Thursday, October 25, 2012

Summer lovin', had me a blast

Summer lovin', happened too fast.
Christine Brennan has declared the Summer of Women (in sports) over. And, today, she and I are on the same page.
Eternal pessimist that I am, I suspected--as it was happening--that the surge of interest in women's sports that was ignited primarily by the Olympics but also by the concurrent news and (mostly) praise of Title IX during its 40th anniversary year, would dissipate. It's a roller coaster ride. Luckily we only have to go down screeching down that big hill of disappointment once every 4 years (and down a smaller hill of disappointment after the winter Olympics end).
Brennan was brought back to her reality after hearing UConn women's basketball coach, Geno Auriemma, discuss his stance on lowering the rim in women's basketball to make it a more popular sport that people (i.e. men) want to watch. People who don't like women's sports are not going to watch them. And inferiorizing the sport only provides the haters more reason not to care.Why do people continue to laud this man?
Also at issue is the forthcoming hiring of a coach for US national women's soccer team. Will it be a man or a woman?? Brennan explains why it matters--and it does--even as people fall back on the hackneyed "we're just going to hire the best person for the job" because we don't want to think about how gender and race and class inequalities are perpetuated in sport.

Apologies for the Debbie Downer post. I'll put on my hope and cheer outfit later.

1 comment:

Diane said...

No need to apologize for exposing the truth. At least Brennan has had an "ah-ha" moment.

Makes me think about when Jon Wertheim said that the ATP deserves more money and support than the WTA because of "the market." He totally ignored the fact that "the market" is controlled by the sports media and its biases and prejudices, the cultural bias toward anything male, and the fact that the WTA is controlled by whatever the media says is "significant."

Auriemma is part of the problem; he always has been.