Olympics Excluding Women Ski Jumpers
February 18, 2010
by Alison
|The opinions expressed herein are those of the author, and not necessarily those of The New Agenda.
I’m feeling frosted. How is it that some of the best ski jumpers in the WORLD are not allowed to compete in jumping in this year’s winter Olympics? Well, the answer becomes clear when one realizes that these accomplished athletes are women.
It turns out that ski jumping is the only remaining Olympic sport that still bans women. So I think it’s time for this Olympic sport to update its look.
Jacques Rogge, President of the International Olympic Committee, said that the decision to ban women is not discrimination and instead sites “technical” reasons. It’s hard to see how this makes sense when Lindsey Van holds the world record for the longest jump. And that means that Lindsey has even out jumped the boys. Hmmm… could this be troubling some members of the Olympic Committee?
Other “experts” suggest that ski jumping is too dangerous for the ladies. But since when did the Olympic Committee become overly concerned with a little danger? I’m going to take a wild guess that the Olympic Committee will not take any steps to ban men from luging, bobsledding or snowboarding, sports that also have some level of risk for both men and women.
With sports we accept a certain amount of risk because we enjoy pushing the boundaries of human achievement. And when we deny women involvement in the highest level of sport competitions, we are telling them that pushing boundaries is just not acceptable for women and girls.
Denying women the right to compete in a sport they so clearly excel at sends a clear message to our girls. Girls and women need not compete and they need not take risks. Oh, and they don’t really need the glory that comes with it all. Glory is for boys and men.
I want my daughter and her peers to grow up to believe that competing at the highest levels is for girls, too. And What sort of competition denies half the population the right to compete?
…..
Hat tip. Violet Socks of the Reclusive Leftist on her piece.
Besides the jumping facilities were probably paid for with tax dollars so if they are going to tax women to pay for it then they should be able to use it. The real deciding factor is probably if they had to have the women’s events they would have to take valuable time away from the men’s events, or build two ski jumps.
Why is this anymore dangerous for women then men? I mean don’t the men also have to go airborne? Women are not stupid they understand the dangers and are willing to take that risk. So why is the Olympic committee deciding this for women when we are certainly capable of deciding for ourselves that we want to compete in dangerous sports or in careers that are not physically safe.
They want to protect women from danger then start putting Rapists away for life that will do more to protect women then banning them from a sport.
The most recent tragedy to occur in the “dangerous” winter sport of the luge, was a young man being killed because, as it was reported later, he was too inexperienced for the run. The danger exists for both men and women. It’s not about danger, it’s about more time to cover the men.
Bes, you are absolutely correct. If women pay equal taxes that pay for these vents, then they should play. The only time women are viewed as equal to men is when it comes to paying taxes. The rest of the time, men get to tell us what we can and cannot do.
What will it take for women to stand up and say ENOUGH! We want to live our lives to the fullest and the way we want, just like the men do. Just who do they think they are by preventing us from doing so?
Well young women are being spoon fed mind numbing blather from the corporate media who are the only entities who have a loud voice in our culture. They learn their role and their sexual role from that media who wants them to feel inadequate and unfulfilled so they can sell them remedies to their perceived inadequacy. The TV channels young women watch are not entertainment entities they are advertising venues and everything that takes place on them is meant to drive feelings of inadequacy and sales. It is time for feminists to stop complaining to corporate media that they are sexist or whatever. Corporate media doesn’t care, let them do their commercial thing and feminists need to develop their own female positive media, meeting places and especially stories and myths. Really if we don’t talk about positive female sexuality in the context of male female relationships then we are the only ones NOT talking to young women about their sexuality. And young women also need a place to talk it out themselves without being lead by a corporate agenda. If we give young women these things I think we will see them stand up and take what is theirs. Amy has gotten us off to a good start with this blog.
“if we don’t talk about positive female sexuality in the context of male female relationships then we are the only ones NOT talking to young women about their sexuality. And young women also need a place to talk it out themselves without being lead by a corporate agenda.”
Bes, I have been wanting to enjoy some conversations about sex for a long time! Strange thing is that no one really wants to talk about it. Let’s chat about sex!
Karen: Well Actually plenty of people in Corporate media are talking about sex and young women’s role in it and they’re taking their cues from pornography. It seems like feminists are the only people not talking to young women about positive one male-one female sex. I don’t get it. But there is the same taboo in pornography where one male one female non painful loving sex is the one type of sex you NEVER see but every other kind of often extremely distorted views of sex are encouraged to be brought up. Maybe feminists don’t know what to say? But I have a hard time believing that because many are Mothers and they’ve had to have told their children something. And at this point I am not sure feminists even have credibility on the subject since they have allowed themselves to be portrayed as not feminine and asexual for so long. So giving young women a blog place to figure it out might be the best we can do.
