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Formula 1 to stop using Grid Girls and women who just lost their job are fighting for it.

MastAndo

Member
I'm really not sure what the end game is here. It's basically "let's get rid of stuff we don't like," but those goalposts are constantly moving.
 

lifa-cobex

Member
Women being forced out of the job they chose to do. Sounds progressive.

Rachel Riley's twitter has supposedly been getting tons of ppl begging channel 4 not to let her go. (Don't really know what it's based on).
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbi...fans-beg-producers-not-sack-Rachel-Riley.html

For ppl who don't know who Rachel Riley is, She's a co-host on a UK channel 4 programme called Coutdown.
Its a quiz show that takes math problems and anagrams.
She received an upper second-class honours degree in mathematics. She's really switched on.



And also really attractive.

I guess weather girls will be next to go too.
 
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Serious question, what are people trying to pull in this decade? How does this help anything?

I just don't understand how "liberals" have become so sex-negative and puritanical.
 

lifa-cobex

Member
Serious question, what are people trying to pull in this decade? How does this help anything?

I just don't understand how "liberals" have become so sex-negative and puritanical.

I doesn't help anything. It's regressive.
It's shallow, base and very selfish putting your own insecurities onto other people.

TBF we've had ppl like this each decade. The difference is the internet is here for this one.
 

cormack12

Gold Member
I was reading Susie Wolffs thoughts on this. Basically saying it wasn't something she ever had a problem with and is far from the most important issue with regards to women in F1 racing.

....Neither was it something I saw as one of Formula 1's priorities to change to allow the sport to evolve.

'Grid girls' were a tradition within the sport. At most races they are well dressed and representing top luxury brands. At the Austrian Grand Prix they were in traditional dress (the dirndl) and it was perceived as an honour to be picked as a 'grid girl' for an F1 Grand Prix.

During my time racing in German Touring Cars for Mercedes-Benz, I can recall getting into one conversation with a 'grid girl' while waiting for my parade lap to start. She was a medical student who found it fascinating to be so close to the racing car and on the grid just before the race start.

I set up the Dare To Be Different organisation to try to promote efforts to make a step-change, to drive female talent.

Let's take the successful women in the sport and make role models out of them to inspire others. Let's get school girls around an F1 show car and allow them to dream. Let's increase the talent pool of girls and women entering the sport.

The next generation are now in prominent roles within teams and in the management of F1. From my personal experience they are a lot more open to the fact that women are capable of achieving the same things as men in a competitive and performance-based environment.

Quote source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/formula1/42903658

She makes a decent point but also fails to see the correlation. I guess the overall point is if women do watch F1 they see women as grid girls and aspire to maybe participate, whereas they have no F1 women drivers to aspire too. But that is a completely seperate issue (imo). After reading a bit more, it seems the debate (unsurprisingly) comes down to physiological barriers versus mental prowess again.

There is a big lack of culture in Formula 1," said Ceccarelli. "Too many drivers focus on physical strength and not enough on the mental side.

"Yes, you need the strong muscles in the neck and upper body so you can have the energy to drive without any tiredness, but once you reach a certain level - there's no more benefit. There's no point putting on extra muscle.

"Endurance training, rather than weight training, then becomes key. The heart will become bigger, which pumps more blood to the brain. That in turn improves the efficiency of the brain and improves the driver's ability to perform all the tasks he needs to perform in the cockpit. Slowly, drivers are coming round to this idea but there's a still long way to go.

"To achieve the optimum in training, our research shows a driver needs to spend just 30% of their time on physical training and the other 70% on brain training. If you can train the brain to be more efficient, it's easier to multi-task and that will make the bigger difference in terms of performance."

And until now, the latter has always been the problem. From the five women who had a chance in F1, three failed to qualify for a race - they drove cars that simply weren't good enough.

So when will we see a female driver be given a real chance to prove herself in an F1 race? "Definitely within the next decade," said Wolff. "There's a few of us close to F1 now. It would just take a massive leap of faith for one of the teams to give a female a chance.

Quote source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/formula1/18332772


Ultimately the conclusion I draw from this is that the grid girls are a solid foundation to keep women's faces around the sport in general until the emergence of a real female driver given the proper opportunity. This step just makes a poorly represented subset now invisible, and creates job losses.
 

lifa-cobex

Member
She makes some fair points. But ultimately, would getting female drives pull female viewers?
Would women really care about the actual race over the fact of just rooting for a female driver to win.
Would that interest remain over a long period or would the novelty die after a month or two.

