Annie Giordano |
When watching sports channels on TV, how many times do we see coverage on women’s sports? How many times are the sports we watch NOT dominated by men? Rarely.
In fact, womens sports events make up only 7% of all Sports TV coverage. 7%! That means the likelihood of young girls switching on a sports channel to see a woman who they can look up to is very slim. Worryingly slim. It’s not just that it demotivates them, there is clear evidence according to recent studies that show that girls are doing half the amount of sport that boys do and this can leads to many worrying health problems.
Just look at the past 10 years of winners of ‘Sport Personality of the Year Award’, they are all men. What message does this send to young girls who need female role models to show them that they too can be just as good, just as successful and just as athletic as males?
No wonder girls do less hours in physical activities, they see few female role models on TV that can inspire them and that they can aspire to be. Not that there is a lack of female role models, just a lack of representation from the media. There are many female powerhouses in sport that we will be looking forward to watching at the 2020 olympics.
