Sports: How Cultural Roles Leave Women Vulnerable
In
the last decade sexual harassment mostly in the form of improper sexual
advances made by men towards women in the workplace has garnered much national
media attention and intense debate.From
Anita Hill to Jennifer Flowers to Desiree Washington many women have been
mistreated sexually by powerful men.From
the female perspective this notoriety can be construed either positively
or negatively.It is arguable that
the mass attention to this issue has aided feminists’ issues and advocates
by depicting these women as strong to rise and accuse their aggressors
in the face of almost certain embarrassment and probing into their private
lives.It also is plausible to claim
that these incidents being made public help make other women more aware
of the boundaries of sexual harassment.Alternatively,
these cases have also brought to light the objectification of women as
entities to be enjoyed by men.In
one of the latest and strangest cases of alleged sexual impropriety Sable,
of the World Wrestling Federation, has accused her employer of sexual harassment
and lack of regard for feminine safety.She
is seeking $100 million in punitive or non-economic damages for her pain
and suffering and she deserves most if not all of that sum.This
becomes evident by analyzing the issue and exploring the traditional cultural
roles of women in sports, like wrestling, where the ideals of feminism
have seldom been a choice.
Popular
male sport like boxing, basketball, and football are ingrained into the
cultural fabric of our society.In
these sports women’s roles are limited to cheerleading, spectating, or
ring dressing (holding up round cards).These
women are typically scantily clad and athletic, but they do not participate.For
the most part women in these sports are sideshows to the main event.This
however has become less true in the world of wrestling, which for the sake
of argument shall be considered a sport.In
wrestling the character roles of women have increased in importance and
overall exposure as women are now actually wrestling and able to hold belts
or championship titles.A female
wrestler named Sable was one of these champions and became one of the most
popular wrestlers in the WWF.
Sable
was a contracted wrestler with the WWF, but more so a top entertainer in
an industry that is enormously popular and has sales in the billions each
year.With her fame came opportunities
to profit and in April of 1999 she chose to pose naked for Playboy and
was tremendously successful.To capitalize
on her success the WWF decided to market her sexuality even more by selling
T-shirts of Sable offering sexual favors, demanding her be cast in a lesbian
scenario, and requesting that she take off her top during a live pay-per-view
event.When she refused these demands
and complained about the drug abusing male wrestlers challenging her to
out of ring fights, intimidating her, and watching her change she was demoted,
quit, and eventually sued.
A
plausible line of argument as to why Sable is in the wrong is dependent
upon three key factors.Firstly,
she is under contract and therefore must cede to the desires of her management.Her
image, services, and body belong to the WWF and if she did not like the
progression of her career she could quit.Second,
wrestling is entertaining sport.Therefore,
vulgarity and obscenity to reasonable degrees must be accepted and is frankly
expected by the fans and the participants to sell tickets.Thirdly,
Sable had already posed naked for Playboy so why not assume that
she will strip for her wrestling management and fans.Basically,
proponents of Sable believe that this is the WWF and the pain and suffering
she experienced were part of the job.
Although
the appropriate dollar amount is beyond the scope of this analysis Sable
should win her case against the WWF.Firstly,
Sable has been prescribed a cultural role in this instance because of tradition.Despite
her athletic efforts she was never allowed a fully equal opportunity to
compete.She was relegated to her
role partly because of her own action of posing naked, but mostly out of
cultural expectations of women in sports like wrestling.The
cultural roles assigned to women in wrestling are prescriptive or dictated
and not descriptive.Sable is a potentially
legitimate athlete if allowed an equal chance.This
is the essence and ideal of feminism, offering women equality and choice.Sable
has been denied these ideals.Secondly,
Sable was marketed in a way that is offensive in all reasonable senses.From
the lesbian scenario to the T-shirt she was objected unfairly because of
her gender.Just because an individual
is under contract to wrestle does not mean that they must participate in
actions which they deem personally embarrassing, slandering, or exploiting.Thirdly,
no employee of any corporation should feel endangered in the workplace.Wrestling
is obviously a bit different from most workplaces in that it is inherently
dangerous, but Sable’s complaints were over out of ring incidents.Lastly,
just because Sable posed for Playboy is no valid reason to assume
that she will strip again for anyone, nor should she be expected to.
Wrestling
is a dirty business and there should be no false pretenses as to how it
treats women since sex and sexy women sell ticket, merchandise, advertising
time, etc.However, women by the
ideals of feminism have rights to equality and choice over issues like
when to take off their clothes.The
prescriptive roles of culture and tradition can and should be broken.Athletes,
like Sable, should be described by the belief systems in society, not prescribed.Seeing
that the WWF violated her rights and the ideals of feminism and society
as a whole, wrestling should be held liable.The
Sable case has shown women to be powerful but also objected.Although
these two outcomes seem to diametrically oppose each other hopefully the
uniform result will be the same; increased female awareness of sexual harassment
and exploitation regardless of their profession or past personal activity.