I can't really see the issue of men enjoying something that is male dominated. When did this become a sin?
Should women be aloud to race? Yes. Absolutely. Anyone who enjoys F1 knows to watch the start, skip the middle and watch the end. It's about the skill. not the gender.

"There is a big lack of culture in Formula 1," said Ceccarelli. "Too many drivers focus on physical strength and not enough on the mental side."
"Yes, you need the strong muscles in the neck and upper body so you can have the energy to drive without any tiredness, but once you reach a certain level - there's no more benefit. There's no point putting on extra muscle."

But it's still a huge thing to develop. If a driver tells me that me that's the thing to develop, then i'll believe them. They are the drivers. If anyone will know, it's them.

F1 racing has only become far more safer with the past few decades. Technology has advanced leaps and bounds that drivers have to worry far less.
In the 70's and 80's this was deemed a dangerous sport. Women have never really been associated with high risk jobs or dangerous sports in the past.
But tech has made it much more accessible.
If you think you can do it. Then go for it and god speed in your endeavour. But wtf are you doing taking jobs away from ppl that choose to do them and in enjoy them. That's not equality. That's ppl with an agenda and/or bias
 

cormack12

Gold Member
She makes some fair points. But ultimately, would getting female drives pull female viewers?
Would women really care about the actual race over the fact of just rooting for a female driver to win.

Definitely not. Can't reply to all as now on mobile. But I think she's saying even if a team with a good quality car took a chance on a female driver now and it started gaining traction, you'll only see these changes cascaded in 15/20 years as proportional representation (relative to the general sex to dangerous jobs ratio).

Which is why she is saying that is more important than destroying an entire subculture of a sport. No one is taking a chance in female drivers at the high end, and the point was made if you put Damon Hill in a shit car he would lose too.

I don't really know how you get past that unless the teams have an invitational to women as a guest racer on the qualifiers (maybe they have? I'm just spitballing without knowing at this point).
 

lifa-cobex

Member
Definitely not. Can't reply to all as now on mobile. But I think she's saying even if a team with a good quality car took a chance on a female driver now and it started gaining traction, you'll only see these changes cascaded in 15/20 years as proportional representation (relative to the general sex to dangerous jobs ratio).

Which is why she is saying that is more important than destroying an entire subculture of a sport. No one is taking a chance in female drivers at the high end, and the point was made if you put Damon Hill in a shit car he would lose too.

I don't really know how you get past that unless the teams have an invitational to women as a guest racer on the qualifiers (maybe they have? I'm just spitballing without knowing at this point).

ahh I see what you mean.
 

RoboFu

One of the green rats
Don’t these extremists leftist understand that they are really are not being liberal at all. They making strict rules that everyone must follow.
 

grumpyGamer

Member
Well, it is Karma for one, and two, this isn't Karma. It isn't the wack jobs out of work, it is the women who weren't complaining out of work.
Yeah i know, but what did people expect,that is was only going to effect men, even the ladies who like they re work will be effected because of the fucking movement.
and it will get worse, for fear of criticism, everything that exposes a women or alike will have to change how they work, the result will be this.
people can´t make a difference anymore they all just want to get out of the line of sight of the movement

edit: there are situation when objectifing a women or men is not bad, funny nobody criticizes porn industry, it is all hypocrisy
 
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SatansReverence

Hipster Princess
Don’t these extremists leftist understand that they are really are not being liberal at all. They making strict rules that everyone must follow.

They've officially reached the stage that their heads are so far up their own ass they can see daylight again.

Even a modicum of introspective ability would allow them to realise how stupid and warped their views are.
 
People liked and chose to work in minstrel shows. People liking and wanting to work in a place has next to nothing to do with this argument.

F1 is a product people are selling. People are allowed to comment on aspects of that product that they liked or didn't like. If I'm watching a TV show that's constantly interspersed with random half naked dudes, then I'm allowed to complain about that.
Regardless of which side of the argument you fall on here, Comparing grid girls to minstrel shows seems disingenuous. Last time I checked grid girls position employed women while the actors employed in minstrel werent actually African Americans but white guys in black face.
 

Breakage

Member
These feminists don't actually care about who suffers in the process of furthering their ideology. As far as they are concerned, these women must lose their jobs for the "greater good".
 