Here is a recent example I find very disturbing. You all realize the Twilight trend and I know there are vast differences of opinion among feminists about what it means. Some say Bella the heroine is timid, some say Twilight is feminist because it encourages young women to forget their appearance and sit happily on their average sweat-panted bums checking out hot men which is a half of their sexuality that has been denied them by patriarchy since that half of their sexuality doesn’t benefit men. So on Valentines day a photo shoot from Details “men’s mag” featuring Robert Pattinson (Hot male lead of Twilight) fully clothed with a bunch of random fully nude women drops all over the internet and is all over fan sites that are visited by tween girls who are in lust with “Robward”. It is such a old sexist view and Conde nast had to have known it would go all over the web and they chose to use a man who would draw in young girls and women. I really feel this sort of insidious sexism aimed at our girls needs a feminist antidote that is easily swallowed but I don’t know what that might be. Because it is a waste of our time and energy to try to get the old pigs at Conde Nast to shut up, how many years have we been working on that? You can see the photos at Details web site I am sure and they have been all over sites like Popsugar, Lainey Gossip, Twi Crack Addict which tween girls frequent. I’m telling you they need an alternative, American girl is great but girls need an alternative sexual conditioning message. Getting off soapbox now…..
HOW CANADIAN WOMEN ATHLETES LOST THE GAME…IN COURT!
The Canadian women athletes took this issue all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada which agreed that women ski jumpers cannot be discriminated in Canada under its Charter of Rights and Freedoms that has constitutionally entrenched “equality” for women (what ERA would be in the U.S.); Women’s Equality is a “right” in Canada since 1982 when women from all over Canada got together, seeing gender equality was not mentioned in their repatriated Constitution, and boarded buses by the thousands protesting in Ottawa’s paraliemnt. Prime Minister Trudeau then included equality based on “gender”–and women’s equality in Canada was guaranteed.
However, the Supreme Court ruled (shocking Canadian women athletes and feminists) that it’s ultimately the decision of that supreme body of Olympic Misogynists run by Mr. Jacques Rogge who cited the excuse that “not enough women athletes participated” anyway! It was an issue involving international jurisdiction, and not the Canadian venue and Canadian Women lost their lawsuit agaisnt the Olympic Committee. Pity, as Canada is one country that takes women’s rights very seriously in athletics and all areas of life and women compete in all events.
But the boys of the Olympics Committee have the last word, even though the Games are in Vancouver, B.C. Canada! But this has made Canadian women athletes all the more determined to take the issue further….
Bes,
I’m sure the reasons you list for women, in general, are the same reasons why women thrive in all women’s colleges. It’s proven to be the one place where women aren’t forced to deal with male-only views nor are they intimidated into silence by their male counterparts.
Women need to learn how to be as confident and assertive as men are, except be able to do so against greater obstacles than the men do.
Like Governor Ann Richards once said: “women can perform when given the chance. After all, Ginger Rogers did the same thing Fred Astaire did, except she did it backwards and in heels!”
Canada ROCKS for women–outlawed Pornography because they found it violated the equality clause of their constitution…..
Kathleen: I agree. I sent my daughter to a Catholic girls high school whose woman Principle has a PhD in Physics so it had an amazing science program and she could get multiple science classes each quarter. We were both very pleased with the program. The school opened at 6am and had activities until at least 7pm each night. That guaranteed she was busy and happy and missed her corporate media sexual conditioning messages because she was too busy to watch TV. At the same time the school had many opportunities for men from the girls families to be involved, I’ve never seen so many father-daughter clubs in my life. I think they did a good job of preparing her because she is in a co-ed engineering program now and is doing well. In contrast she came from a Catholic K-8 primary school. Of the 30 girls in her 8th grade class 6 were in TREATMENT for eating disorders, I remember the basketball post was 5’11″ and weighed 181 in 7th grade and had a beautiful athletic figure, she came back to practice the next fall in baggy clothes and passed out during the first workout, she weighed under 100 pounds. The media indoctrination starts early and it is very damaging and insidious. I have to work 5 more years but after I retire my goal is going to be offering an attractive supportive alternative to corporate media conditioning of girls. I have no idea how to do that so I should be busy.
Jenniferintexas: Wow they really outlawed pornography!? I go up to Whistler BC a couple of times each year and I had noticed you don’t see the skanky “mens” mags all over the place which I found odd because any ski town has 8 men to one woman. The USA clearly values the rights of a few creep old pornographers over the rights of all women and girls so that will never happen here. If we could just even tax the hell out of it like they do alcohol and tobacco we could probably pay off our national debt in a very few years.
MSakel. That really sucks. Women Olympians have always challenged unreasonable boundaries for all of us. We used to get a channel out of Vancouver in our cable package and it was so superior to USA based entertainment because of the Olympics reporting and the women characters in many of their series. Of course they made sure to block it to make room for more USA garbage. I miss it. Love Canada by the way.
recently saw on my yahoo page that there is a TV series in the US pornography the business of pleasure. we have a long way ahead to catch up on Canada. what great idea to tax pornography like tobacco.
should we write Mr. Rogge, exactly how many women athletes need to be interested in ski jumping to make it an Olympic discipline?
