Eat My Shorts
The Tokyo Olympics has officially started, which means more women’s sports coverage (woo!). It also means more stories that make me want to pull my hair out....
From the female runners with too much natural testosterone, to the banned swim caps made for black hair, to disqualification for marijuana use, there’s been a clear message to black, female athletes that they aren’t welcome.
The women who have been encouraged to compete are given a different message: make sure you look good.
Last week the Norwegian women’s beach handball team was fined 1,500 euro by the European Handball Federation for wearing too much clothing on the court. The team decided to swap bikini bottoms for spandex shorts, a decision that blatantly defies the EHF’s rule of not wearing anything covering more than 10cm of their butts.
Yes, that’s a rule.
Even grosser, the uniform regulations state that all athletic wear and accessories must show an “attractive image of the sport.” For men that means any shorts exposing 10cm of their knee caps. The underlying message being that only women have to show their asses to keep audiences interested in handball.
Personally, I'd love the men to wear those same uniforms, but clearly the federation doesn't care about women's preferences.
The uniforms we all want to see.
Who Wears Short Shorts?
And why should the federation care? The sexualization of female athletes is historically more lucrative than giving them respect.
Cheerleading started as a men's sport and was sexualized over time as a major marketing strategy. Now the NFL is famous for forcing women into skimpy outfits and body image problems. The Jills team director even went so far as to administer a "jiggle test" before performances to make sure her girls were in peak shape to be ogled at.
Ahead of the 2012 Olympics the Badminton World Federation attempted (and failed) to enforce a new, more feminine dress code for women. Their argument was that wearing skirts in the elite level would create a more “attractive presentation.” The deputy president further explained that “we just want them to look feminine and have a nice presentation so women will be more popular.”
How lovely...
Beach volleyball in particular has had tons of controversy around the discrepancy between men's and women's uniforms. The female players were so sexualized that they became the only Olympic athletes to show up as body parts in the Getty Images Olympic archives. Abs, asses, arms, but not a face to be seen.
Imagine being an Olympic photographer and only posting pictures of the hockey team's butts? How quickly do you think you'd be fired? In female beach volleyball, however, those are the money shots.
Luckily the rules were eventually changed in 2012 to allow shorts and sleeves for players who wanted more coverage. Whether or not those uniforms are positively embraced is a whole other question...
Some gymnasts have recently started wearing full-legged leotards instead of the high-cut bodysuits. Sarah Voss debuted the new style last spring, explaining that “as a little girl I didn't see the tight gym outfits as such a big deal. But when puberty began, when my period came, I began feeling increasingly uncomfortable.” Voss along with a few other German gymnasts have decided to normalize full-coverage options in their sport, giving younger athletes the chance to focus on their athleticism as opposed to their comfort.
All The Small Things
A pair of shorts here, a leotard there, it all seems innocuous; however, the constant objectification and sexualization of women builds up to encourage abuse and violence.
When you don’t see women as people, it’s hard to treat them as such.
Objectification happens unconsciously. Our brain is constantly distinguishing between "object" and "person." In a 2019 study, participants were shown images of people and things to gauge their neurological activity. When shown women in their underwear, every participant's brain reacted more like it was seeing an object than a person.
In other words, we've learnt to look at female bodies like 'things" instead of as individuals.
That type of distinction can have real world consequences. ‘Barely-legal’ and ‘teen’ porn, for example, has taught us that it’s normal for men to fixate on young women. So much so that many believe it’s a biological tendency for men to lust after children.
In reality, teenagers are more likely to have complications during pregnancy. The chance of dying is twice as high for a girl aged 14-19 than it is for a woman in her 20s. Evolutionarily speaking, women should actually be lusting after younger men. "Barely legal boys" sounds way worse, but it's technically the same. The difference is that we're used to the sexualization of girls.
The popularity of the "teen" genre is fine in the fantasy-land of porn, but the inclination trickles elsewhere. Google ‘school girls’ and ‘school boys’, and you'll immediately see the difference. Couple that fantasy with unconscious objectification, and you end up with a third of girls in the UK saying they’ve been sexually harassed in their school uniforms. Some victims were as young as 8.
Of course it’s not just school girls that get harassed. Canada has seen an increase of 20-30% in the rates of gender-based violence during the pandemic. Catcalling in particular has become a reality of day-to-day life.
The increase is because street harassment has never been about the women involved. Catcalling, at its core, is an assertion of power, and there is evidence to suggest that harassment increases during hard times. It's easy to take out your frustration on an object. Why bother confronting other men when you can make yourself feel powerful at the expense of a woman?
Objectification also changes the way we talk about men's behaviour as it relates to women’s safety. Last spring women everywhere were reeling over the death of Sarah Everard. Sarah was attacked during her walk home even after doing all the safety tips we’ve been told will help us: she called her boyfriend when she left, was wearing bright colours and running shoes, and chose to walk through a large public park.
Police officer Wayne Couzens kidnapped her before she got home. Couzens has since pled guilty to the rape and murder of Sarah.
The most disturbing part of the story is that former colleagues had nicknamed Couzens “The Rapist” on account of him making the female officers feel uncomfortable.
My blood is on fire.
The nickname absolves him of shitty behaviour and glorifies the mistreatment of women. It's an easy name to laugh at when you think of women's bodies as toys and not as part of people.
The same kind of thinking makes it challenging for people to hold abusers accountable. We quickly see what a rapist is losing (ie: a swimming career, acting contract, or presidency), but too often we forget about what has already been taken from a victim.
This week the Montreal Canadians drafted a player who specifically asked not to be picked because of criminal charges he's facing. Logan Mailloux took a photo of a woman engaged in sexual activity and shared it with his team without consent. After being charged, Mailloux urged NHL teams to leave him out of the draft until he could show more maturity.
The Canadians decided to pick him anyway.
For some reason we can't hold men accountable even when they're asking us to. This is a player we will likely forget about by next year, so why bother accepting his behaviour?
The reality is that none of the decision makers care about her experience. They'd rather get a slightly better player than stand up for women's safety, and that's just given me another reason to hate the Habs.
My version of Hot Girl Summer
Slippin’ Into Something A Little More Comfortable
.As women, our bodies have been policed for years. Abortion, reproductive rights, what constitutes rape - everything about our beings is or has been regulated. It's frustrating to see decisions made and enforced by people who don't understand our experience.
From the company forcing tiny uniforms, to the Supreme Court judge accused of sexual assault, to the ex-president caught on film saying "grab 'em by the pussy," it takes a toll to watch our safety fall to wayside over and over and over again.
And yes, I think forcing athletes to wear bikini bottoms is directly related to our collective well-being.
How we show women in the media, how we talk about female athletes, and how we react to men’s behaviour all matters. All those small things add up, and the numbers aren't looking good. 1 in 3 women in Canada experience sexual assault, so let's allow women to compete in whatever makes them feel comfortable, let's hold abusers accountable, and let's STOP GIVING NICKNAMES TO POTENTIAL RAPISTS.
Cool?
Here's hoping the Olympics focuses more on female athleticism than female asses this year.