But they celebrated the removal and women losing their jobs which is as bad as demanding to remove it. I would compare it with people condeming violence but on the other hand celebrate when people they do not agree with get punched in the face.

Kinda disagree. Celebrating the use of violence to stop free speech is very different than celebrating the elimination of what you think is a morally outdated role.

Regardless of which side of the argument you fall on here, Comparing grid girls to minstrel shows seems disingenuous. Last time I checked grid girls position employed women while the actors employed in minstrel werent actually African Americans but white guys in black face.

Black actors worked in minstrel shows. Hope that makes more sense now.
 

Dunki

Member
Kinda disagree. Celebrating the use of violence to stop free speech is very different than celebrating the elimination of what you think is a morally outdated role.



.
Selfjustice is against the law and only acceptable in Super Hero movies. To shut someone down with fear is the wrong way. Especially when you fight against right wing extremists. They will A use these violent attacks against you to make them the victims and B. It makes their belives even stronger because while they are not violent the other side is. When you cause someone to lose his job he wont be understanding. He will hate even more. And then something like Charlottesville will happen again.

And no Antifa should never be celebrated. They are not your friends or allies
 
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PJV3

Member
I can see the women looking a little old fashioned 'end of the pier' style and why a business would get rid of them, it doesn't bother me much if they stay or go.
 
I doesn't help anything. It's regressive.
It's shallow, base and very selfish putting your own insecurities onto other people.

TBF we've had ppl like this each decade. The difference is the internet is here for this one.

And in the prior decades people wanting to get rid of stuff like this would have been laughed out of the room.

Never ceases to amaze me how much the culture has changed in just ten years, in the 00s sex was EVERYWHERE, it was an absolutely sex obsessed culture, whatever was sexy or sexual was fine, the only people against it was "conservative Christians" so for the political left anything that would piss off a Jerry Falwell type was fair game.

But then in the 2010s came along and now that the left was the dominant cultural and political force they turned on each other and this puritanical streak came to the forefront, although to be fair, it's a bias against male sexuality, not female sexuality, women are obviously free to do whatever they want but men better live their lives to this puritanical standard and anything that's appealing to men, like these grid girls, have got to go.
 

lifa-cobex

Member


I actually forgot about the other bans like at PAX.
I really hope they scrap this ban. It's fucked up keeping people out of jobs just because of the way they look.

Forget Bitcoin.
Invests in cat food. You can thank me in ten years.
 
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Blood Borne

Member
I'm not even surprised by this. Whenever you hear people's options being taken away, bullies, totalitarians, collectivism, just know that it's leftists.

They have a vision/ideology and it must be enforced regardless of who suffers because they genuinely believe that their morals are far superior than others and they know what's best for other people.

Tyranny is the end game.
 
Amazing how the right-wing responses here are just blaming feminists as a scapegoat. Do you really think that a businessman in a board room is going to care that some feminist blogger complains about grid girls? Besides, I haven't heard of any complaints about grid girls in the leftist circles I'm in, until this story broke.

If grid girls were important for F1's business, they would stay. When there is money to be made, nobody is going to care about some random feminist complaining about it. This seems more like a case of societal norm changes making the concept of grid girls outdated. People who watch Formula 1 are there to watch car racing, not grid girls. They have been deemed unimportant and therefore have been fired.

Workers who don't bring value to the company will get fired. That's Capitalism, baby.
 
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lifa-cobex

Member
Amazing how the right-wing responses here are just blaming feminists as a scapegoat. Do you really think that a businessman in a board room is going to care that some feminist blogger complains about grid girls? Besides, I haven't heard of any complaints about grid girls in the leftist circles I'm in, until this story broke.

If grid girls were important for F1's business, they would stay. When there is money to be made, nobody is going to care about some random feminist complaining about it. This seems more like a case of societal norm changes making the concept of grid girls outdated. People who watch Formula 1 are there to watch car racing, not grid girls. They have been deemed unimportant and therefore have been fired.

Workers who don't bring value to the company will get fired. That's Capitalism, baby.


