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Maclean's: Sexism still running rampant at the Olympics

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http://www.macleans.ca/olympics/rio-sexism-runs-rampant-women-athletes/

Andy Murray isn’t a tennis historian, nor is he responsible for fact-checking journalists. He’s a tennis player—and a great one at that—but to his credit, he’s also aware when he hasn’t made history.
In an interview after Murray won gold in the men’s singles tournament in Rio, the BBC’s John Inverdale told him: “You’re the first person to ever win two Olympic gold tennis medals. That’s an extraordinary feat, isn’t it?” To which Murray replied: “I think Venus and Serena [Williams] have won about four each.”

Murray didn’t directly call out the BBC presenter for overlooking the existence of women’s tennis, but he may as well have. While his response was widely applauded, it is but a lone bright spot in an Olympics where underlying sexism continues to reach the podium.

The questions from Ron MacLean talking about Penny Olesiak and trying to relate it to her brother Jamie is absolutely hilarious, no surprise coming from that weasel.
 

mclem

Member
While Inverdale is an almighty buffoon and most often does exhibit sexism, I suspect this is actually more a case of the fact that doubles play tends to be somewhat overlooked. In singles terms, the claim is correct; each Williams sister has one Gold.
 
While Inverdale is an almighty buffoon and most often does exhibit sexism, I suspect this is actually more a case of the fact that doubles play tends to be somewhat overlooked. In singles terms, the claim is correct.

Yeah, but then there's also the case of female athletes, who are married to other well known male personalities having headlines like "So and so's wife/GF won a medal...". It's kind of ridiculous
 
I think NBC(and their amazing Olympic coverage) credited a Hungarian swimmer's husband for her success.

Listed in the article:

after Hungary’s Katinka Hosszú broke a world record in swimming, an NBC commentator saying: “There’s the man responsible for turning his wife into an entirely new swimmer,” when the camera panned up to her coach (who’s also her husband) celebrating in the stands;
 

mclem

Member
Yeah, but then there's also the case of female athletes, who are married to other well known male personalities having headlines like "So and so's wife/GF won a medal...". It's kind of ridiculous

A Brit journo had a little fun with that, let me see if I can find the tweet.

XCBF5Rs.png
 

jonno394

Member
I give inverdale the benefit of the doubt here and assume he just mispoken and meant "you're the first to DEFEND tennis gold"
 

mclem

Member
I give inverdale the benefit of the doubt here and assume he just mispoken and meant "you're the first to DEFEND tennis gold"

Nah, the Williams sisters have done that in doubles (2008, 2012). It's either omitting doubles or omitting women that's the key factor, here.
 

*Splinter

Member
Yeah, but then there's also the case of female athletes, who are married to other well known male personalities having headlines like "So and so's wife/GF won a medal...". It's kind of ridiculous
I imagine the same thing would happen if the husband of a more famous wife won a medal too?

I could be wrong though
 

Jayof9s

Member
Yeah, but then there's also the case of female athletes, who are married to other well known male personalities having headlines like "So and so's wife/GF won a medal...". It's kind of ridiculous

Are you saying that if the (less famous) husband of a celebrity won a medal you don't think the headline would read the same?

"Famous person's less famous spouse does a thing" sounds like the media doing what the media always does to me.
 

kavanf1

Member
The British media are notoriously arrogant when it comes to sporting victories. I think this is less likely to do with sexism than it is to do with the unspoken comment that he's the first British athlete to do it, not the first ever.
 
D

Deleted member 80556

Unconfirmed Member
This makes me realize that reporters in my country have done pretty well, reporting and analyzing female athletes. At worst, they have called them girls, but I guess it could be much worse from what I've read here.
 
This makes me realize that reporters in my country have done pretty well, reporting and analyzing female athletes. At worst, they have called them girls, but I guess it could be much worse from what I've read here.

Canada's is usually pretty good, but this year has had some pretty embarrassing ones (as listed in the article) alongside some really bad snafus not related to sexism.
 

Kinyou

Member
the BBC calling it “an even bigger moment” for Chinese diver He Zi when her boyfriend proposed to her as she stood on the podium accepting her silver medal;
eh... I could see that one go both ways. I guess it's dumb to even compare the two

But overall sad to see how women sports are ignored or plainly forgotten about
 

Bluenoser

Member
http://www.macleans.ca/olympics/rio-sexism-runs-rampant-women-athletes/



The questions from Ron MacLean talking about Penny Olesiak and trying to relate it to her brother Jamie is absolutely hilarious, no surprise coming from that weasel.

Pretty harsh to call MacLean a "weasel". I didn't see that interview, and I would have liked a bit of context, but usually when they talk about family members (which he does often, be it male or female athletes), it's to illustrate athletic genes in the family, not to take anything away from the person he is talking to.
 

Browny

Banned
Not the first time Inverdale has dropped himself in it - he made some comments about Marion Bartoli (tennis player) a while back. I think he's a very good commentator, but he might need to slow down a little in interviews...
 
When I was a child I was sure that racism and sexism would be dead by the time I grew up because my generation was a lot more progressive. I was sure all the old bigots would have died off by then.
 
Pretty harsh to call MacLean a "weasel". I didn't see that interview, and I would have liked a bit of context, but usually when they talk about family members (which he does often, be it male or female athletes), it's to illustrate athletic genes in the family, not to take anything away from the person he is talking to.

That is more or less my opinion on Ron MacLean as a whole, going back to 2010 around the time when Winnipeg was going into the NHL, when MacLean decided to try and catch Bettman on gotcha questions in a studio interview, which Bettman promptly shut him down at every opportunity. Also doesn't help that he was one of the main players in the Alex Burrows - Stephane Auger feud
 
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