Impact of Media on Gender Inequality in Sports

From UBC Wiki

Introduction

Gender inequality in sports has a long history marked by discrimination and struggle. Women in sport have had their challenges, be it discrimination or sexism. It has been believed for a long time that sports were a male dominant field. Women in sport have been subject to sexism, misrepresented media coverage, sexual objectification, unequal pay, and a lack of respect from their male peers. Gender inequality is made evident through the media coverage in sport. The notion that man is physically superior and woman is physically inferior, that men control and women are controlled, is perpetuated. Sport is a primary means of exhibiting the patriarchal notion of gender inequality.

In 2009, the 18-year old South African athlete, Caster Semenya, won the women’s 800-meter world championship in Track and Field. Her time of 1:55:45, a surprising improvement from her 2008 time of 2:08:00, caused officials from the International Association of Athletics Foundation (IAAF) to question whether her win was legitimate. If this questioning were based on suspicion of steroid use, the case would be no different from that of Roger Clemens or Mark McGuire, or even Track and Field Olympic gold medal winner Marion Jones. But the questioning and eventual testing were based on allegations that Caster Semenya, no matter what gender identity she possessed, was biologically a male. (Little, W., McGivern, R., and Kerins, N., 2016)

To provide further context, during the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, eight female athletes with XY chromosomes underwent testing and were ultimately confirmed as eligible to compete as women. To date, no males have undergone this sort of testing. Does this not imply that when women perform better than expected, they are “too masculine,” but when men perform well they are simply superior athletes? Imagine Usain Bolt, the world’s fastest man, being examined by doctors to prove he was biologically male based solely on his appearance and athletic ability? (Little, W., McGivern, R., and Kerins, N., 2016)

In this wiki page, we would like to address the issue of gender inequality in sport and show how sexuality, misrepresentation, intersectionality, oppression and power in sports are all results of the system of patriarchy.

Sexuality in Media Coverage of Sport

When addressing gender issues in sport, there is a continued assumption by many sports practitioners that the experiences of women and men will always be different because of perceived physiological characteristics. A sport that is considered masculine functions in society to reinforce the sense of separation between men and women. Such ideas lead to the construction of the ideologies concerning the female body and the polarization of the sexes. The sort of sport that women played exclusively in the past and play often in the present have their distances and times shortened, rules delimiting movement patterns more rigidly, coaches rarely teaching aggression, and referees thwarting any body contact. Of more importance, perhaps, than the modified version of sports played by female athletes is the aversion to sports of a substantial portion of the female population. This is because the sport's essential element is physical prowess, a trait that has been defined as masculine, that has been socially reduced to a typically male form of behavior. The media is perhaps the worst culprits in this socialization into sex roles; one need only think of advertising products that appeal to and perpetuate the woman's need to be a sexually attractive object and the man's need to be a dominant, active agent, owner, and builder in society. Misrepresentation in the media including sexual objectification is the result of patriarchy. According to Eoin, the underrepresentation and the sexualization of women athletes are still prominent. Within each of these themes is an array of ways in which the sports media continues to reinforce and reproduce hegemonic masculinity within sports. Sports that were generally specific for men were contact sports, such as football or rugby, and these types of sports consisted of masculine characteristics such as danger, risk, strength, endurance, and violence. While for women, it was sports that emphasized grace and aesthetic appeal that was considered acceptable for media coverage. The media has perpetuated a reward system for women athletes who conform to the gender hierarchy receiving more coverage than those who do not (Eoin, 2013).

As pointed out by Duncan and Hasbrook, when compared to male athletes, female athletes were subject to equivocal commentaries about their life. When women made mistakes it was down to emotional and sentimental difficulties, yet when men made mistakes it was down to unfortunate luck. The evidence of ambivalence suggested the print and television media denies power to women in sports for no logical or practical reason at all. Female athletes were shown a hierarchical naming, where men are given the dominant role, and women are recognized after them. The language used diminishes women athletes and denies them credit and therefore reaffirms patriarchy within sports (Duncan and Hasbrook, 1998). Female athletes are objectified on the field, much as they are on the streets. From coaches to commentators, to the audience, women are looked at as commodities showcasing themselves for men’s pleasure, not as entities of potential and talent.

Sports women have been stuck at this juncture of ‘looks vs sport’ on several public platforms, where they feel that their professional success has often been based on the ‘way they look’ on and off the field. Women athletes who are less glamorous get less attention from the media than those who do. The highlighting of the femininity of athletes focuses on the non-athletic achievement and therefore serves as a trivialization factor in their athletic accomplishments. As explained by Hargraves, when the media emphasizes women as attractive and feminine this shifts attention from their skills to their looks and minimizes the threat these women pose to the male dominance of sports (Hargraves, 1994). For instance, in Tennis, Maria Sharipova is a young blonde tennis star who has garnered an immense amount of media attention because of her body. Sharipova has won major tournaments and is a phenomenal athlete but yet the media remains focused on her body and continues to refer to her using language such as beautiful young girl, soft skin, and flowing locks of hair, all of which have nothing to do with her skills as an athlete.

