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It's been said a people can be judged by their prisons. Can they be judged by their national pastime as well?
Bills cheerleaders performing during a game in September 2013.
BUFFALO — Alyssa cannot recall the precise moment she realized her dream gig as a Buffalo Bills cheerleader had turned into a nightmare.
Each week held so many indignities.
Supervisors ordered the cheerleaders, known as the Buffalo Jills, to warm up in a frigid, grubby stadium storeroom that smelled of gasoline. They demanded that cheerleaders pay $650 for uniforms. They told the cheerleaders to do jumping jacks to see if flesh jiggled.
The Jills were required to attend a golf tournament for sponsors. The high rollers paid cash — “Flips for Tips” — to watch bikini-clad cheerleaders do back flips. Afterward, the men placed bids on which women would ride around in their golf carts.
A not-incidental detail: The carts had no extra seats. Women clung to the back or, much more to the point, were invited to sit in the men’s laps.
For these and more humiliations, and for hundreds of hours of work and practices, Alyssa and her fellow cheerleaders on the Buffalo Jills received not a penny of wages, not from the subcontractor and certainly not from the Buffalo Bills, a team that each year makes revenue in excess of $200 million.
The National Football League, that $10 billion “nonprofit” business, is the occasionally repulsive gift that keeps on giving. An all-American empire, the N.F.L. is structured with various and many principalities and emirates, and fixers who cushion the leadership from the unsightly details of league business as usual.
So owners and lobbyists handle the shakedown of cities for publicly funded stadiums; Commissioner Roger Goodell alights when a grip and grin is needed to seal the deal. Lawyers and doctors on the league’s pad handled the league’s war against payouts for concussions, which began with denial and segued into discredit, until lots of not-so-hot publicity made that unbearable.
Now the league claims credit for its bravery in confronting the scourge of wrecked brains.
And that brings us back to cheerleaders.
Alyssa, joined by her friend and fellow cheerleader Maria, talked of their work in downtown Buffalo, in the office of their lawyer, Sean Cooney. Petite and blond, an experienced dancer and a lifelong Bills fan, Alyssa worked a year as a Jill.
In keeping with the N.F.L.’s coyly kittenish policy which requires that cheerleaders offer only their first name, and because her lawsuit has angered many in this Bills town, she declined to give her surname or to use it in the lawsuit. Not in keeping with N.F.L. policy, Alyssa, Maria and three other cheerleaders sued the Bills in May, alleging flagrant violations of state minimum wage laws.
The most they could hope for as cheerleaders, they said, were a few small tips and appearance fees here and there. Alyssa says she made $420 for more than 800 hours of work; Maria made $105.
“People really thought we had it good, that we were paid well and had this luxurious lifestyle,” she said. She narrowed her eyes and shook her head.
“Seriously? I ended up feeling like a piece of meat.”
Buffalo is a handsome old city on Lake Erie. It suffered bloody wounds over the past decades, from population loss to abandonment, before it turned a corner of late. Nothing about local pride is phony. One hundred and fifty women paid $50 each to try out as a cheerleader, and viewed it as an honor and a thrill.
(Some other Jills, particularly alumnae, remain angry at Alyssa, Maria and the other three cheerleaders for bringing their lawsuit.)
“I grew up in Buffalo, and was captain of the cheerleading team in high school,” said Maria, who is an accountant. “I busted my butt to make the Jills. To make it! What a thrill.”
Alyssa recalled that team managers herded the winning cheerleaders into a darkened room to watch a slide show. They saw screen shots of their Facebook pages, obtained without their permission. “You’re thinking, oh my God, this is so embarrassing,” she said. “And they never asked you about any of this.”
We will monitor everything you do, the women were told.
The team’s contractor handed the women a contract and a personnel code, and told them to sign on the spot. The team dictated everything from the color of their hair to how they handled their menstrual cycle.
The contractor required they visit a sponsor who was a plastic surgeon. He offered a small discount if they opted for breast augmentation and other services. Larger breasts, however, were not a condition of nonpaid employment.
“If you complained, you were told: ‘This is a privilege. Deal with it!’ ” Alyssa recalled.
Many pro football clubs maintain cheerleading teams, although times are changing, maybe a little bit. The Oakland Raiders recently settled a pay lawsuit with the Raiderettes. The team agreed to pay minimum wage and overtime, which counts as a come-to-Karl Marx moment for the N.F.L.
Other cheerleaders have sued the Bengals, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Jets. The Buffalo Bills, however, stand out as the only one of these teams that insists cheerleaders kick and dance in heat and arctic cold for zip. Cash-flow problems have nothing to do with it. Terry and Kim Pegula, who made their fortune in fracking, recently purchased the Bills for $1.4 billion. That is the highest price yet paid for a league franchise.
