Sports, Gender and Homophobia Essay Example

attitude towards sports. As a result, the television specifically, the media companies that own these television stations are only interested in profits. As a result, the manner in which television covers of fails to cover women in sports assists in peddling the narrative in which women are viewed within the society (Volkwein-Caplan, 2014. P. 237). The issue of women sports attracting equal support from the lower levels such as high school and college has been an issue of current and ongoing debate.

According to recent research on the quality and quantity of coverage of women sports in comparison to men’s sports coverage, gender stereotyping is at the center stage of it all. The major problem is that women sports are underreported in the media yet women and girls are a substantial portion of the American population. Underreporting women participation in sports deals a blow to women in sports because it affects their morale. This underpins the need for media to report women in sports accurately.

The manner in which women sports are presented in the news bring forth women as sexual and humorous way and fails to bring out the athlete quality in the women. For instance, women in Bikini are flashed hurriedly when a newscaster is making a joke unlike the seriousness portrayed with men sports. This shows that women are sexualized and thus not accorded the seriousness women participation sports deserve. Stereotypes such as spectacular performance in men sports which lacks in women sports trivializes the reporting of women sports by insinuating that women sports such as basketball lack the historical drama and spectacle that warrant wide coverage. In this case, it is common to

see men games introduced in an alluring manner that lacks in women sports. This already creates the picture in the mind of the viewer that men sports are likely to be more interesting as opposed to female sports (Fuller, 2014, pp 97). These traditions in reporting women and men games have created the culture of disinterest in women sports.

Homophobia and Its Effect on Women in Sport

As aforementioned, homophobia is common in women sports and is often the reason for the unpopularity faced by women and girls participating in sports. By viewing men as the vestiges of patriarchy it would be demeaning to see the women rival men following that the American society is highly patriarchal. This is the reason behind separation in sports where there are different leagues for women and men. Surprisingly, this separation is not prevalent in education. Women who attract attention and who exceed common standards set by stereotypes often meet the back lashing by a homophobic community, which calls them transgender or men in female clothes. For instance, athletic women who appear strong and present a brilliant performance similar to that of men are met with homophobic attacks. The media also fits into homophobia in sports because social media is highly unregulated thus, easily to peddling homophobic attacks against women athlete.

In conclusion Swann (2016, pp 1) notes that the media is responsible for disparity in women representation in sport, as well as, the homophobia partly because it fails to present women participation in sports to the public in a manner that attracts public attention. The other part that makes the media culpable is because it reports negative views such as homophobic

attacks against women on social media. The media commoditization of sports such that it seeks to attract advertisements by airing men sports makes women participation in sports appear inexistent and reduce women athlete to sex and humor objects to attract attention of sports viewers.

References

1. Fuller, L. K. (2010). Sexual sports rhetoric: Global and universal contexts. New York: Peter Lang. Pp 97
2. Swann, S., 2007. Why women’s sports are less popular and receive less media coverage than men’s sports. Retrieved on august 28, 2016 from http://dailyorange.com/2016/03/why-womens-sports-are-less-popular-and-receive-less-media-coverage-than-mens-sports/ . pp 1
3. Volkwein-Caplan, K. A. E. (2014). Sport, fitness, culture. Aachen, Germany: Meyer & Meyer Sport. Pp 237