Women in Sports
Women matter. There it is. I said it, and we all know it's true, but it seems that many pro sports don’t get it.
In the last month or so, multiple
influential female athletes have made headlines for all the wrong reasons. And
that isn’t because they said something provocative or did something
controversial. Instead, they aimed at making noise
against their organizations and it’s hierarchy in order to be
compensated for their work, as anyone should.
These women put their foot down and are stand as a group for what they
believe is right. So here I am today, sharing their message.
I support them. Hopefully you do to.
P.S
I could only highlight two stories for you today, but here is a
list of others which you can read about as well. Some have paved the way for
future women athletes, and some are still struggling to have their voices herd.
Caster Semenya
Photo Credit: Getty Images
Backstory
You may not know who she is, but
unless you’ve been living under a rock, her name should sound familiar.
Two-time Olympic Gold Medalist in the 800m track-and-field event. She holds
many World Championship medals as well, yet she isn’t exactly initially recognized for those accomplishments. To make things short, Caster was born with
an abnormal level of testosterone as a female. Because of that, her
accomplishments have been questioned for viability.
“Is she taking performance enhancers
and that’s why she looks like a man?”
“Should she be aloud to run as woman
if her biology is similar to that of a man?”
“Is she even a woman or is she a
transgender woman?”
“Should she be forced into
taking testosterone-limiting drugs to compete fairly among other
women?”
These are all valid questions people
have had and argued over the last 10 years
since she became world champion in
2009 having beaten her personal best by 4
seconds from a month earlier. For the last two years Caster has
been in the spotlight and most recently, a legal battle with
IAAF (International Association of Atheltics Federation), in attempts to overrule their decision to
impose hyperandrogeneous athletes, which she would be classified as, to take medication to offset their
higher levels of testosterone. Last week, her appeal failed and here we
are.
My
Opinion
Needless to say, this
infuriates me. You may have your own judgment and that is fair, but I can't believe this ruling. I understand that testosterone is a
performance enhancer, but when you are naturally gifted with a talent, why
is that allowed to be punishable? It doesn’t make any
sense.
Take Michael Phelps for example. The
reason is was able to beat all those records and be the most
decorated Olympian of all time, is purely because he was
gifted. His incredible wing span allowed him to swim
long distances in less strokes, and although that extra weight should
have slowed him down, he remained aerodynamic in the water. All because he was
born with a gift. Yet I don't see anyone telling him to modify his body to conform with the physical attributes of his fellow swimmers.
How is that any different than a
woman being born with a biological gift of higher testosterone? Phelps was
not limited in his career and his medals never questioned for his
body’s structure, yet Semenya is being dragged into a storm. She isn’t cheating, she
is just running faster than her competitors, just like Phelps was just
swimming faster than his competitors.
The issue here is not only ethical,
it’s racial and raises the question on gender in male-female competitions. This ruling poses a threat to eminent future issues with gender. It’s a matter
of time before a transgender woman wants to compete alongside other women. The
IAAF has not come close to resolving those issues. Instead they’ve decided to
rely on their 20-year-old methods to solving the performance enhancer
problem. Undoing the work of nature with doping is completely unethical,
especially in an industry that time and time again is trying to
remove drug enhancers from its programs. Doping should not be the
answer when it is actually the root of the many other problems.
The message that I am getting from
the IAAF is that if you have a natural born talent where the chemistry and
biology of your body allows you to be the best at what you do, it won’t be
accepted in our sports… unless you are a white male. And that just
seems to be the truth time and time again.
If you think I am being too harsh, do your own research about this story, and let me know what you think.
North American Women’s Hockey
Photo Credit: Getty Images
Backstory
Dislciamer: This story has ALOT of moving parts. I'll do my best at explaining the gist, but if you want to learn more, I suggest you read about all of it here.
Officially, women’s hockey
pro-leagues have only been running for the last 10 or so years. That
doesn’t seem long enough, right? Especially for the amount of exposure they
have during the Olympics. Most recently the CWHL (Canadian Women’s Hockey
League) had to seize operations due to lack of resources (aka they didn’t
have any more money to sustain the league). The NWHL (Nation Women’s Hockey
League, run in the US) said they would step up and expand their league with two
teams, in Toronto and Montreal. This last call of desperation doesn’t seem to be good enough for
the players.
A week or so ago, over 200 US,
Canadian, and some international female pro-players decided to boycott the
upcoming season of the NWHL. Their anger comes on from many
different angles, but for the most part it stems from lack
of financial security and overall support. On average, these women
make an annual salary ranging from 10,000$ to as low as 2,000$ a year.
Sounds crazy when you stack it up against the men’s hockey in the NHL
where the minimum salary is 650,000$. If that sounds “messed up” it’s because it
is.
The women who boycotted, includes
most of Team Canada and Team USA’s Olympic and World Championship
rosters.
Think of a player you remember watching at the Olympics last
year. Yup, she's not playing either. And though they will be competing at the
international level, professionally, in North America, they have put everything on the
table and stepped away until changes are made. The obvious answer would be
to receive compensation, and management help from the NHL, but even after
many press conference and news releases, it isn’t clear why the help hasn’t
been received. I have my assumptions though.
My
Opinion
First off, these women are just as important to growing the sport of hockey as the men. I know first-hand many girls who’ve played hockey, yet unlike with the boys, there’s this lingering reality.