The Pegulas are big donors to Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo. New York State contributed tens of millions to rehabilitate the team’s stadium before the Pegulas took over. Now there is pressure for the state to fork over for a new stadium. No doubt I am unfair to place these facts in the same paragraph.
Faced with the lawsuit, the Bills disbanded the Jills for this season. A team spokesman emailed me that the Bills appreciated this “ancillary service” provided by “third-party vendors.” Its statement complained of “allegations” that “attempt to give the impression that our organization employs cheerleaders.”
Impressions can be so unfair. The Bills, however, might not have helped their case much by keeping the Jills’ calendar-release video on the team website. The case is now before Justice Timothy Drury of State Supreme Court, and no trial date has been set. But the judge has ruled that the team set the terms and approved contracts for the Jills. “These facts are further indication of the control the Bills exercised over the Jills,” he wrote.
The Jills’ subcontractor, Stejon Productions, readily acknowledges that it is a front operation.
“The Bills control everything, from the moves to the uniforms to the dances,” said Dennis Vacco, the lawyer for Stejon. “The Bills have a long history here of wanting their cake and eating it too.”
A Jill’s life can shine an unforgiving light on fraught questions of gender in the N.F.L. Alyssa and her friend Maria loved to dance, and their faces lighted up as they recalled performing before tens of thousands of fans.
Their jobs could swing just as fast into the land of the humiliating. The women were required to attend a “Men Show” at one casino and a Jills calendar release party that started at midnight at another casino. The women walked amid men who leered and grabbed.
The National Football League, as is its practice, has little to say on the question of uncompensated work by these high-profile women. Goodell offered his patented I-know-nothing routine.
“I have no knowledge,” he wrote in an affidavit, of the Jills’ “selection, training, compensation and/or pay practices.”A contract surfaced that laid out the terms and was signed by Goodell. A league lawyer asserted that Goodell’s signature was affixed by a stamp. Alyssa and Maria shook their heads. They have resolved not to return to the Jills, even if the squad is brought back.
“It came down to this,” Alyssa said. “What self-worth do I have? I am 100 percent happy with myself without this.”
You wonder if the Bills owners and N.F.L. commissioner can say as much of themselves.
BUFFALO — Alyssa cannot recall the precise moment she realized her dream gig as a Buffalo Bills cheerleader had turned into a nightmare.
Each week held so many indignities.
Supervisors ordered the cheerleaders, known as the Buffalo Jills, to warm up in a frigid, grubby stadium storeroom that smelled of gasoline. They demanded that cheerleaders pay $650 for uniforms. They told the cheerleaders to do jumping jacks to see if flesh jiggled.
The Jills were required to attend a golf tournament for sponsors. The high rollers paid cash — “Flips for Tips” — to watch bikini-clad cheerleaders do back flips. Afterward, the men placed bids on which women would ride around in their golf carts.
A not-incidental detail: The carts had no extra seats. Women clung to the back or, much more to the point, were invited to sit in the men’s laps.
For these and more humiliations, and for hundreds of hours of work and practices, Alyssa and her fellow cheerleaders on the Buffalo Jills received not a penny of wages, not from the subcontractor and certainly not from the Buffalo Bills, a team that each year makes revenue in excess of $200 million.
The National Football League, that $10 billion “nonprofit” business, is the occasionally repulsive gift that keeps on giving. An all-American empire, the N.F.L. is structured with various and many principalities and emirates, and fixers who cushion the leadership from the unsightly details of league business as usual.
So owners and lobbyists handle the shakedown of cities for publicly funded stadiums; Commissioner Roger Goodell alights when a grip and grin is needed to seal the deal. Lawyers and doctors on the league’s pad handled the league’s war against payouts for concussions, which began with denial and segued into discredit, until lots of not-so-hot publicity made that unbearable.
Now the league claims credit for its bravery in confronting the scourge of wrecked brains.
And that brings us back to cheerleaders.
Alyssa, joined by her friend and fellow cheerleader Maria, talked of their work in downtown Buffalo, in the office of their lawyer, Sean Cooney. Petite and blond, an experienced dancer and a lifelong Bills fan, Alyssa worked a year as a Jill.
In keeping with the N.F.L.’s coyly kittenish policy which requires that cheerleaders offer only their first name, and because her lawsuit has angered many in this Bills town, she declined to give her surname or to use it in the lawsuit. Not in keeping with N.F.L. policy, Alyssa, Maria and three other cheerleaders sued the Bills in May, alleging flagrant violations of state minimum wage laws.