Nobody is using Feminism as a scapegoat. It's because feminism that these girls are being let go. The girls have said so themselves. Glamour girls and models have been a target for this crap for a very long time.
Yes I do believe that enough noise from these harpies will scare companies into following suit. It worked at PAX, Darts, Walk on agencies, and UFC.
I'm not sure you understand how Walk on girls work but they are basically walking advertisements. They pay for themselves (and more so) by third party companies.
They get peoples attention more that billboards and have been effective by it for a decades.

If F1 were haemorrhage money because of these ladies, then they would have immediately said so to reduce backlash. (which they are now receiving).
Now they have to face protests in the bullpit as a result.
https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/ne...sands-expected-bullring-protest-keep-14242770
 

Bumbles

Member
As a female who likes motor sport, I couldnt care less if the grid girls are there or not. I dont actually care for much of the filler during the telecast, it just gives me time to grab a drink without missing anything important.

It doesnt bother me the girls are part of the show, its just not interesting.
 
Nobody is using Feminism as a scapegoat. It's because feminism that these girls are being let go. The girls have said so themselves. Glamour girls and models have been a target for this crap for a very long time.
They are only assuming that's the case.
Yes I do believe that enough noise from these harpies will scare companies into following suit. It worked at PAX, Darts, Walk on agencies, and UFC.
I'm not sure you understand how Walk on girls work but they are basically walking advertisements. They pay for themselves (and more so) by third party companies.
They get peoples attention more that billboards and have been effective by it for a decades.
If this kind of marketing is effective, F1 will be receiving plenty of complaints from marketing companies this year.
The worst thing is F1 cite "societal norms" for the ban when the vast majority are against it...
The "vast majority" (really a vocal minority) are against it because this gives a bunch of people a chance to say "fuck feminism" for a while. But eventually the controversy will die and F1 races will continue without the grid girls. The protests are not in support of grid girls, they are protests against feminism. If the grid girls were let go for another reason than "societal norms", the protests would not be happening.

The actual vast majority does not care if the girls are there or not.
 
It’s becoming more abundantly clear that the majority of modern day ‘feminism’ is just overweight bloggers that can’t get a man petitioning for every other successful woman to be eliminated.
 

Mohonky

Member
Sucks for them. The current climate is terrible. Who makes up the rules? Why are "grid girls" not okay and who determines that? I can't believe they lost their jobs for the "cause". smh

Ironically, a bunch of men make the decision for whether its ok for there to be grid girls.

Take your pick;

- women can do whatever they want with their body their choice!!

Or

- men need to stop dictating what women can and cant do with their bodies!!

Apparently men CAN dictate what a women does with her body.
 
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This topic is funny.

Modern feminism is overwhelmingly in favor of women using their bodies any way they see fit. This would include being a "grid girl."
 

SatansReverence

Hipster Princess
This topic is funny.

Modern feminism is overwhelmingly in favor of women using their bodies any way they see fit. This would include being a "grid girl."

Actually, "modern" feminism is all for not placing "unrealistic" expectations on women while letting women do what ever they please!

It's hilariously self defeating.
 

llien

Member
But I do think it would be interesting if F1 managed and promoted a female racing league and had the same constructors compete there.
Did that work with basketball?

Could we look into reversed gender examples, meanwhile? Beach volleyball.

Sex does sell, however, the way F1 was selling sex made enough people unhappy that they decided to change that in order to prevent them possibly losing money.
Citation needed, seriously. As far as I see, there is absolutely no evidence for this move to be financially justified.

So the men in the top 0.1%, out far on the bell curve of racing ability are going to vastly outperform women in a reaction time based sport like racing.
While I agree with with your point of there naturally being no parity, still, even if you stick with evolution theory, it is still about "likely / less likely".
E.g. Scarlet (SC2). Given how much smaller female SC2 player base is, it's even more amazing.

And that despite of all the sex objects:



Women have never really been associated with high risk jobs or dangerous sports in the past.
Looking at fatal accidents at work statistics, it hasn't changed. (about 20 to 1)
 
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Did that work with basketball?

Could we look into reversed gender examples, meanwhile? Beach volleyball.


Citation needed, seriously. As far as I see, there is absolutely no evidence for this move to be financially justified.

I would say that the Wnba has be completely mismanaged, it's a league where it's stars go and play in other European leagues because they can make more money there. Diana Taurasi, a WNBA legend, a couple of years ago straight up skipped her Wnba season so she could rest up to play for a Russian team. A poorly run league will obviously not work in this landscape.

I don't know why we should ignore tennis and MMA, huge sports who've proven that you can make it work.

