"Sociology"
Blogging on the World and the behaviors of society
A League of Their Own
Choice 1: Choose one scene from the movie A League of Their Own that you can recall summarize the scene and explain how it dealt with gender roles of the time?
One of the scenes that best exemplifies gender roles of the time in A League of Their Own is when a commercial about the girl’s league is shown. The league's owners released this commercial to give it more publicity. At that point in the movie, the league wasn’t bringing in as much revenue as Mr. Harvey had hoped. They released the commercial to the public to show that these girls were tough enough to play ball while delivering obvious messages about how these ladies were still, well, ladies.
The commercial begins with the girls in the league practicing and throwing the ball around, but then starts to focus on the players’ more feminine qualities to give an underhanded message of how ladies should behave and act. In the commercial you see one of the ballplayers pouring coffee for other men, one player knitting on the sideline, and one player who is renowned for cooking very good spaghetti. The goal of the advertisement was to expose the league to the population while simultaneously establishing gender roles. What's humorous is that this is all voiced over by a masculine voice emphasizing these qualities who even nicknames one of the players "Betty Spaghetti". This commercial is spreading the message that women are meant to be homemakers. In today's society these women ballplayers would be looked at as calalai or even bissu. This commercial eludes from this by bringing out and capitalizing on their femininity.
The commercial also does a great job displaying only the attractive women in the league. It is obvious that businessmen focus on players like Betty, Mae, Helen, and Dottie who are the most attractive women in the league. The players who weren’t as attractive were completely avoided as we saw in the skit with Marla. This is yet bringing another message that a woman should always look beautiful, feminine, and covered in makeup no matter the circumstance. In this case, even if a woman is playing baseball.
This scene best expresses the feelings and expectations towards women during the World War II era. The media was trying to show that although women are now playing baseball, they are still inferior men. The commercial gives us a full glimpse of what was expected of women back in that time. Back then women were expected to be feminine, beautiful, and most importantly, a homemaker.
Choice 2: Why have men’s sports been so dominant compared to women sports over the years? In your opinion is the situation changing and will women sports be as loved and discussed as men's team sports are now? Why or why not?
Here we see Ronda Rousey, one of the toughest fighters in the UFC.
The reason why men’s sports are more popular compared to women’s sports is due to the fact that men have naturally been stronger, faster, and more durable than females have. Females can undoubtedly play whatever sport a male can, that’s for sure. You cannot hide the fact, however, that there is a definite gap in talent and physical strength when it comes to the two sexes. Men's sports are more popular because it’s more thrilling and entertaining to watch because of how tough and fast-paced it is compared to women's sports.
People who sponsor and broadcast sports events don’t want to give women the coverage they desire. It’s not that the people don’t care about women, it’s just that they don’t bring in as much revenue as men. At the end of the day, the goal for these businessmen is profit. Men’s sports bring in way more revenue which is why the receive more coverage and are compensated more money than females. This is the glass ceiling that women in sports leagues face. This ceiling will not be easy for them to shatter.
The way I see it, I don’t think women’s sports will receive the same popularity that men’s sports do anytime soon. The reason why is because I don’t see them bringing in the same revenue that men can. If there’s no profit, then how will they receive coverage? Some of the only sports that women receive coverage for is tennis and fighting in the UFC. Since men dominate all the other sports like football, soccer, and basketball, businessmen don’t see the point in investing in women’s sports. Being in a capitalistic society, I don’t believe that women’s sports will become as loved and as popular as their male counterparts.
Here we see Giancarlo Stanton of the Miami Marlins, arguably one of the best home run hitters in MLB at the moment, striking out against Aroldis Chapman. This is the speed and power we see in MLB pitchers.
A glimpse into what men's football looks like. It's fast-paced, tough, and full of brutal tackles.