The most they could hope for as cheerleaders, they said, were a few small tips and appearance fees here and there. Alyssa says she made $420 for more than 800 hours of work; Maria made $105.
“People really thought we had it good, that we were paid well and had this luxurious lifestyle,” she said. She narrowed her eyes and shook her head.
“Seriously? I ended up feeling like a piece of meat.”
Buffalo is a handsome old city on Lake Erie. It suffered bloody wounds over the past decades, from population loss to abandonment, before it turned a corner of late. Nothing about local pride is phony. One hundred and fifty women paid $50 each to try out as a cheerleader, and viewed it as an honor and a thrill.
(Some other Jills, particularly alumnae, remain angry at Alyssa, Maria and the other three cheerleaders for bringing their lawsuit.)
“I grew up in Buffalo, and was captain of the cheerleading team in high school,” said Maria, who is an accountant. “I busted my butt to make the Jills. To make it! What a thrill.”
Alyssa recalled that team managers herded the winning cheerleaders into a darkened room to watch a slide show. They saw screen shots of their Facebook pages, obtained without their permission. “You’re thinking, oh my God, this is so embarrassing,” she said. “And they never asked you about any of this.”
We will monitor everything you do, the women were told.
The team’s contractor handed the women a contract and a personnel code, and told them to sign on the spot. The team dictated everything from the color of their hair to how they handled their menstrual cycle.
The contractor required they visit a sponsor who was a plastic surgeon. He offered a small discount if they opted for breast augmentation and other services. Larger breasts, however, were not a condition of nonpaid employment.
“If you complained, you were told: ‘This is a privilege. Deal with it!’ ” Alyssa recalled.
Many pro football clubs maintain cheerleading teams, although times are changing, maybe a little bit. The Oakland Raiders recently settled a pay lawsuit with the Raiderettes. The team agreed to pay minimum wage and overtime, which counts as a come-to-Karl Marx moment for the N.F.L.
Other cheerleaders have sued the Bengals, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Jets. The Buffalo Bills, however, stand out as the only one of these teams that insists cheerleaders kick and dance in heat and arctic cold for zip. Cash-flow problems have nothing to do with it. Terry and Kim Pegula, who made their fortune in fracking, recently purchased the Bills for $1.4 billion. That is the highest price yet paid for a league franchise.
The Pegulas are big donors to Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo. New York State contributed tens of millions to rehabilitate the team’s stadium before the Pegulas took over. Now there is pressure for the state to fork over for a new stadium. No doubt I am unfair to place these facts in the same paragraph.
Faced with the lawsuit, the Bills disbanded the Jills for this season. A team spokesman emailed me that the Bills appreciated this “ancillary service” provided by “third-party vendors.” Its statement complained of “allegations” that “attempt to give the impression that our organization employs cheerleaders.”
Impressions can be so unfair. The Bills, however, might not have helped their case much by keeping the Jills’ calendar-release video on the team website. The case is now before Justice Timothy Drury of State Supreme Court, and no trial date has been set. But the judge has ruled that the team set the terms and approved contracts for the Jills. “These facts are further indication of the control the Bills exercised over the Jills,” he wrote.
The Jills’ subcontractor, Stejon Productions, readily acknowledges that it is a front operation.
“The Bills control everything, from the moves to the uniforms to the dances,” said Dennis Vacco, the lawyer for Stejon. “The Bills have a long history here of wanting their cake and eating it too.”
A Jill’s life can shine an unforgiving light on fraught questions of gender in the N.F.L. Alyssa and her friend Maria loved to dance, and their faces lighted up as they recalled performing before tens of thousands of fans.
Their jobs could swing just as fast into the land of the humiliating. The women were required to attend a “Men Show” at one casino and a Jills calendar release party that started at midnight at another casino. The women walked amid men who leered and grabbed.
The National Football League, as is its practice, has little to say on the question of uncompensated work by these high-profile women. Goodell offered his patented I-know-nothing routine.
“I have no knowledge,” he wrote in an affidavit, of the Jills’ “selection, training, compensation and/or pay practices.”A contract surfaced that laid out the terms and was signed by Goodell. A league lawyer asserted that Goodell’s signature was affixed by a stamp. Alyssa and Maria shook their heads. They have resolved not to return to the Jills, even if the squad is brought back.
“It came down to this,” Alyssa said. “What self-worth do I have? I am 100 percent happy with myself without this.”
You wonder if the Bills owners and N.F.L. commissioner can say as much of themselves.
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