Girls, women, sports & homophobia

Two articles on women and sports today:

A favorite topic of mine that we discuss in my intro classes is the impact of Title IX and the growth of girls’ and women’s sports on American culture.  Critics have long argued that women’s sports like the WNBA are simply not as economically viable as men’s.  This New York Times article offers an interesting argument that the reverse is true for young girls’ sports – that girls’ participation is more likely to involve entire families’ – and therefore be more economically viable.

The second article points to how women’s sports is constructed so as to be economically viable – specifically, how it caters to society’s homophobia.  Mike Wise at the Washington Post asks why a staple of  sports coverage – the “kiss cam” is not used at Washington Mystics games.  The Mystics manager says it’s “not appropriate” because so many kids are at the games, which directly touches on the double standard by which heterosexual family values are worshipped at a sports event which takes for granted its substantial lesbian support base.

On girls’ sports

Ten members of Kirsten Grant’s family converged here last week to watch her play in a major youth softball tournament. Her mother, father, sister and brother had driven 13 hours with her from their home in suburban Toronto. Other relatives had traveled from as far as Salt Lake City. During lulls in play, they all went shopping and visited local attractions.

But last year, when Kirsten’s older brother, Erik, played on a traveling baseball team, the experience could not have been more different. Parents rarely accompanied the team, he said, and the coach frowned on anything that distracted from the game. “No leisure activity,” said Erik, 19. “It was eat, sleep and drink baseball.”  More here

On the lack of “kiss cams” at Mystics games

“Why don’t they have a KissCam at Mystics games?” a young friend asked last week, which preceded an awkward pause and an even more awkward answer.

Really, why doesn’t the inclusive WNBA franchise in the nation’s capital, of all places, send their video cameramen and camerawomen to find unsuspecting couples in the stands during timeouts and capture their mugs for all of Verizon Center’s crowd to see? And wait for the couple’s reaction, which usually involves a polite, if awkward, peck on the lips.

Just like they do at NBA games and other sporting events in which the participants are men.

“We got a lot of kids here,” Sheila Johnson, the Mystics’ managing partner, said when asked last week at a game. “We just don’t find it appropriate.” More here

Also see story at Out Sports