It’s no secret that football is considered a “sport for men”. Despite its ever-growing female audience, it is still marketed towards male fans and portrayed as something that only they can truly understand. On the surface, it seems like an old, worn-out rhetoric that belongs to times long gone. Unfortunately, that couldn’t be further from the truth.
Many things could be said about football and misogyny. The topics are seemingly never-ending and broad enough to fill books, rather than articles. That is why I want to focus on one particular aspect of the conversation, more exactly, the concept of women being unable to truly understand and comprehend the sport.
This rant was prompted by a clip from a podcast that had appeared on my social media. In it, two men were analyzing the replies to a particularly enraging X (formerly known as Twitter) post:
“Bro, how’s your girlfriend treating you? But explain in football terms so that women won’t understand.”
Its comments were filled with surface-level metaphors, obvious to anyone who has seen a singular football match. Mentioning offside, talking about home and away games, or referring to different leagues were common among the men who decided to respond. Every answer was lined with the same “joke”: it was supposedly indecipherable for women.
Someone might say that taking apart a post from X is extreme. Of course, it isn’t something that should be taken seriously, and it’s not the be-all, end-all of the state of the world. What it is, however, is a good starting point for a discussion about the view men have of women and sport. The very existence of the short statement is proof that, in the eyes of many, if not most, men, women will never truly understand football, motorsports, or basketball. That if they want to watch sports, they should stick to the ones “meant for them”, so artistic gymnastics or ice skating.
While for some men the misogyny-filled view stems from the idea that they are inherently smarter than all the women around them, for others, the issue is quite different. Many male fans simply cannot believe that it is possible for women to be truly interested in sports. They assume that even if girls are watching games or races, they are only doing so for male-centered reasons. Maybe they are trying to impress their boyfriends, or maybe they are just looking at the handsome players. One thing they certainly cannot be doing is paying attention to the techniques and strategies employed on the fields. Therefore, they can never possibly understand the ‘intricacies’ of the games they devote their time to.
Unfortunately, this isn’t a sentiment that only exists online. Women interested in sports have to deal with the same style of misogyny in their day-to-day lives. Telling a man that you do like a given sport is equivalent to leaving the house wearing a band t-shirt. In both cases, you are immediately bombarded with the questions meant to prove that you aren’t a “real fan”. Men get to enjoy sports casually, but women are not given the same courtesy. They have to know every little detail to be worthy of watching.
Even if the women do pass all the tests and answer all the ridiculously detailed questions, they still aren’t off the hook. There is still one more argument that can be used to undermine them. “I guess you do know quite a bit. Your boyfriend taught you well, didn’t he?” The ‘boyfriend’ can be replaced with someone else. Father, brother, cousin, it doesn’t matter. The point is, a man must have taught her everything she knows because she could never possibly understand it on her own. There is no winning against the blatant misogyny.
The view takes on a ridiculous tone when these same men comment on the professional female players of their beloved sports. Even though these women spend their lives on the fields, putting their blood, sweat, and tears into becoming the best, they are seen as a nuisance, rather than as professionals. Through the lens of misogyny, they do not fully grasp the intricacies of football. It doesn’t matter how much time they spend on the pitch and how many goals they score in national competitions. Nothing will ever be enough.
While the issue I describe is tied directly to sport, it is a symptom of a much larger societal problem. There is an implication behind it that goes far beyond football. What the men in the post are saying is: women are not intelligent enough to understand sport. What they leave behind is a continuation of that sentence: women are and always will be less intelligent than men.
Everything seen as “manly” is important, complex, and worth attention. On the other hand, any hobby that is seen as feminine is both simple and a waste of time. What these men believe is that they could easily do anything women like; they simply choose not to because it isn’t challenging or stimulating enough. This outdated, tired view is a staple of modern misogyny, and nowhere is it more visible than among sports fans. Their minds, when it comes to women, are already made up, and nothing could ever change them.
Despite its implications, the case of a poorly worded tweet is still one of the mildest examples of misogyny within the world of sports. Women involved in all aspects of the industry have to deal with much bigger issues on a day-to-day basis. Through every mocking smile and off-handed comment, they are reminded that, to some men, they will always be less-than. That they will never be smart enough to understand something as simple as a football metaphor.
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