Women's Violence as Exhibited the Sports Arena

As we watched in the previous video in class, when female athletes are portrayed in sports magazines, they are commonly objectified. Instead of focusing on their athletic talents and abilities, such women are portrayed in scantily clothed attire, emphasizing their sexuality in comparison to men who are often depicted in their sports' habitat. A male athletics champion, for example, might be on the cover of Sports Illustrated holding a football rather than laying practically nude on a beach, as the sun highlights his muscles. The media just does not function in this manner, at least in terms of publicly conveying male athletes. Extremely accomplished women, on the other hand, are given the opportunities to pose on the cover of magazines such as Sports Illustrated but they are framed in a narrow light (like men). It is the choice of each and every individual to assume these roles, however, their offered roles are often limited.

The very nature of conveying women in a feminized, over-sexualized framework and men in a masculinized, over-athleticized framework, in my opinion, impacts the way in which we treat gendered sports violence. For men, it is almost assumed. Unless someone is critically injured, male sports violence does not appear to be much of a surprise, as we do not see such acts in the headlines. Contrarily, when female sports violence occurs, including the recent soccer fight, we are bombarded with media coverage from news channel to news channel. I see a connection between the way women are portrayed in the media and the way we treat female sports violence. When a female athlete poses in a magazine, an observer who does not know a thing about sports could easily assume that she is solely a model, not athletic or aggressive at all, characteristics that are frequently associated with male athletes and possibly men in general. By focusing on the soccer fight that took place not too long ago, I find that aggression in correlation to sports is viewed as a male concept that, in turn, reinforces the dichotomy between men and women.