Canada is very pro-women, and they have some friggin’ great women skiers!!
We don’t want to tax porngraphy, we want to ban pornography. Taxing abuse doesn’t help the child or women in the picture or the one the porn is used on or the woman denied the promotion because women aren’t smart enough, etc., etc.
Canada hired Catharine MacKinnon and Andrea Dworkin to argue for the state and they won. But their constitution is much stronger than the ours in regards to equality between men and women….
jennifer, i am with you on banning pornography. we probably need ERA first. there is a group over 3000 strong on facebook ERA-NOW. you don’t need to be a NOW member to join. they are working the 3 state strategy and argue to extend the time for states to pass ERA which was done for some other amendment recently.
That’s fascinating about Canada. I would love to know more about how their ban against pornography works, how it happened and what are the positive changes in their society because of this.
Bes, about Twilight, it is sexual empowerment on the part of the audience to appreciate a hot-looking guy. However, there is no empowerment within Bella’s character. I don’t think she notices appearances, just her own emptiness when she doesn’t have a man around.
I love your entire comment, especially the first paragraph, and I think we will all be better for listening to you. ^_^
Allison,
I will find the best book and post it here. ANDREA Dworkin is my heroine and any book by her a woman reads is the first, second, third, last step she will need to take to free herself….
Marille,
Thanks for the heads up. I will go and see if there is anything I can do to help. I am a good letter writer and I have about 100 people who will follow….
There’s a great link on CBC’s website “Supreme Court Spurns Women Ski Jumpers”
Katie Willis, the Canadian ski jumper who launched the lawsuit, received huge support for her legal challenge in Canada from former Salt Lake City Mayor Deedee Corradini, president of Women’s Ski Jumping, USA. She’s vowed to include women ski jumpers in the next Olympics in Russia, 2014!
Vancouver’s Olympic organizing committee (VANOC) said in a statement it hopes the female ski jumpers have a place in future Games. If this were to have been a decision of a Canadian jurisdiction, there’s no question female ski jumping would have been included. (The Canadian Charter of Rights prohibits since 1982 discrimination on ground of “gender” or “gender orientation” and same-sex marriage has been legal in Canada since 2005) But the Elite Boys of the International Olympics Committee don’t like female competition!
The Canadian Vancouver Olympics (Vanoc) Chair said: “We remain supportive of these young women and of having women’s ski jumping added to the roster of future Olympic Winter Games.”
The women first launched a lawsuit against local organizers in May 2008, 18 months after the International Olympics Committee (that elite band of “boys are best in sports”) decided to exclude the sport.
The Canadian women dropped a complaint with the Canadian Human Rights Commission and the Federal government of Canada agreed to lobby the IOC on their behalf. When that failed, the ski jumpers pursued the court case.
The women wanted the courts to force Games organizers to either add a women’s event or cancel the men’s. Organizers said they could do neither.
It is incredible that the International Olympics Boys Club still manages to get away with gender discrimination in such blatant fashion. Let’s hope the Russian Games will include female ski jumpers–or boycott the damn games! Let the real games for Equality begin!
Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/canada/olymp.....z0gEHKoqBP
Bes
Thanks for your comment. I agree with you fully about Canadian TV broadcasting. I like much better and women seem to get “stronger” roles. The CBC’s Passionate Eye (similar to PBS Frontline) is a great source of documentaries often featuring women’s issues and recently they did a great doc on human trafficking and how it affects girls and women locally and internationally.
They even have “Little Mosque on the Prairie” a hilarious comedy of muslims in multicultural Canada, in ‘redneck’ province Alberta.
Katharine MacKinnon, Kathleen Mahoney and Andrea Dworkin did heroic work defending the equality of Canadian women and protecting women’s equality right against the right of “free speech” of pornographers. Mr. Butler was a porn freak who argued, in the case that LEAF [the Canadian Legal Education & Action Fund]took all the way to The Supreme Court of Canada, that his “free speech” rights were violated. The Supreme Court ultimately accepted the essentials of LEAF’s “equality” argument. (Dworkin argued that no criminal obscenity law should be given weight–her own books were confiscated at the U.S.-Canada border!)
The court declared the obscenity law was unconstitutional if used to restrict materials on a moral basis, but constitutional if used to promote sex equality. The court interpreted the criminal “obscenity” provision to prohibit materials that harm women. So, at least in Canada, pornographers have to be very careful with “materials that harm women”. Of course, we all know that the Internet makes a mockery of these laws anyway. Although I don’t believe in government censorship, I do think some sites should be BANNED outright. And China may have it right–but for the wrong, political, reasons. If only we could enforce these “equality” laws on proliferating internet predators (Amy had a great vid some time ago) and stop the wild west frontier gender massacres on the net, where women and girls are both target and collateral damage….
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