Please elaborate on your Beach volleyball point, it appears to be a pretty tiny sport so I don't really know where it fits here.

Also, F1 is an asset for a business, therefore, I think it's reasonable to assume that every decision they make has money in mind, unless you have any evidence that this a grand moral stand for them. Even if this was them reacting to some great public outcry/protest (which I don't believe happened), that would still be them trying to defend themselves from bad PR and potentially losing money in the future.
 

llien

Member
I would say that the Wnba has be completely mismanaged, it's a league where it's stars go and play in other European leagues because they can make more money there. Diana Taurasi, a WNBA legend, a couple of years ago straight up skipped her Wnba season so she could rest up to play for a Russian team. A poorly run league will obviously not work in this landscape.

WNBA has by far the strongest competitor on our planet: NBA. It just doesn't look that well in contrast.
The same applies to football, it simply isn't as spectacular.

I don't know why we should ignore tennis and MMA, huge sports who've proven that you can make it work.
I don't know much about MMA.
As for tennis, remember the women tennis pay controversy? (

The men are generally paid significantly more than the women, which is largely a reflection of television viewing figures. Last year the men’s tour was watched by a total global TV audience of 973 million, including 102 million for the year-end finale at the O2, while the women’s tour attracted 395 million viewers, including 32 million for the finale in Singapore.

Two to one viewing audience, in finals three to one.

In the end it comes down to "who can attract more viewers".
In case of beach volleyball, it is women. (I'm not into it, but would assume people like almost naked women more than men)

4vMdRnx.jpg


I personally prefer watching classical women volleyball to men's, since women are more likely to succeed at defending, with men it's a slam through fest. (there is a crisis in volleyball in general, it must be said)

Also, F1 is an asset for a business, therefore, I think it's reasonable to assume that every decision they make has money in mind, unless you have any evidence that this a grand moral stand for them. Even if this was them reacting to some great public outcry/protest (which I don't believe happened), that would still be them trying to defend themselves from bad PR and potentially losing money in the future.
I believe it is them avoiding bad PR (and after that, unless some miracle happens and it is reversed, others will have to follow or be dubbed women haters).
The issue here is that it is a small vocal sex negative minority that is orchestrating it.
 
WNBA has by far the strongest competitor on our planet: NBA. It just doesn't look that well in contrast.
The same applies to football, it simply isn't as spectacular.


I don't know much about MMA.
As for tennis, remember the women tennis pay controversy? (



Two to one viewing audience, in finals three to one.

In the end it comes down to "who can attract more viewers".
In case of beach volleyball, it is women. (I'm not into it, but would assume people like almost naked women more than men)

4vMdRnx.jpg


I personally prefer watching classical women volleyball to men's, since women are more likely to succeed at defending, with men it's a slam through fest. (there is a crisis in volleyball in general, it must be said)


I believe it is them avoiding bad PR (and after that, unless some miracle happens and it is reversed, others will have to follow or be dubbed women haters).
The issue here is that it is a small vocal sex negative minority that is orchestrating it.

I apologise, maybe you misread the earlier debate I was having. The argument wasn't "will the male sports league be more successful than the female sports league?", the argument was "is a female sports league viable?". Therefore, the women tennis pay controversy has nothing to do with this, nor does volleyball. The existence of a male/female league does not mean the other sexes' league can't exist and be successful.

Also, "The issue here is that it is a small vocal sex negative minority that is orchestrating it.", rings hollow when to my knowledge there is no great public outcry/protest (please fill me in if you think I'm wrong). The only people I've seen talking about this before the announcement are journalists who've covered the sport for years. And by the way, with the whole "sex negative" thing, as I said earlier. There is nothing wrong with sex objects, there is a problem with the culture that surrounds them. The culture that surrounds all of us. It's a problem of restricted female participation, except when they can be made into sex objects. That's the issue.
 

llien

Member
I apologise, maybe you misread the earlier debate I was having. The argument wasn't "will the male sports league be more successful than the female sports league?", the argument was "is a female sports league viable?". Therefore, the women tennis pay controversy has nothing to do with this, nor does volleyball. The existence of a male/female league does not mean the other sexes' league can't exist and be successful.

