Sports and Politics
Although I am not particularly religious, I hate country music, and live in one of the bluest places in America, I need no better reason to be a Republican than political correctness. While not all political correctness is bad and some may even be necessary, there are many areas where political correctness is just absurd. Sports is one of them.
Almost everyone recognizes that there are physical differences between men and women which contributes to men being on average better at sports. There are also other differences which contribute to men enjoying sports on average more than women.
Political correctness has already influenced professional tennis. Now we have equal pay in tennis for all of the Grand Slams for men and women despite the fact that men play best of five sets finals versus the best of three sets finals for women and the overall superiority of the men's tennis players. Equal pay for equal play would truly be equal if both men and women were playing in the same league as opposed to playing in separate leagues. The argument that women tennis players work as hard as men is baseless. Plenty of tennis players work a comparable amount to Roger Federer, yet they do not make as much because they are not as good.
The opposing argument presented by women's tennis that it is more enjoying is a more persuasive argument. I enjoy watching women's tennis, sometimes more than men's tennis, because of the longer rallies and in some cases some of the women are fairly cute. So if women can demonstrate that they are producing as an enjoyable a product and are getting equivalent ratings over a substantial period of time than the argument has merit. However, that is not what happened and instead tournaments such as Wimbledon were forced to mandate this year, equal pay, based not on economics but on political correctness.
Okay, so who cares about tennis right? Good point. But political correctness has the ability to make a difference in other sports as well. Take the NCAA tournament. Currently, I am forced to watch stories on ESPN (to get to the men's tournament coverage) on the wommen's NCAA tournament despite the lack of interest in it. Besides UCONN and Tennessee fans, I know of no school where the women's basketball team generates a ton of excitement. I don't of a single person who fills out or at least admits to filling out a women's tournmanent bracket. Five minutes of this is fine. I can listen to stories about coaches and players I have never heard of but what happens when people start demanding equal coverage of this. I am not sure. All I know is that political correctness stinks in many cases and there is no better example of this than in sports.
Almost everyone recognizes that there are physical differences between men and women which contributes to men being on average better at sports. There are also other differences which contribute to men enjoying sports on average more than women.
Political correctness has already influenced professional tennis. Now we have equal pay in tennis for all of the Grand Slams for men and women despite the fact that men play best of five sets finals versus the best of three sets finals for women and the overall superiority of the men's tennis players. Equal pay for equal play would truly be equal if both men and women were playing in the same league as opposed to playing in separate leagues. The argument that women tennis players work as hard as men is baseless. Plenty of tennis players work a comparable amount to Roger Federer, yet they do not make as much because they are not as good.
The opposing argument presented by women's tennis that it is more enjoying is a more persuasive argument. I enjoy watching women's tennis, sometimes more than men's tennis, because of the longer rallies and in some cases some of the women are fairly cute. So if women can demonstrate that they are producing as an enjoyable a product and are getting equivalent ratings over a substantial period of time than the argument has merit. However, that is not what happened and instead tournaments such as Wimbledon were forced to mandate this year, equal pay, based not on economics but on political correctness.
Okay, so who cares about tennis right? Good point. But political correctness has the ability to make a difference in other sports as well. Take the NCAA tournament. Currently, I am forced to watch stories on ESPN (to get to the men's tournament coverage) on the wommen's NCAA tournament despite the lack of interest in it. Besides UCONN and Tennessee fans, I know of no school where the women's basketball team generates a ton of excitement. I don't of a single person who fills out or at least admits to filling out a women's tournmanent bracket. Five minutes of this is fine. I can listen to stories about coaches and players I have never heard of but what happens when people start demanding equal coverage of this. I am not sure. All I know is that political correctness stinks in many cases and there is no better example of this than in sports.
posted by The partisan moderate at 2:11 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home