Opportunities to further a career as a female hockey player are fractions of a fraction of the opportunities for men. Men playing hockey in high school have a goal to look forward to; get a university scholarship, work hard, get an agent and one day play in the NHL. Whereas women’s goal is just to get a scholarship in university, to get a degree, and maybe keep playing hockey for fun and if that doesn’t work out, which it hardly ever does, they at least have a degree to fall back on. Many have the “It was fun while it lasted” mentality.
In terms of financial help, it’s easy for me to say that the NHL should step up and provide support with the millions in profits they make, but I realize it’s not that simple. The NHL, and Gary Bettman (the league's commissioner), act as a representative for the many stakeholders and owners of the NHL. Without a 100% support from them, the NHL can’t just take their money away to fund a women’s pro-league.
Similarly, a big issue for the women’s league is attention and promotion, but I don’t see how it could be so difficult or expensive to market?
Ok say the NHL never gets involved, the women need more people to attend their games, right? Why not invite ex-players and Hall of Famers? Why not spend money on billboards and TV ads on sports channels as promotion? I haven’t seen either of those things. That has to be a big reason why the funding has lacked since the beginning.
The athletes are talented, and the game is entertaining. There is no question about that because we watch those girls play in the Olympics. But the money is with the men in the NHL, and that's just the world we live in today.
With a lot of fire power and loud voices, things can change. And although they've boycotted the league, they need to broadcast their frustrations everywhere on main stream media, going on the news, doing interviews, plastering it online. But I haven't seen any of that. Maybe it's coming soon, but as of now I guarantee most people will, or already, have forgotten about it since the news broke a couple weeks ago.
Going back to my point, we have a case of the classic chicken and egg. You need money to advertise and broadcast the games so people show up, but without enough money from attendees and fans, you can’t afford the advertisements, or to pay your athletes. The money has to come from a third party, and they need even more than they’ve been getting in previous years. Boycotting is only the first step to achieving better pay... and better ratings.
They need to put their faces out there and speak loud and tell their stories for EVERYONE to hear and listen. They need people who know nothing about hockey to feel a need to want to help them! Hopefully, I am helping with that right now, with you! They need everyone to be talking it. The more people talk about it, and the louder those voices are, they will be herd incisively by their organizations (NWHL and beyond) and changes will be made.
Opportunities to further a career as a female hockey player are fractions of a fraction of the opportunities for men. Men playing hockey in high school have a goal to look forward to; get a university scholarship, work hard, get an agent and one day play in the NHL. Whereas women’s goal is just to get a scholarship in university, to get a degree, and maybe keep playing hockey for fun and if that doesn’t work out, which it hardly ever does, they at least have a degree to fall back on. Many have the “It was fun while it lasted” mentality.
In terms of financial help, it’s easy for me to say that the NHL should step up and provide support with the millions in profits they make, but I realize it’s not that simple. The NHL, and Gary Bettman (the league's commissioner), act as a representative for the many stakeholders and owners of the NHL. Without a 100% support from them, the NHL can’t just take their money away to fund a women’s pro-league.
Similarly, a big issue for the women’s league is attention and promotion, but I don’t see how it could be so difficult or expensive to market?
Ok say the NHL never gets involved, the women need more people to attend their games, right? Why not invite ex-players and Hall of Famers? Why not spend money on billboards and TV ads on sports channels as promotion? I haven’t seen either of those things. That has to be a big reason why the funding has lacked since the beginning.
The athletes are talented, and the game is entertaining. There is no question about that because we watch those girls play in the Olympics. But the money is with the men in the NHL, and that's just the world we live in today.
With a lot of fire power and loud voices, things can change. And although they've boycotted the league, they need to broadcast their frustrations everywhere on main stream media, going on the news, doing interviews, plastering it online. But I haven't seen any of that. Maybe it's coming soon, but as of now I guarantee most people will, or already, have forgotten about it since the news broke a couple weeks ago.
Going back to my point, we have a case of the classic chicken and egg. You need money to advertise and broadcast the games so people show up, but without enough money from attendees and fans, you can’t afford the advertisements, or to pay your athletes. The money has to come from a third party, and they need even more than they’ve been getting in previous years. Boycotting is only the first step to achieving better pay... and better ratings.
They need to put their faces out there and speak loud and tell their stories for EVERYONE to hear and listen. They need people who know nothing about hockey to feel a need to want to help them! Hopefully, I am helping with that right now, with you! They need everyone to be talking it. The more people talk about it, and the louder those voices are, they will be herd incisively by their organizations (NWHL and beyond) and changes will be made.
Final Thoughts
Plain and simple, we still have an incredibly long way to go, and everyone should care about reaching an equal society, in terms of gender. I don't care what you identify as, male, female, gender-nonbinary, it doesn't matter because at the end of the day we are all people; people who deserve equal rights.
Just like in any "movement", if you believe something isn't right than speak up about it. Personally, gender inequality in sports is something that I am passionate about and so I chose to use my voice, here, to talk about it and continue the conversation.
If everyone talked about and advocated for what they believed in their hearts was wrong, or right, we'd be getting closer and closer to solving our worlds problems. Of coarse politics come into play, but we can't let that discourage us from doing something and standing up for those who need more voices to spread their message.
Our generation is blessed to have endless possibilities and opportunities to share ideas and opinions with the world. So do yourself, and your future self, a favour and speak up!
In the grand scheme of things, you have nothing to loose and so much to gain.
-Marie
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