Part of me bristled at the notion that the team needs to reach out to men who can't be bothered to do much more than talk smack about women's basketball. But something Mercury VP Ann Myers-Drysdale said in the article struck me:
"It's not even about basketball," Mercury vice president Ann Meyers Drysdale said. "It's 'Don't be critical about something you know nothing about.' It can be science, education. People make comments about things they're uneducated about, but how can you have a valued opinion if you don't see it live?"Isn't that just the crux of, well, everything? This is the same argument for putting more people of color, more LGBT people, more differently abled people on television. It's the same argument for LGBT people to come out. Unless the people around you, the people in your community, the people all over the country can see you, or people like you, how are they going to get to know you? How are they going to understand who you are, what you need, and your value?
Yes, this is about basketball and a bunch of idiots who think that the WNBA is akin to the pick-up game at the Y but it's also, as Myers-Drysdale points out, about how we move outside our silly little bubbles and grow as people. Sometimes we need to meet a gay person, watch a woman play basketball or change the oil in your car, see people in situations that all outside our comfort zones and that go beyond stereotypes. Without that kind of education, without that curiosity, that willingness to be uncomfortable, to risk being wrong, we're not going to advance very far, are we?
I hope you all have wonderful weekends.
I think that these are very exciting times for sport. Last year we had the Olympics in England, and a few weeks later we had the Paralympics. Nobody, I think, realised how popular the latter would be. People quite rightly treated the athletes as sporting HEROES. Ellie Simmonds, Sarah Storey, Jonnie Peacock, Hannah Cockcroft, David 'The Weirwolf' Weir. No 'buts' no 'isn't it a shame' but real HEROES.
ReplyDeleteMy dad is an amateur boxing trainer, and he was initially sceptical about the women's Olympic boxing. He's changed his mind, though. He now thinks that they're as good as any male boxers of their weight. For myself, when I watched the England women's football team I felt proud in a way that I haven't felt for years watching the men's game. They're just so bloody determined to win. For them it's not about picking up zillions of pounds in advertising, it's about representing your country and doing the very best that you can (and then some!).
You're so right. We must all meet as many people different from ourselves as possible. Like the poem says 'I am a part of all I have met'.If we are to change the world, our vision must be as big as the world.
Gary
Oh, and have a wonderful weekend yourself.
ReplyDeleteGary