Augsut 24th 2026

Privilege comes with responsibility

Privilege comes with responsibility

Not everyone gets to become an elite athlete. Like it or not, there is a certain set of genetic, inherited preconditions plus social factors that allow elite athletes to become the best. Height, body shape, muscle fibre twitch speed, early access as children to training and support, the right coaching, the right funding and sponsoring support to be able to focus on your sport.

No one reaches the top without the application and commitment to their skill. Add to this the mental fortitude.

It is a whole package.

And it is a minority, highly privileged position. As such, it comes with a level of responsibility not all elite athletes take seriously.

Young kids aspire to be you. You are the heroes. They watch. Everything. Model everything. In a world seriously absent strong male role models, the elite male athlete is a role model.

Currently, a moral, ethical, equal world is fighting to surface against the oppression of patriarchy and misogyny. This fight has been ongoing for hundreds/thousands of years. My belief is that a world of more equality will be better for all.

The lowest of the low, the Andrew Tates and Donald Trumps of the world, do not want this to happen. They like their superiority and domination.

So when five men from an Australian elite men’s football team (Australian Rules) decide to have a massive party, continuing to drink late into the night and bringing women back to their hotel in response to a post-game euphoria, still a few games away from the finals, the choice they make is the example they set. The usual lame, sexist excuse – boys will be boys – simply doesn’t cut it. The life you worked hard for, the privilege you have, means you also chose to be exemplary in your behaviour.

A culture that says elite athletes need to get shit faced on alcohol/drugs and hire professional strippers speaks to a culture of misogyny and domination. Encourage that behaviour, and that is what you get more of.

It is that culture that needs to be exposed for what it is and the harm it does. No one wins. The men, women, the young people seeking role models. Just this week, a report by the University of Melbourne titled Misogyny, Online Radicalisation, and Youth Extremism in Australia revealed that nearly one-third of teenage boys hold hostile views toward women.

In our work in Syntropic World, we start with the inviolate principles and values we hold to each other and our work as the ground of being. We agree, as a collective team, on the consequences of our actions when we choose to violate our code. We hold each other to our best, and are supported in the skills and tools to speak to rogue behaviour, not through shaming or cruelty, but as an act of profound care for the best in the other.

Privilege comes with responsibility. The responsibility must be designed in, coached and lived in all actions by all actors. No Little Atrocities. (https://syntropic.world/little-atrocities-the-path-from-integrity-to-self-deception-and-bad-business/) No step overs.

Only then do we get to grow up and be better humans.

Published August 24th 2026. Photo taken August 22nd 2026