Also, "The issue here is that it is a small vocal sex negative minority that is orchestrating it.", rings hollow when to my knowledge there is no great public outcry/protest (please fill me in if you think I'm wrong). The only people I've seen talking about this before the announcement are journalists who've covered the sport for years. And by the way, with the whole "sex negative" thing, as I said earlier. There is nothing wrong with sex objects, there is a problem with the culture that surrounds them. The culture that surrounds all of us. It's a problem of restricted female participation, except when they can be made into sex objects. That's the issue.

Apologies, now I get what you're saying.

The pay controversy itself is an example, Djokovic didn't say "pay men more", pay 'based on how much income you make from sports" is quite different and an actual practice, but was slammed nevertheless.

Could you elaborate why Djokovic should be paid the same as Williams, if his matches are attracting less viewers and hence less income? Isn't it fair if he gets paid less?

There are certain issues that for some reasons get into "too sensitive" mode that prevents discourse.

The issue is, "grid girls are restricting female participation" theory lacks evidence.

There are cheerleaders in basketball, but not in soccer (I assume), yet there hasn't been noticeable difference from female participation perspective and both teams dominate world cups.
 

Cybrwzrd

Banned
While I agree with with your point of there naturally being no parity, still, even if you stick with evolution theory, it is still about "likely / less likely".
E.g. Scarlet (SC2). Given how much smaller female SC2 player base is, it's even more amazing.

That was my point when I said it would be rare for a woman to outperform the top male drivers, not that it isn't possible. The thing is, that rare woman with the ability to do so may not even like motorsports.
 

Zog

Banned
Regardless of which side of the argument you fall on here, Comparing grid girls to minstrel shows seems disingenuous. Last time I checked grid girls position employed women while the actors employed in minstrel werent actually African Americans but white guys in black face.
Actors pretend to be someone they aren't, it's the job.
 

TheWatcher

Banned
So ridiculous. Go after a legitimate job that empowers women like Grid Girls. Feminists just want to see their more attractive counterparts fail. Why don't these rabid feminists go after the porn industry for exploiting and abusing young women?
 
Apologies, now I get what you're saying.

The pay controversy itself is an example, Djokovic didn't say "pay men more", pay 'based on how much income you make from sports" is quite different and an actual practice, but was slammed nevertheless.

Could you elaborate why Djokovic should be paid the same as Williams, if his matches are attracting less viewers and hence less income? Isn't it fair if he gets paid less?

There are certain issues that for some reasons get into "too sensitive" mode that prevents discourse.

The issue is, "grid girls are restricting female participation" theory lacks evidence.

There are cheerleaders in basketball, but not in soccer (I assume), yet there hasn't been noticeable difference from female participation perspective and both teams dominate world cups.

By that logic, why should Djokovic get paid the same as any person? If I'm a mid-tier tennis player and Djokovic and I make it into a grand slam finals, and I win, then I will make more money than Djokovic. By the logic you provided, that makes no sense, Djokovic is way more famous than me so his matches during the tournament may have had an order of magnitude more viewers than mine.

Tennis is a series of tournaments. This dispute isn't about negotiated individual contracts, it's about tournament winnings. So, why should women's tournaments have winnings less than men's tournaments? If you're a singles Wimbledon champion, shouldn't the prize be the same for you whether you're a man or woman? One argument against me might be "the bigger stars are in the men's league so they should make more as they attract more viewers". If that's the case, shouldn't male tournament winnings go down if someone like Djokovic isn't in the tournament due to injury? Also, lower ranked male players successfully pushed for the payout for lower round eliminations from Wimbledon a couple of years ago, so this has never been a purely female issue.

At the end of the day. It's a nice thing to do. It's a symbolic gesture. There are arguments in both directions.

Also, to clarify my argument isn't "grid girls are restricting female participation", my argument is that female participation is restricted, except when they can be made into sex objects.
 

Dunki

Member
By that logic, why should Djokovic get paid the same as any person? If I'm a mid-tier tennis player and Djokovic and I make it into a grand slam finals, and I win, then I will make more money than Djokovic. By the logic you provided, that makes no sense, Djokovic is way more famous than me so his matches during the tournament may have had an order of magnitude more viewers than mine.

