There's a fuss in certain parts of the media because the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Award has been drawn up and there are no women on the ten man shortlist. Oh no, sexism!
To be perfectly honest I think SPOTY is a complete sham anyway, most of the winners have no personality. Andy Murray is on the shortlist, he has the personality of a mosquito but is more annoying. The whole point of sport is to compete and win, thus proving you are best, assuming where applicable dodgy referees or judges don't influence the result. SPOTY is just a bit of purely subjective razzmatazz so I don't care whether the short list is all male or all female.
What really annoyes me though is the kneejerk cries of sexism, as if whoever draws up the shortlist sit down and make a conscious decision to exclude women from the shortlist. One top female athlete is urging a boycott by all women, excluding male athletes from her call which is surely sexist. So which woman athlete is so peeved at not being nominaterd she wants the sisterhood to boycott? None other than Chrissie Wellington who, if anybody had actually heard of her may have actually got onto the shortlist. She's an ironman triathlon champion apparently.
Not wanting to be left out of the limelight Rebecca Adlington has also attacked the shortlist and called for an all-female shortlist next year. So it's an evil 'ism' to have a male only shortlist but fine to have a female only shortlist. Some consistency may help their cause.
Personally I break out in a cold sweat whenever I hear cries of racism, sexism, ageism or any other 'ism'. I'm afraid it's a case of the boy who cried wolf. All too often it's a patronising attempt to give one group or other a politically correct peg up. But with numerous women world champions I do find it odd that none have made the shortlist. However, I hardly think the BBC, of all organisations, could ever be accused of an 'ism', it's far too politically correct. Isn't it?
While we're at it, two of the ten nominees are ethnic minorities which, if my maths are right, is 20%. Isn't that racist according to NickClegg's quota sytem when ethnic minorities only make up 10% of the population?
2 comments:
I saw a piece that explained that the shortlist is chosen by journalists from a number of publications. It is not drawn up by the public. Ladsmags like Nuts & Zoo get a vote but not women's magazines. I have heard it suggested that this may have something to do with the all-male shortlist.
It's a nonsense to firstly assume that there should be a similar proportion of men/women, black/white etc in anything and secondly, that if there are no women it's because men discriminate.
The whinging is straightforward political correctness.
Post a Comment