Double Standards in Life as Well as Sports (wait...sports AREN'T life??)
This year, Yours Truly began a job working in a professional atmosphere. Seeing that the most "professional" my life had been heretofore (beer pong, 3AM Taco Bell, wearing my old high school gym shirt, growing strange facial hair for money, etc.), this was a bit of an adjustment due to culture shock. When I began my job, I was informed by several of my friendly co-workers that my boss was a stickler for professionalism. How? In truly important ways such as speaking articulately and confidently with coworkers and clients, maintaining a tidy workplace, not eating at our desks, and acquiring borderline obsessive-compulsive organization skills. These are all wonderful methods for nurturing a efficient, successful work environment. However, one of my boss' tenets of professionalism that has truly stuck in my craw: The biased dress code.
This really wasn't too much of a concern in the winter/spring months for me, since a New York winter means pants and long sleeves for the better part of the year. Summer? That's another issue. Imagine having to worry about wearing an oxford shirt, tie, dress slacks, and dress socks on a 90+ degree July day to get lunch because you're worried about having a massive back sweat puddle, so you feel compelled to put on an UNDERSHIRT so you can do so. On the same track, imagine that you make the trek back to your office with a bag of crappy Chinese in your hands, and you see all the women in your workplace wearing sleeveless shirts and skirts complaining about how the A/C in the office is making them cold.
Now close your eyes and try to figure out the magnitude of your delirium in said situation.
What's the moral of the story here? There's nothing egalitarian about this picture, and as long as women want to cut corners for their personal benefit, there will never truly be equality amongst us. All I have to say is...I'd love to see what would happen if I showed up at work in that old cutoff high school gym shirt and a pair of khaki shorts.
So where is the connection to sports here, you ask? There are examples all around us. The Title IX collegiate sports fiasco, the ludicrous sport of softball, Candace Parker's dunk contest "victory," Michelle Wie's PGA Tour exemption fest, and Danica Patrick's desire to move on to NASCAR next season. With regards to Wie, you might be wondering: What about Annika? Well, Annika has spent about a decade on the LPGA Tour and has proved to be a dominating force...like Michael Jordan did, when you find yourself on top of the world in your respective sport, it can't hurt to embark on a new challenge. On the other hand, Wie hasn't accomplished a damn thing. She hasn't yet won an LPGA tournament of any kind, let alone a major, but because she's such a curiosity in the public eye, she will take the place of a less-fortunate male golfer in every tournament she decides to sneak into via free pass.
In Parker's case, her slam dunk championship victory two years ago was perhaps the most egregious example of corner-cutting in women's sports history. When a 6'4" Division I women's college basketball player barely sneaks her hands over the rim to convert a George Mikan-esque dunk, compelling her male opponents to attempt virtually-impossible jams (unsuccessfully) just to keep pace with her, there is something horribly wrong.
I am all for women achieving, but it must be done on a level playing field and not at the expense of their male counterparts.
For the record, I wore a polo shirt today (ohhhh snap!).
This really wasn't too much of a concern in the winter/spring months for me, since a New York winter means pants and long sleeves for the better part of the year. Summer? That's another issue. Imagine having to worry about wearing an oxford shirt, tie, dress slacks, and dress socks on a 90+ degree July day to get lunch because you're worried about having a massive back sweat puddle, so you feel compelled to put on an UNDERSHIRT so you can do so. On the same track, imagine that you make the trek back to your office with a bag of crappy Chinese in your hands, and you see all the women in your workplace wearing sleeveless shirts and skirts complaining about how the A/C in the office is making them cold.
Now close your eyes and try to figure out the magnitude of your delirium in said situation.
What's the moral of the story here? There's nothing egalitarian about this picture, and as long as women want to cut corners for their personal benefit, there will never truly be equality amongst us. All I have to say is...I'd love to see what would happen if I showed up at work in that old cutoff high school gym shirt and a pair of khaki shorts.
So where is the connection to sports here, you ask? There are examples all around us. The Title IX collegiate sports fiasco, the ludicrous sport of softball, Candace Parker's dunk contest "victory," Michelle Wie's PGA Tour exemption fest, and Danica Patrick's desire to move on to NASCAR next season. With regards to Wie, you might be wondering: What about Annika? Well, Annika has spent about a decade on the LPGA Tour and has proved to be a dominating force...like Michael Jordan did, when you find yourself on top of the world in your respective sport, it can't hurt to embark on a new challenge. On the other hand, Wie hasn't accomplished a damn thing. She hasn't yet won an LPGA tournament of any kind, let alone a major, but because she's such a curiosity in the public eye, she will take the place of a less-fortunate male golfer in every tournament she decides to sneak into via free pass.
In Parker's case, her slam dunk championship victory two years ago was perhaps the most egregious example of corner-cutting in women's sports history. When a 6'4" Division I women's college basketball player barely sneaks her hands over the rim to convert a George Mikan-esque dunk, compelling her male opponents to attempt virtually-impossible jams (unsuccessfully) just to keep pace with her, there is something horribly wrong.
I am all for women achieving, but it must be done on a level playing field and not at the expense of their male counterparts.
For the record, I wore a polo shirt today (ohhhh snap!).