Tennis is a series of tournaments. This dispute isn't about negotiated individual contracts, it's about tournament winnings. So, why should women's tournaments have winnings less than men's tournaments? If you're a singles Wimbledon champion, shouldn't the prize be the same for you whether you're a man or woman? One argument against me might be "the bigger stars are in the men's league so they should make more as they attract more viewers". If that's the case, shouldn't male tournament winnings go down if someone like Djokovic isn't in the tournament due to injury? Also, lower ranked male players successfully pushed for the payout for lower round eliminations from Wimbledon a couple of years ago, so this has never been a purely female issue.

At the end of the day. It's a nice thing to do. It's a symbolic gesture. There are arguments in both directions.

Also, to clarify my argument isn't "grid girls are restricting female participation", my argument is that female participation is restricted, except when they can be made into sex objects.
Also here it has something to do with biology and also the reception.

It is no secret that male tennis as an example is way more powerful and "athletic" than the women part and call it bad or good this form draws more people into the stadiums. It is the same with every other physical sport. A great example would be soccer. Women first class teams and world cup winner are getting easily beaten by unkown 15-17 year old boys. I That is the level of women soccer right now. And you can not deamnd that topclass women should earn the same as men. Same with Tennis: A Venus Williams in her prime could not even get into the male Top 200 list. There is such a huge difference here that it would be unfair if they get the same.

And for your Gridgirl argument: Wrong: There are women who use this as springbord into the sport as well. And most importantly these women love their jobs they never felt objectified or threaten. So why should they not allowed to do this? And let us be honest here. Formula one would be almoost impossible for women since they can not endure the HUGE physical requirement for this sport. Low class sure but not Fromula 1
 
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llien

Member
By that logic, why should Djokovic get paid the same as any person? If I'm a mid-tier tennis player and Djokovic and I make it into a grand slam finals, and I win, then I will make more money than Djokovic. By the logic you provided, that makes no sense, Djokovic is way more famous than me so his matches during the tournament may have had an order of magnitude more viewers than mine.

It is a good point and it is how it works actually in Spanish football league, provided, you can prove that viewers are after particular player/team. Barcelona and Real are getting more money for their matches, than the rest of the league, because there are people who are specifically interested only in those teams.

So, why should women's tournaments have winnings less than men's tournaments?
Less in this context is misleading.
The question is: shouldn't the prize be proportional to the income of the tournament?
And the answer is apparently yes, and it works just fine like that (nobody even tries to suggest to change it) when it is "distinctly" different

But now we have "single" tournaments, which technically are two different tournaments (as people of different genders do not compete vs each other) that simply happen at the same time in the same location and the rules are changed.

It is apparently unfair, no matter the POV , it should be the same sum both times or income based sum both times.
Since it is a "sensitive" topic, nobody dares to argue for proportional always, on the other hand "the same" always simply wouldn't work in practice, so while lobby for it is much stronger, they can't achieve it.

Also, to clarify my argument isn't "grid girls are restricting female participation", my argument is that female participation is restricted, except when they can be made into sex objects.
I don't quite understand what you mean by "restricted" in this context. So if I'm an insanely skilled female driver, exactly what would stop me, what would not stop similarly skilled male driver?

It is no secret that male tennis as an example is way more powerful and "athletic" than the women part and call it bad or good this form draws more people into the stadiums. It is the same with every other physical sport.
No, and I've just given an example: volleyball. Even if you bar bikini aspect, women's games are more entertaining to watch, sometimes there is too much strength.
 

Dunki

Member
No, and I've just given an example: volleyball. Even if you bar bikini aspect, women's games are more entertaining to watch, sometimes there is too much strength.
Ok maybe I should have put highly paid into it as well. And yes I agree its more exciting and yes also because of the bikinis IMO
 

Dunki

Member
Honestly I think the solution for this is pretty cool. Even its really sad that people were totally fine with women who love their jobs has lost them. The new Solution are "Grid Kids" and not norml ones but kids already driving in kart series etc. So it has become like Soccer. It is nice solution but still pretty shitty for the women.

Formula 1: 'Grid kids' to replace 'grid girls' from start of the season

The children used will be competitors in karting or junior categories, chosen by national motorsport authorities.

"This will be an extraordinary moment for these youngsters," F1's American commercial chief Sean Bratches said.

http://www.bbc.com/sport/formula1/42950040
 
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JDB

Banned
Was this change actually in response to any group actively calling for the removal of grid girls? I don't see the issue with the company simply thinking it no longer fits their desired image.
Either way, having grid kids is ten times better anyway. Will probably be an amazing experience being out there with their F1 idols.
 
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