Posted on behalf of Tyler Howes:
Many people complain about the lack of coverage and promotion for women’s sports as compared to men’s sports, but is it not somewhat justified? In this article:
Ideas & Trends; Why Don't Women Watch Women's Sports? - New York Times
It discusses the television audiences, or lack thereof, as well as poor attendance of women’s sports. With the exception of some golf and tennis tournaments, and…I… guess figure skating? Women’s sports events are sparsely populated and never watched. Take for instance the WNBA which is dire need of a defibrillator. Their games draw 1/3 of the television audience of NBA games on average, and half of those viewers are male. Women’s soccer brings in just one-tenth of the already dismal numbers of basketball. So why don’t women want to watch women in sports? As ESPN.com columnist Stacy Pressman so eloquently explains in the article; ''I'm bored out of my skull at women's basketball games…I prefer a few women's events, like tennis, but I refuse to be politically correct about basketball…I'm sorry, but 40 minutes of underhanded lay-ups is not entertaining.'' Take for example right now, with the NCAA tournaments. The women’s tournament gets far less glamour and discussion than the men’s tournament.
Chapter 6 of MediaSport discusses the issues in women’s sports journalism and marketing. Some of the questions it poses in dealing with the coverage of women’s sports are; how do advertisers decide when a sporting event is worth commercial media sponsorship? What is the correlation between audience size and appeal and the coverage it receives? So what do you guys think, why don’t women watch women the way that men watch men’s sports?
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I think that women don’t watch women sports the way that men watch men’s sports because it is an issue of gender, power, and coverage. First off, starting with gender. As stated in a Wall Street Journal article, “male superiority and female inferiority (90)”. Women are viewed as not being as competitive, strong, and skilled as men. Even the NCAA degrades the women athlete by saying, “as women become more competitive, the game gets better and it will breed (sic) more competitive female athletes (90)”. By proclaiming this statement, it shows that the sports own organization feels as if the women athlete is inferior to the male. If they are promoting the fact that the men’s college basketball teams are better than the women, then sure I wouldn’t be motivated to watch the women either. Later in the paragraph it goes on to talk about how women’s basketball as “pure, innocent and team oriented”. Now, I’m not sure if the rules are the same in the men’s game, but in lacrosse it may be the same sport but the rules and regulations are completely different. Women don’t wear as much padding as men because in women’s lacrosse we can’t check, hit, or basically do anything men do. They get away with a lot more plays and moves, whereas with women’s lacrosse a whistle is being blown ever 2.2 seconds. Much like women’s basketball, women’s lacrosse is presented as a game of “elegance”. When the same sport is divided by gender, and treated differently, it alters the image of the sport. If the intensity of the sport is downgraded, it makes it less appealing and entertaining to watch. Why watch a game of elegance and girls galloping down the field with their sticks when you can watch boys beating each other with sticks and long poles?
Another reason that women don’t watch women play sports as much as men watch men is because women’s sports are covered nearly as much as men. “Female athletes are invisible, ignored and denigrated in the media and the dearth of women’s sports coverage functions to symbolically annihilate their existence (92)”. The one way women are getting coverage these days are for their image. “Marketing the LPGA and women’s professional tennis involves pressure to be slim, look sexy, and act feminine (95)”. This doesn’t relate to women and men watching female sports, it translates into women and men looking at female bodies. As much as it is true that women don’t watch women sports as much as men watch men sports, I have to agree. I don’t watch women’s sports because I feel like they are boring, they aren’t as entertaining as men, and they aren’t as aggressive or powerful as men. I feel that women may never watch women sports due to the fact that they will never be taken as seriously as men sports, or covered as seriously as men sports.
Personally I am not a fan of watching women’s sports. I agree that women deserve to be treated equally in the sports field, but it doesn’t make much sense for all types of media to be involved in women’s sports. The target audience for women’s sports is obliviously women; therefore it would make sense for companies directed toward women to advertise during these games. For ESPN to have their games featured on SportsCenter other than highlights would in my opinion result in a loss of viewers. On the opposite side of things if you have a female athlete that is “hot” then it may benefit ESPN to do a feature story on such athlete.
Chapter 6 in MediaSport talks about the marketing aspects of women sports. “They don’t dunk. They don’t talk trash. There isn’t a 7-foot among them.” This to me would be a main reason why women’s basketball would lack media attention. The book seems to think otherwise. Because it is the same sport yet played so differently it has the potential to be the “next hot sport.” I think because the appeal of women’s sports isn’t that great yet, it lacks the appeal for the coverage. There’s no sense in covering an event that no one is interested in. I hope that one day women’s sports become as exciting as men’s. I think once the excitement is there, the coverage and marketing quickly follow.
Why aren't women's sports as popular as men's sports? I think that a major factor is how we are socialized. Many things can influence our beliefs, values, opinions, and actions: family, friends, and the media, to name a few. Traditionally, men's sports have been the favorites. When we were growing up, we probably learned to love the sports our parents loved when they were kids. The WNBA has only been around since 1997, and by that point older generations had already been invested in their favorite (men's) sports for years.
