Women in sports judged on looks more than ability.
September 14, 2000 1:52 AM Subscribe
posted by aaron at 7:26 AM on September 14, 2000
1) Men are judged by their looks too in sports.
2) Most paying sports customers are men still.
Is it any wonder that advertisers and media types are still pandering to their audience?
posted by norm at 7:46 AM on September 14, 2000
posted by dogwelder at 9:41 AM on September 14, 2000
According to the volleyball association rules, and olympic rules, female volleyball players must wear bikinis, that have not more than 6" of fabric over the hip. Didja know that the decision to keep the ruling was based on using sex appeal to attract viewers, rather than athletic prowess?
posted by kristin at 2:42 PM on September 14, 2000
posted by davidgentle at 5:30 PM on September 14, 2000
I think we're well beyond the point where we have to pretend that sex appeal has nothing to do with professional athletics. The women who've done those photo layouts or whatever are also trying to enhance their saleability to sponsors, which especially in the individual sports, is the only way to be able to do it.
And to say that women are exercising to look good instead of for their health ... well, jeez, how many MEN are exercising for their freaking health? That's contextless and pointless.
posted by dhartung at 5:48 PM on September 14, 2000
There are two sports in the Olympics where women and men compete together equally for a single set of medals, where they compete against each other, where there are not separate "women's medals" and "men's medals" but just medals for the sport.
Let see if anyone can guess what they are. I'll post the answer later.
posted by Steven Den Beste at 6:44 PM on September 14, 2000
posted by the webmistress at 7:25 PM on September 14, 2000
posted by davidgentle at 8:29 PM on September 14, 2000
any of them, if they thought they could win.
I think women athletes *are* promoting themselves as sexy girls, and I think that's because the stigma has always been that if you're athletic you're "boyish". women want to be recognised as being attractive not in spite of, but because of, their athletic abilities (and by extension the well-toned machine of a body that gives them that prowess.) I have no problem with that.
the point of the article still stands (at least to me): women are being highlighted by the media based, not on "she's an athlete, and boy is she sexy" but on "she's sexy and, oh, also an athlete" (based on more conventional standards of beauty).
sort of the difference between "she's so smart and I think that's so sexy" and "she's really a babe, even though she got has a law degree."
rcb
posted by rebeccablood at 9:00 PM on September 14, 2000
>>But at what point will we have a total equality 100m? I would have thought that broad usage of storoids and more futuristic technologies would make it a possibility.<<
Steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs are banned in most organized sports. (Whether they should be is up for debate, I think, but they are, and I doubt that's going to change anytime soon.) So that's not gonna happen. And even if we did finally come up with something that would allow women to run as fast as men in the 100m, and it were allowed to be used, it would probably make the women's bodies look so bizarre, overly bloated with extra muscle mass and such, that few would want to make use of it.
posted by aaron at 10:03 PM on September 14, 2000
posted by davidgentle at 7:01 PM on September 15, 2000
Dressage is particularly interesting because it also permits handicapped people. An amputee competed in it once. I'm sure the other sports permit handicapped participation, but there's really no way they could qualify in most cases. Seems to me like a leg amputee could compete in shooting, though, since they shoot prone.
posted by Steven Den Beste at 7:18 PM on September 15, 2000
Somebody beat you to it.
posted by aaron at 11:33 PM on September 15, 2000
posted by davidgentle at 6:29 PM on September 16, 2000
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posted by Neale at 2:14 AM on September 14, 2000