For my entire life, I have been raised to watch and be dedicated to one of America’s favorite pastimes, sports.
Before I begin my topic on this subject matter I want to clear up one thing, I am from New York. Therefore, all of my favorite sports teams are New York teams. Seeing that many readers of this blog are from New England, I just want to assure you this isn’t a “The Yankees are better than the Red Sox” blog entry (even though that is the truth).
As I stated previously, I grew up watching sports. I remember countless nights sitting on my living room couch with my neon pink Yankee’s hat on watching the games with my father. I would constantly ask him why he yelled at the TV or why an umpire made a bad call. This was the same with any other sport depending on which season it was. As I grew up, I became more and more familiar with the world of sports. I developed favorite players and an overall passion for these teams that I grew up watching.
Within the past few years I have noticed a common theme when talking about sports, no one takes the female sports fan seriously. “You don’t know what you’re talking about, you’re a girl,” “You couldn’t even tell me what’s going on right now,” “Why aren’t you watching the Kardashians or something?” are all criticisms that I’ve received when watching sports with male audience members.
It made me wonder why females are so unappreciated as sports fans. There are thousands of female sports experts across the nation, so what makes them less creditable as fans? If males can hoot and holler at their television during an important game shouldn’t the female audience have every right to as well? Maybe it’s because all of the most followed sports teams are all male teams. It could also be the fact that they more commonly identify with athletes such as Tim Tebow or Lebron James because they are also males.
Whatever the reasoning may be, I think that women should be recognized as just as passionate about sports as men are. Not just because they want to marry Derek Jeter or Alex Rodriguiez, but because they have a love for the game.
Morgan Miller
Pierce Arrow Editor-in-Chief
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