As we have seen in many issues within sports, misogyny brings core issues of violence and homophobia at the forefront. Masculinity is able to sustain itself because it is the dominant form in our society in terms of power relations. Since experiences in sports are typically divided up into the binary between “boys” and “girls”, this rivalry is what allows for sports to be unsafe for LGBT athletes. When people are divided up into all-male groups, this causes a sense of rivalry to act masculine because of their group interactions. The same goes for the feminine side. On the cover of the film Training Rules it lists three rules No drinking, No drugs, No Lesbians. This immediately aligns sexuality as being a binary between normal and abnormal. If being a lesbian is grouped into the same wrongness as drugs and drinking, then that has a huge effect on those whose sexual orientation is not heterosexual. Instead of address sexual orientation issues, sports has created an environment where discussing “other” identities is not welcomed.
Sexual orientation is often difficult to understand because of two issues. In the book The Psychology of Sexual Orientation, Behavior, and Identity, Diamant and McAnulty state that the two issues are “one that pertains to the meaning of sexual orientation, and the other is the quality of information available for understanding sexual orientation within the framework of social institutions” (410). These two issues are important to understand because it separates meaning and understanding. With this model in mind, sports is thus the “social institution” in which the “quality of information available for understanding sexual orientation” is yet another institution where this is an apparent issue.
Sports is and is not a safe environment for LGBT athletes. The reason why it is not is because of the violence that sports culture maintains. Misogyny within sports creates a focus on the ways males perform in relations to their masculinity. If someone’s sexual orientation is understood as not being masculine, then the issue is placed on the meaning of sexual orientation in the sporting institution. Ironically, this could be also be why sports is a safe place for LGBT athletes. Of course it is not safe because of what I just said, but, because of the focus on masculinity, sports could be the outlet for speaking up for LGBT rights. It’s highly commercialized and those who do begin to unveil their sexual orientation could help in making this issue more commercialized/normalized. This is also how I would strategize a more inclusive American sport culture. The more athletes begin to speak up for their identities, the more masculinity will begin to lose its weight on how we define a successful athlete. It’s not a big step, but it is a start. Even this class for example has brought more attention to the relationship between sports and sexual orientation. This discussion is clearly become more popular and it can only continue to be so.
Similar to what we discussed with the word “nigga” become a term of endearment, words such as “fag” “cunt” etc., are also becoming words that could become not associated with something negative. Since “nigga” is relating to race, “fag” “cunt” are words relating to sexual orientation. I am in a class right now where someone read an article that said women in other cultures see the word “cunt” as a positive term. Our vernacular is process that is constantly changing over time. This can be seen through music. The song “Strange Fruit” by Nina Simone, is used in Kanye West’s song “Blood on the Leaves” on his most recent album. While Simone’s song is more about the history of lynching, West uses this sampling within his own song to bring in issues about race relations today. Over time words, styles, music, etc., are all artistic expression that are adapting themselves to issues of the present.
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