Violence and Rule Breaking

Amy Morris

Dr. McMahon

SMS 302

1/11/18

                Gender Inequality in Sports

        I always was aware there were gender inequality issues is sports. What did surprise me, though, was that there is an increase in women competing in college sports, almost surpassing men, and yet they still receive so little of the funding for college sports. I am not sure what the best solution is but, to be fair, more funding needs to go to women’s athletics.

        On a personal level, I can believe these things are going on in sports because it is going on in life. Women run into gender equality issues every day. I appreciate it being brought to light, though, because it is such the norm that we don’t even realize it’s happening. I am not someone who participates in most sports. In fact, growing up I was always involved in more girly “sports”: cheerleading and dance. I am, however, into fitness. I love to lift weights but I know, as a woman, I am judged for that. I cannot believe that there is still a stigma that weight lifting will make you “look like a man.” That it’s not lady-like. That we’re too frail. That I must not know what I’m doing and definitely need your help when I’m in the gym lifting heavy. I’m not a power lifter by any means and still see these prejudices every day. Of course, these are more prejudices than actual inequality but it illustrates why this doesn’t surprise me.

        I do, however, hope for change in the future. I hope to see more televised women’s events. I hope to see bigger female athletic programs, in general. As was stated in the video, if you took the money provided to football and gave it to women’s sports, think of what could be done? For women’s sports, gymnastics and figure skating are spectator’s sports. As was stated in the video, you could hire the best coaches and have amazing facilities and, possibly, woman’s sports could take off like men’s. We will not know unless given a similar opportunity.

        The other thing that was hard to hear was that when the NCAA took over the AIAW, so many female coaches lost their jobs. This is a blatant step backwards for women. These women were already coaching and lost their jobs to male assistant coaches. I, personally feel, whenever possible, women should be coached by other women. They know their sport and they know women’s physiology best. Plus, when we think of coaches as a support system, I think this is especially important. Of course, the best candidate should get the job. Women shouldn’t just be given the position to fill a quota but if they are also highly qualified individuals, why would they lose their job so a male can hold it?

        While watching the video it was made clear that the decisions that were made in regards to Title IX were not made to help women but to protect the funding to men’s athletics. The three prong system was basically set up to keep them within the letter of the law, but not the spirit of the law. Yet, currently, programs are not even following these guidelines. Prong One was about proportionally distributing funds based on participation. Currently, the number of female athletes has increased to come close to equal with male athletes. The women’s programs are not seeing this increase in funds. In the video, this was referred to as economic discrimination. The money can’t be taken from football for women’s sports. Why not?  Football or other high revenue sports do get a substantial amount more funding than other sports, as well as nicer facilities. The reason, of course, is that they are high revenue sports but no other sports program gets this opportunity. There have got to be ways to provide for all programs.