Another classic example is Serena Williams, who is not one of the best “female” athletes, but is one of the best athletes of all time as she has won 3 more Grand Slams than Roger Federer but his name shows up as winning the most number of Grand Slams on the internet. This shows how the world does not acknowledge the fact that a female athlete can be more successful than a male athlete.

Intersectional View of Gender Inequality in Sports

When analyzing the role of Feminism while looking at gender inequality in popular sports, intersectionality is a much needed lens for discussing these topics, as the convergence of race, gender, and class create an overlap of subordinations towards certain groups of people over others. Highlighting these issues will allow us to further understand how deep discrimination goes, and to better understand the position minority individuals are in, no matter how talented they are in the sport. A clear example of an athlete discriminated against for both her gender and race is professional tennis player Serena Williams. Even as recently as 2018, in a derogatory caricature created by Mark Knight, Williams was bombarded with an onslaught of racist remarks, as Knight illustrated her with thick lips, wild upright hair, jumping on her racket as if she is unable to control her rage at losing the championship (Newman, 2018). Behind the depiction of Williams is a white male umpire telling the calm and collected looking blonde opponent, “Can you just let her win?”. (Newman, 2018). 

In this way, with one wrong step that insulted the public opinion, Williams’ race and gender as a black woman was immediately attacked in the most inhumane way, made to be the laughing stock of political cartoons across the globe. In this illustration specifically, Knight is playing on the racist trope of the “Angry Black Female'', reducing Williams to a cartoonish caricature and completely erasing her identity. The understanding of intersectionality is vital for situations such as these, as these attacks were not just on Williams black identity, or just her womanhood; it converged and attacked both to create an even more dramatic and dehumanizing reduction of her identity. This concept is articulated by scholars such as Kimberlé Crenshaw, who defines intersectionality as something that helps expose single-axis thinking that undermines the struggles for social justice (Cho and Crenshaw, 2013). By considering the dynamic and mutually constituting nature of interlocking identities such as race, gender class and sexuality, a much more sinister view of discrimination and sexism comes to the forefront (Cho and Crenshaw, 2013).

Another example of interlocking forms of oppression in sports is in the case of Caster Semenya and what she has come to represent. High performing women athletes such as Semenya are suspected by popular media as being “men'', simply because it is outside of the dominant narrative for women to be talented at a sport. In addition, women of color are disproportionately suspected in this matter, Semenya being a prime example of receiving this overt misogyny and racism. By erasing Semenya’s talents and suspecting that she has ‘too much testosterone’, sporting organizations created a narrative that they are protecting ‘real’ women from competing against women who are ‘suspected’ to be men. Within a few months of completing the Track and Field World Championships in 2009, Semenya’s genitalia, sexual organs, and hormone levels immediately became a subject of global discussion, all subjects she has never speculated in herself before (Bailey, 2016).

Due to the public’s complete disregard of Semenya’s wellbeing, she was put through multiple tests, her internal organs being x-rayed and her chromosomes being meticulously analyzed (Bailey, 2016). From this public outrage, a still young 18 year old Semenya grew to be suicidal despite accomplishing a world feat in track & field. These incredibly specific forms of discrimination can be understood as ‘Structural Intersectionality’ as well, that can be defined as a multilayered and routinized form of domination (Cho and Crenshaw, 2013). These overlapping structures of domination reveal a subordination of particular groups of women who are particularly vulnerable due to their race and gender.

Oppression and Power in Sports

The media is an industry that is consciously or subconsciously promoting stereotypical male attitudes in domains that are seen as more “masculine”. The concept of hyper-masculinity (display of dominance, strength) is often encouraged by the media through advertisements which promote “manliness” for selling products like sports gear, soaps, deodorants etc.(Vokey, et al.,2008). Furthermore, the notion of “boys will be boys” is used to justify their behaviours and actions whereas women exhibiting or indulging in similar activities are mostly looked down upon and are seen as them trying to become a “man”. The biological determinism of women which defines behaviour and individual characteristics to be innate further acts as a tool of oppression where men are naturally seen as being superior to women in almost all aspects of life. The media not only participates in promoting it but it actually is one of the prime players for breeding this ideology. Even though more women have become active agents in the workplace, the pay gap between men and women is extremely large(Fuller, Sylvia, Vosko & Leah, 2008).

