Comments on: THE COMMENT THAT LAUNCHED 1000 PHOTOSHOP CONTESTS

by: Dave Fried

Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

Many women’s sports are a hard sell because women are not as strong, as athletic, or as fast as men. Given a choice between being forced to watch men’s or women’s soccer, I’d pick men’s, because it’s a better game.

The place where I see women having an advantage is where the lack of size and strength makes their game substantially different. Tennis is a good example - Anna Kournikova aside, the women’s game is much more interesting because there are fewer aces and more volleying.

Think about college football… who runs the option or wishbone offense in the pros? Yet because the defenses in are slower in college, they become possible. There are a lot of people who think the college game is more interesting than the pros because the lower level of play creates more variety.

So, if women want to be taken seriously as athletes, and have people want to watch them play, they should stay away from sports that men are simply better at, like soccer and basketball. Instead, they should find or create sports where they’re going to be able to provide a product that men cannot.

by: Mark Hasty

Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

You’re absolutely right about tennis, Dave. The women’s game is much more fun to watch, since they actually play the game, instead of trying to smoke the serve down the line.

Supposedly the same is true of basketball as well–that women run better offenses and defenses to make up for the lack of 7′ centers who can simply go over any defenders.

Women should be equally competitive to men at motor sports as well. And horse racing is a truly unisex sport.

But I thought the great appeal of soccer was that size and strength really didn’t matter that much. Or is that only an advantage for the players?

Women figure skaters are generally more entertaining to watch than their male counterparts, since figure skating requires tremendous flexibility, something most men don’t have. Gymnastics is a slightly different case, since men’s and women’s gymnastics have slightly different focuses. But, with both those sports, it’s another case of skimpy tight uniforms + hair and makeup–sex appeal still has something to do with each sport’s success.

by: James Joyner

Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

I’d point out, though, that the women who dominate their sports are the ones who CAN do the things the men do. Martina Navratilova dominated “women’s” tennis because she was so much more powerful than the thin, attractive women she played against. Now, the Williams Sisters are far more muscular than John McEnroe or the male tennis stars of old–steroids or no.

by: Mark Hasty

Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

That’s certainly true, James. Navratilova and the Williams sisters are all phenomenal athletes with tremendous strength–and ISTR that many people lamented/continue to lament their success because it left little room for the more “traditional” (read: more petite) athletes in those sports.

Although, to be fair, I saw Monica Seles in a Rochester, MN shopping mall once, and she’s not exactly tiny.

I’m also reminded of a French skater named Surya Bonaly who could do all kinds of insane jumps and flips, the sort of athleticism one would not expect from female skaters. I thought she was far superior to her competition–but, since she was about 6 feet tall and black, she was low on the “sweetheart” factor, and consequently didn’t “win” the competitions she won.

Still a long ways to go, I’m afraid.