Is it anti-feminist to watch the World Cup?

Submitted by Mastodon on Wed, 2014-06-25 01:40

Article here. Excerpt:

'This puts me in a quandary. Men's football is loved in Britain simply because the players are men, and men like watching other men play football, and what men like to do and like to watch is, de facto, culturally important. Even the fact the men's World Cup is not explicitly stated to be a men's competition erases women – I predict there will be little fuss made of the Women's World Cup in Canada next year. So do we women sideline ourselves by boycotting the games or do we take up space and holler along because it is fun and exciting? You could argue that the Fifa World Cup is also ageist and disablist (footballers are doomed to retire as soon as their wisdom teeth fully descend and disabled people are tacitly excluded – let's not forget that a former England coach was even sacked for his dodgy views) and there is a difference in football's relationship with women.

British men's football is so deeply sexist that even the boss of the Premier League engages in email conversations where women are referred to as "gash". Male footballers are boys' role models, yet have been openly violent towards us.'

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Let's say you (a female) decide to watch the LPGA on TV or in person wherever they are playing principally because the players are all female and you want to support the LPGA as such, even if there are only 1/10th of the number of attendees/viewers of the LPGA as compared to the PGA.

Or what if you're a male and likewise want to watch the LPGA for that reason (the players are all women), even if you don't have a thing for the rather short skirts the players wear? Are you still being sexist?

Speaking of watching a sport because the players seem dressed fetchingly, is a female American football fan being sexist if she's a fan because the male players are all dressed in tight clothes and have very masculine styles of dress for the game?

I'll say 'yes' on all counts. And indeed, it's hard *not* to be sexist in some way. After all, is one being sexist if he or she does not feel erotically or romantically attracted to people of a particular sex? You could say that's sexist, too.

Sexism, sexism... everywhere!

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Submitted by Matt on Thu, 2014-06-26 05:44

What a bunch of hogwash! It seems to me that these actions are fueled by nothing more than a desire to destroy anything male; that is, anything women don't control.

I love how no evidence is provided to back up her claim regarding how the male players promote violence against women. Referring to women by a not-so-flattering name doesn't count. I won't deny that some athletes are in fact violent towards, their wives or girlfriends. However, there have been several of female athletes lately (such as Jantel Lavender: http://news.mensactivism.org/node/17126 ) who have been charged with domestic violence. Interesting how the media seems to be nearly silent whenever that happens.

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Submitted by xtrnl on Fri, 2014-06-27 15:20