Men earn way more than women playing in the same league or position. For instance, Pro league NBA male players are paid an average of 7.4 million dollars an year whereas a female player earns less than 20 thousand dollars a year on average. These pay gaps often lead to women becoming demotivated and heavily dependent on men which may also lead to issues of domestic violence and other forms of oppression as women are often seen as ‘things’ owned by men to be used at their disposal. Competitive sports is one of the main areas where toxic masculinity is encouraged. Bryson points out that since childhood boys are often put in sports that involve a lot of aggression which feeds the idea of aggression being ‘innate’ in men whereas women are often put in activities considered to be more feminine(Bryson,1983).

The media’s commentary of male and female sports varies significantly. On one end men are asked about their skills and performance, female athletes are questioned about their personal life rather than their performance or their goals. As stated by Anne Patrick, Hyper masculine commercials and media’s underlying patriarchal messages give rise to cultural stereotypes leading to a never ending vicious cycle of female inferiority and oppression(Patrick, 2020). Moreover, if women outperform men in sports that are considered ‘masculine’, people tend to naturally believe that the woman was using ‘steroids’ or that she isn't a ‘female’ which often leads to them going through testosterone as well as other tests to prove that they are ‘females’ and aren’t using any ‘steroids’.

This not only discourages and undermines other females to participate but also puts the person accused at a higher risk of feeling worthlessness and exploitation. Additionally women performing exceptionally in their area are often compared to their male counterparts, for instance the basketball star Sheryl Swoopes is the best player in the women’s league and is often called by the media the ‘female Michael Jordan’. It may as Patrick points out be seen as something to be proud of but what many don’t see is the masked notion of male superiority over females, which is associated with the ideal standards of society which suggests that greatness is equal to men.

Conclusion

The patriarchal society has historically devalued the concept of women athletes by proclaiming women as inferior to men and it has only been within the last five decades that women have challenged this myth and made the idea of women athletes in sports a possible reality. An apparent reason for this might be that men are afraid of losing their control and status in society in front of women. When women are butch—strong, tough, and unfeminine—they are also threatening because they are seen as not needing male help. If women are ever to achieve real equality, then we have to stop accepting male behavior choices as the default and the ideal. Women must insist on changing social policies and bending career tracks to accommodate their own choices too. Women have proved and continue to push the barriers in sports, showing that being born with two X chromosomes in no way has to equal shy and soft. The society should be embracing, enabling, and indeed celebrating the full range of women’s choices. Patriarchy in society and in sport should not be tolerated. Substantial improvement has been made but there is a long way to go.  For women in sport to take center stage, a cultural shift in thinking, television coverage, and media influences are necessary, so is abandoning a patriarchal universe that puts men at the top of everything and women as inferior to them.

References

  1. Bailey, Moya. (2016). Misogynoir in Medical Media: On Caster Semenya and R. Kelly. In Catalyst: feminism, theory, technoscience, 2(2).
  2. Bryson, L. (1983). Sport and the oppression of women. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Sociology, 19(3), 413-426. https://doi.org/10.1177/144078338301900303
  1. Cho, S., Crenshaw, K., & McCall, L. (2013). Toward a Field of Intersectionality Studies: Theory, Applications, and Praxis. Signs, 38(4), 785-810. doi:10.1086/66960.
  2. Duncan, M.C., and Hasbrook, C.A. (1998). Denial of Power in Televised Women’s Sports. Sociology of Sport Journal, 5, 1-21.
  3. Eoin J. Trolan, (2013). The Impact of the Media on Gender Inequality within Sport. Procedia - Social And Behavioral Sciences, Volume 91. ISSN1877-0428 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2013.08.420.
  4. Fuller, Sylvia; Vosko, Leah (2008). "Temporary Employment and Social Inequality in Canada: Exploring Intersections of Gender, Race and Immigration Status". Social Indicators Research. 88: 31–50.
  1. Hargreaves, J. (1994). Sporting Females: Critical Issues in the History and Sociology of Women’s Sports. London: Routledge. http://dx.doi.org/10.4324/9780203221945
  2. Little, W., McGivern, R., & Kerins, N. (2016). Introduction to Sociology. 2nd Canadian Edition. Chapter 12 – Gender, Sex, and Sexuality.
  3. Newman, Brooke. (2018). The Long History behind the Racist Attacks on Serena Williams. In Perspective. The Washington Post.
  4. Patrick, A. M. (2018). Where's the beef? masculinity, gender and violence in food advertising (Order No. 10811209). Available from ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global. (2038866074). https://ezproxy.library.ubc.ca/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.ezproxy.library.ubc.ca/dissertations-theses/wheres-beef-masculinity-gender-violence-food/docview/2038866074/se-2?accountid=14656
  5. Vokey, M., Tefft, B., & Tysiaczny, C. (2013). An analysis of hyper-masculinity in magazine advertisements. Sex Roles, 68(9-10), 562-576. doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.library.ubc.ca/10.1007/s11199-013-0268-1
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