Personal Narrative: Shameful Coverage Of Women In Sports

Although over time gender discrimination has grown progressively over the years, one place that gender inequality is not fully present is in the sports world. Gender inequality in sports has been an issue in the industry for centuries. For years and years women faced the issues of lower pay, not as much publicity and not being appreciated as a female athlete. Clearly, even in this prevalent era of alleged equality and impartiality, most sports still remains as a male dominion, as there still is an unnoticed barrier between sport and woman. Through this analysis, I wanted to investigate some of the initial causes for the above circumstances.

Some arguments suggest how it puts down male athletes and their sports, but one statistic states how if a female is involved in a sport she will most likely be paid more than men. "The number of women playing college-level sports today is more than five times as high as it was in 1972. And the number of girls participating in high-school sports today has reached a record high of 3.27 million. About two in five girls participate in high-school varsity sports, according to the Women’s Sports

“I wonder how many times a Tom Brady is asked about how handsome he is, or J.J. Watt... it’s something that us female athletes have to deal with all the time,”(Hatch.) quoted by the famous Delle Donne of the WNBA (Women’s National Basketball Association) Chicago Sky. Delle Donne is one of the many female athletes, who endure sexism in sports today. Today in society, people still struggle with the idea of females being involved in sports. Sexism is “ the unfair treatment of people because of their sex; especially : unfair treatment of women” (Sexism.) Many would agree that watching an all female athletic game, is not as entertaining as an all male athletic game. Men believe women are incompetent when it comes to sports talk. During a sports conversation, women tend to get ignored

In colleges the amount men and women on sport teams has to be proportional with the amount of men and women at a school because of the Title IX. But there are some sports, like wrestling and other men sports like men's gymnastics or swimming, where there are a lot more men than women are on a team. Which leaves two ways to fix that problem; 1. Get more women on the team, which may require a lot of money 2. Make some of the men leave the team.

If society stops to understand the struggles these women have been facing for decades will have a clearer picture of what steps to take in order to make a change in the sports industry. Men need to put their masculinity aside and advocate giving women a voice. The purpose of this paper is to explore the issues women in the sport world have faced through history, wage gaps, current issues today, and to discuss findings and recommendations for future research. Title IX is a law that came into effect in 1972, this comprehensive federal law prohibited discrimination on the basis of sex in any federally funded education program or activity.

In addition, women’s sports aren’t the only ones seeing an incline in participation. The media

“You hit like a girl”. This statement connotates women being the weaker sex which summarizes what gender discrimination in sports is. Dictionary-wise, it is the discrimination of one’s athletic abilities based on their gender. It is seen in every sport at any country around the world. Both men and women are victims of this but research proves that when are those who are mostly affected. Women receive less recognition than men and are classified as weak. Women too are called “tomboy” for joining a stereotypical male’s sport or for joining any sport in general. With that said, it also prevents people from discovering their true passion for the fear of society’s perception. Since gender discrimination in sports foes not give men and women equal rights and opportunities, promoting sports without gender divisions will lessen this.

“Female discrimination in sports is a common occurrence all around the world, women are seen as less than males.” (Ladrea) Equality in sports is unequal. In the 1800 women got very little attention and did not get the opportunity to play in any sport in America and all around the world. Men could go and try out for different sports teams and workout but for women they were only allowed to stay home to cook and clean. There were some events women could participate in but it could not be competitive, it was focused on getting active and staying active. With the different sex comes different levels, like males skill level is a lot higher than womens skill level, and males get the bigger audience than females do and men are all over the television

In the article titled Face-off on the playing field By, Judith B. Stamper explains girls have their own story of support or discrimination, success also the debate of girls be allowed to compete on boys’ sports team. First, the writer Title IX explains female athletes are been treated second-class for long enough and should pass of inequalities and biases of girls. The writer also clarifies that girls doing sports make them healthier, physically, and emotionally. Other girls that don’t play sports are less likely to use of drugs. In addition, she notes a former Stanford University basketball player Mariah says, strength and independence of things girls learn from sports, the opportunities that are changing women.

Sports have always been a male dominate sport, especially in schools. It took many years of schooling and fighting for females to be able to participate in sports and have equal education opportunities. “The passage of Title IX, the 1972 Education Amendments to the Civil Rights Act, expanded high school athletic opportunities to include girls, revolutionizing mass sports participation in the United States (Rammell, 2014, pg. 136).” Since the legislation, Title IX was passed, sports offerings for boys and girls has changed. Title IX has created many opportunities for girls and young women today since it began 40 years ago. Although Title IX is best known for sports and athletics, is about much more! It also opens the gate for girls to pursue math and science, requires fair treatment for pregnant and parenting students, and protects students for sexual harassment. Over the years title IX has helped females in sports; sadly, there are still educational barriers and discrimination of gender in schools off of the playing field. Despite Title IX 's prohibition against sex discrimination, there are schools across the country that still show signs of discrimination

Should men and women compete against each other in sport? In today’s modern society it is accepted that gender equality is aspired to in all areas of life. It is agreed that women should be paid the same wage as men, given the same job opportunities and have the same laws applied to them.

People used strong effort to keep women’s sports limited when they wanted to be competitive; that wouldn’t last long (Bell). Women took part in the Olympics of 1900 for the first time. Only 22 women competed and were permitted to participate in golf and tennis (Feminist Majority Foundation). Later in the 1920’s a very stereotypical view was developed towards women and their desire to participate in sports. Their participation became “unfeminine” and “selfish”, and not to mention the fact that all athletic women were accused of lesbianism (Bell).

As Birch Bayh once said, “Title IX is simple: don’t discriminate on the basis of sex (Birch).” According to The United States Department of Justice, Title IX is a comprehensive federal law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in any federally funded education program or activity (“Overview”). Prior to the enactment of Title IX in 1972, “Only one in 27 girls played high school sports and there were virtually no college scholarships for female athletes” (“Before”). Forty years later the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) surveyed the number of college athletes in 2010-2011 and there were 252,946 men and 191,131 women participating in college level sports (NCAA). Title IX has helped women all around the country by creating more athletic opportunities in universities and education systems in general.

Over time so many women and men have been effected by Title Ix. I bet you are wondering what Title Ix is. It’s the law that prohibits the discrimination of sex of any educational program or activity it allows women to do basically what men can do like sports. From 1972-2016 it has impacted the lives of so many women, today we see so many women basketball players, tennis players, volleyball players, and even soccer players and so many more.

On very little occasions girls got the chance to play with the boys. “For many decades girls’ only real chance to compete would come on occasional “Play Days” with neighboring schools” (57). These were very special to the girls because this was their only chance to be mixed with boys, while playing sports that they loved. This kept giving girls the confidence and sooner or later they would not worry about not being accepted. “No longer would females accept ‘No girls allowed’ attitude” (91).