1. Matt Johns The media are quick to report their disgust with the hubris behaviour however rarely claim some responsibility for the behaviour.

2. Overview There is a culture within league that permeates these activities However it is not restricted to rugby league only but other sports too. Youth players come to the top level game with these thoughts and expectations, the media like to point the finger at parents, friends and schools. But do they not concede that these ideas are developed and reinforced by media coverage? Furthermore this behaviour is not restricted to just sportsmen, what about other walks of life?

3. Why do Sportstars like group sex? But professional footballers inhabit a world saturated with sex, booze, opportunity and risk. And old-timers of sport say there's a long- standing link between elite sport and group sex. The ``gang bang'', they say, has long been a quiet part of sport culture, as routine as liniment and communal showers, tacitly endorsed by coaches and managers, stoically ignored by wives, journalists and fans.

4. Why would group sex appeal to handsome young athletes blessed with apparently ample female attention? Eroticism is not the key point, says Dr Clifton Evers of the University of NSW. Group sex, Evers says, is better understood as part of the physicality of men in sport -- the collective journey of shared pain, relief, nakedness, injury, energy and exhaustion.

5. Evers, an expert on the intersection of sport and sexual behaviour, interviewed NRL players in the wake of the 2004 Bulldogs gang-rape allegations. ``These are blokes who are familiar with bonding through their bodies,'' he says. ``They go through physical pain together. They train together, they get inked-up together, and the idea is that, through that, you form your belonging. ``You also have the opportunity to structure your bonding through a sexual situation. It's a classic situation of men bonding through something -- the woman becomes just the something.''

6. Psychologist and sex therapist Bettina Arndt ``The gang-bang experience has little to do with sex,'' Arndt says. ``Men don't do it seeking a peak sexual experience, they do it to be one of the boys. They do it for each other. It's a tribal dance which has far more to do with showing off to each other about being a real man, an aggressive he-man, than enjoying sexual pleasure with a woman.''

7. Professional sportsmen enjoy ever-increasing opportunities for sexual adventure and group-sex, says Griffith University associate professor James Skinner, who researches social and economic dynamics of sport. ``The rising profile of professional athletes probably makes them more wanted,'' Skinner says. ``People want to get close to them, get in touch with them, and therefore they're in environments where those things will happen. Professional sports stars are accessible rock stars. ``High-profile musicians travel with security, but to meet a professional sports star, you just have to know what pub they frequent. It's also an image thing for people to be seen with professional athletes. Those factors probably contribute to people -- women -- putting themselves in situations or environments that are potentially dangerous.''

8. player welfare officer Nigel Vagana Vagana says he was unaware of widespread group sex in his league playing days, and was surprised by former league coach Roy Masters' suggestion it was an unofficial team-bonding activity. ``I was a bit shocked at that,'' he says, ``but one of the things about rugby league is we have guys from everywhere, any culture, any demographic. ``The point is, rugby league isn't the only place these problems are happening. We are a window onto what's out there in society.'' One big change, Vagana says, is there's no longer a perception that high- value players will be protected when they stray. ``There was a perception in the past that the better players in the team were looked after. Now you're seeing guys who played test football banished,'' Vagana says.

9. But addressing the problem means cracking the ``mateship'' code, says Clifton Evers of UNSW, who will return to the NRL later this year for follow- up research with Lumby on whether and how attitudes are changing. ``This is where mateship can get really ugly, where it's about being a mate to bloke-friends, rather than being a mate to the woman in the situation,'' Evers says. ``It becomes about looking after your mates, wanting to belong with your mates. That means women are sexual objects, by and large. If you grow up in a very male-centric culture such as rugby league, then you come across the opinions and ideas of women less. ``That fosters an understanding of relationships that privilege the male over the female.''

11. Culture in Rugby League One anonymous player was quoted on a Fairfax website as saying: “You’re not supposed to say it publicly, but everyone knows that if you’re polite afterwards and pay her cab fare home you usually don’t have any problems.” This modern-day player also pitched the players as the victims, saying they faced constant harassment from young women

12. There is clearly a culture within league that provides cover for this type of conduct, and possibly encourages it. But it is a lazy bit of class snobbery to say that the problem is peculiar to league.

13. Sarah Ferguson’s report on Monday was excellent, but not without some flaws. In one scene we saw a rookie player who has just been picked to play juniors spouting his shocking opinions on women. Now, this is a kid at the start of his footy career. He has arrived at rugby league with those views. His parents, his friends, his school – they’re the ones who should be challenged as to how he’s turned out like that, not the game he’s about to start playing.

14. And to those who say that this boofhead kid has at least ended up in the right code, I can think of four AFL players, one of whom is still going around, who have never been called to account for a group sexual incident that took place in Adelaide’s southern parklands some 10 years ago. And for every small group of footy players there would be some men out there who are stockbrokers, bankers, journalists, lawyers, builders or retailers, who have watched this terrible story unfold with an uncomfortable level of interest. http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/male-silence-at-the- core-of-matthew-johns-scandal/

15. Still the sense of entitlement "For me personally, it has put my family through enormous anguish and embarrassment … For that I can't say sorry enough." No mention of "Clare", the young woman who wept through the ABC's Four Corners expose this week of rugby league sex scandals. http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/morality-code- kicked-into-touch-20090513-b37j.html?page=-1

16. As outrage about continuing rugby league sex scandals grows, it is not just the behaviour of a few predatory players being condemned, but the uber-masculinity such contact sports represent.