After winning the World Boxing Association welterweight title last Saturday, boxer Adrien Broner dropped a bombshell.
“I lifted his belt and his girl,” screamed Broner into a ringside camera.
A few days earlier, Broner’s opponent, Pauli Malignaggi, had referred to the same girl as his “side-piece” and said that he “slept with her” because “athletes sleep with a lot of women.”
After the fight, both fighters were criticized for being derogatory toward women.
What was not mentioned, however, was that their objectification of women is all too common in today’s athletic culture. While some people may be willing to chalk up the fighters’ comments to boys being boys, their comments are indicative of a major problem within our society.
All too often, star athletes objectify women, league executives and promoters market women as objects, and meanwhile, society embraces it all. As a result, a cycle of gender discrimination is perpetuated even though such discrimination should have been eradicated a long time ago.
POOR ROLE MODELING
It is quite possible that the teenage version of Adrien Broner heard Shaquille O’Neal. In 2008, the basketball star climbed on stage and described his relationships with women with the following freestyle rap lyrics: “I don’t love ’em, I just leave ’em. I got a vasectomy, now I can’t breed ’em.”
It is almost certain that at the time of Shaq’s rap verse, Broner, along with an entire generation of young athletes, viewed Shaq as a role model. Unproven athletes look up to athletes who have made it. Kids idolize superstars. Therefore, when an individual as renowned as Shaq climbs on stage and objectifies women, it is almost guaranteed that future generations will do the same.
POOR MARKETING
As Pauli Malignaggi sat on a stool between rounds, he likely noticed the ring girl. How could he have missed her? Scantily clad and parading a “Round 2” sign around the ring, there could be little doubt as to her role. She played the role of object, paid to be gawked at, compensated to look good and expected to remain quiet.
If Malignaggi’s post-fight comments serve as any indicator, he probably viewed the nameless ring girl as a “side-piece.” Honestly, why would he not? Over the course of his career, Malignaggi has undoubtedly witnessed promoters marketing ring girls, objectifying ring girls and making a lot of money doing it. He, along with countless other young athletes, has been trained to see women as nothing more than good-looking money-makers — “side-pieces,” so to speak.
POOR SOCIETY
The sad part about the role modeling, the marketing and the comments is that we, as a society, accept it all. Fans laugh at Shaq’s supposedly humorous freestyle lyrics while ignoring the larger implication of their meaning. Fans wolf-whistle at ring girls while failing to recognize the repercussions that come from marketing women as objects. And ultimately, fans shrug and turn a blind-eye when fighters such as Broner and Malignaggi objectify women as they have been trained to do.
Personally, I find it sad. As long as society continues to avert its gaze from the objectification of women, true progress toward gender equality cannot be made. Female athletes will never realize the same confidence that they would absent the objectification of their peers. Gender discrimination will never truly cease. As a result, society as a whole will suffer.
Therefore, I urge fans, athletes and those not even involved in sports to take a stand. Do not watch silently or laugh as athletes objectify women. Do not pay money to watch women paraded around as moneymaking objects. And most of all, do not accept society’s acceptance of skewed gender roles.
Stand up and say something because only through the exercise of voice can true change be achieved.
Ian MacLaren is the Cortez Journal sports editor.