We are also influenced greatly by the media. True, the women's game is often different than the men's, but the assumption is often made that different means inferior or less exciting. Maybe this is because journalists themselves are socialized to believe that covering women's sports is inferior. Chapter 6 in MediaSport explains, "Work routines (e.g., beat reporting assignments) privilege certain types of news, i.e., the football beat versus the women's field hockey beat" (93). If this is how the journalists are thinking, then it's no wonder that sports fans feel the way they do.
This media mindset has influenced marketing as well. The sports themeselves aren't enough. Chapter 6 in MediaSport outlines what does sell when it comes to women's sports: conflict and controversy, little girls and sweethearts, and heroines (95). If this is how women athletes are represented in the media, not much is being done to advance our thinking.
So, we seem to be caught in a vicious cycle. Maybe if we go against what we know and what we've been told and give women's sports a chance, we could change things for future generations...but it's more likely that most of us will stay with what we know, and the cycle will keep on going.
My post is a little different than the topic proposed, but it is still pretty relevant.
A huge difference between men's and women's sports are the expectations the media and fans have of them, both on and off the field. For example, how many images do we have of David Beckham, arguably the "sexiest" male athlete, without his shirt on. The guy is ripped, so no one has a problem with it and why should they. But there is a different standard for women. In MediaSport: "For instance, the controversies around three-time Olympic veteran Amanda Beard's choice to pose along with other Olympians on the 2004 cover of FHM magazine wearing only a white string bikini, where critics claimed she was denigrating the sport, were about the apparent incompatabilities between the sexualized body and the athletic body."
I have never understood the difference between two scenarios like these. Another instance was the uproar over Brandi Chastain's celebration of her game winning goal in the World Cup. It's a common celebration for men to lift their shirt over their head on any regular goal, let alone the gold medal winning goal.
There are many female athletes that have pride in their bodies, just like Beckham.
In a time where people are freaking out about women models who are unhealthily skinny and setting poor examples for the female youth of America, we push away female athletes that are strong and in great physical condition.
Maybe in the minority when it comes to this. But until male and female athletes are viewed the same as actual athletes, their sports will never be viewed the same either.
I think that women don't watch women's sports for the same reason that men don't watch women's sports. As sad as it is to say, men's sports are much more interesting and exciting than women's sports. Unfortunately, I feel like this will always be the case. It may seem sexist, but because I am a woman I feel like I can say it...Sports is the one thing that I feel men can do better at than women. They are genetically bred to be faster, stronger and larger. Do you think you could ever see women doing what men do at the NBA All Star Game Slam Dunk Contest? I don't think so.
Our Handbook says "What it takes to be sucessful in sport, at least according to conventional wisdom, is the very ideal of a man: superiority, mental and physical toughness, competitveness, initiative, strength, power, aggression and confidence" (231). I'm not saying that female athletes don't have these traits, but men seem to have a higher degree of them, and the competitive levels and entertainment levels of their sports reflect that.
It all comes down to what is entertaining. Entertainment brings in viewers, which brings in advertising demands, which bring in money. Women's sports don't bring in this kind of viewership, so its very understandable that networks don't pick up women's sports because they need to stay afloat.
"Female professional basketball players don't dunk, don't swear and they aren't 7-feet tall (Wenner, 90).
Unfortunately for women's sports, I believe that is just the reason they don't get as many fans and viewers as the professional men's leagues do. Women's sports leagues are completely different then those of men's. The games they play are totally different.
The fact that men's sports are more exciting, there is more to the game, in basketball, just being able to dunk the ball adds a whole new aspect onto the game that you do not get in women's athletics.
Although this statement can easily be argued, it just seems that male athletics are more exciting, require more skill and just have more exciting aspects then women's sports.
We should be fair to both sides, I'm not putting down women's sports, but male athletics are more exciting and obviously the more dominating and viewed sporing events.
Womens sports are not on many peoples list of "things to watch". It has been this way for as long as I can remember. I feel women's sporting events are not watched as much as mens events because there is not that high level of excitement. In basketball, they don't have glass shattering dunks, softball they are not pitching 95mph or hitting balls over 400 feet. The women's hockey does not have bone crushing hits or open ice collisions.
As stated in Wenner, the women's sporting events don't have the same excitement and power that men sports do.
Women don't really watch women's sports as much as they do mens because, i feel, it is not viewed as exciting and nobody seems to really care about it. Rarely is it ever covered on sports center unless their is a championship game of the sort.
Women also do not have that relationship to sports as men do. (the majority at least, some women have played sports but not like men where mostly every guy has played a sport as a kid)
I can not name the many, if any, top women athletes of today. Once again i feel that it goes back the "coverage" issue but not just that. Its much deeper than just not being watched, many people don't see women's sports as an exciting event to watch.
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