![]() The emphasis on appearance and physique can be damaging to men and boys as well. This overemphasis on what athletes look like is damaging on both an individual and a cultural level, and it’s time to reconsider how we talk about their bodies. And yet, especially with women athletes, appearance often becomes the sole focus, even when it has nothing to do with performance. Not long after, an Olympics figure-skating commentator was fired for a degrading remark about a female Canadian figure skater (though it was about her personality, not her physique).įocus on the bodies of athletes is not only a frequent issue but a problem, as Christine Yu observes:Īerobic capacity, power, strength, muscular endurance, biomechanics, strategy, tenacity, and good genes-none of which are necessarily visible to the human eye-all determine an athlete’s ability. At the 2021 Winter Olympics, there was pressure to focus on sports appeal and not sex appeal of the athletes. ![]() In the last year, two commentators were fired for making disparaging comments about high school basketball players’ bodies. As well, non-binary gendered and intersex bodies are the almost nearly always the subject of controversy and discrimination.īody talk happens in the media at all levels of game. In contrast, the descriptions of women athletes’ bodies are often hetero-sexualized in ways that undermine their athleticism. As Kathita Davidson notes, descriptions of male athletes’ bodies often reinforce perceptions of strength, athleticism, and performance. Televised commentary on athletes’ bodies is a much more prevalent issue for women, one that creates a double standard to boot. One player was described repeatedly as “baby-faced,” another was “slender,” and a third was “sturdy.” Maybe it was just a lazy start to the commentary, but with all the history and statistics available to discuss, who is served by this body talk? I was complaining because the broadcasters were making comments about the bodies of the pro golfers as they teed off on the first hole.
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