisions are made on sporting grounds.
Joulamo says that it is difficult to respond to criticism of competitions without concrete examples of racism.
- I believe that structural racism, ie old traditions and norms, can in some way shape even today's decision-makers in national team contexts, and of course it should not be that way.
But it is very difficult to deal with things like this without getting concrete examples.
- But we have no reason to doubt the testimonies or the statements that have happened, we can only think about how we should work forward to prevent that from happening in the future.
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Fredrik Joulamo, general secretary of the Swedish Basketball Association, does not agree with player Kalis Loyd that skin color affects team selections in the national team.
Photo: SVT
LINK: Watch Blue and Yellow Heroes on SVT Play