Football and Feminism
By: Toni Hargis
Tags: Microaggressions, Sexism, Aguero, Feminism, Football

Football and Feminism

Far From Sympatico

Photo: Sky Sports

In a Manchester City football (soccer)game against Arsenal yesterday, striker Sergio Aguero disputed a call made by female ref Sian Massey-Ellis and when doing so, grabbed her by the shoulder in a manner which many women (and some men) instantly recognised as an aggressive power move. Here it is -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYqXUH-cRC8

It was enough of a shocker that football commentators immediately remarked in their post-match commentaries, and then (natch) it blew up on social media. On the few threads I ventured in to, there was gas-lighting galore, along with a huge dollop of dismissal, and it ran the gamut. There’s little point in debating some of the Neanderthals out there (especially the ones with no avatar and almost as many followers), but here are actual comments and the arguments I’d have put forward if I thought they would have made any difference:

“The reaction is over the top” — This is men telling women what they can and can’t object to, pure and simple. Despite many women recognising the act as aggressive and threatening, men were there to tell them they were over-reacting. It was repeated over and over in different formats — There was “nothing in it”, and

“When I watched this I felt nothing”. Well maybe because you’ve never experienced it nor felt the accompanying fear or humiliation? Put another way, I haven’t seen Pluto, I haven’t been to the bottom of the ocean, but I’m taking the experts’ words that it’s all real. And yes, when we’re talking aggression against women, we are the experts.

See this is the beauty of a micro-aggression when you’re the perpetrator; if you do it right, no one else sees it and even the target sometimes second-guesses herself.

Or to quote Laura Bates in her Ted Talk on Everyday Sexism–

“The same ideas and attitudes about women that underlie those more “minor” incidents of sexism and harassment, that we’re often told to brush off and not make a fuss about, are the same ideas and attitudes about women that underlie the more serious incidents of assault and rape.”

Manchester City football club manager Pep Guardiola’s response managed to squeeze in not one, not two, but three examples of dismissal.

“Come on guys, Sergio is the nicest person I ever met in my life. Look for problems in other situations, not in this one.”

“Sergio is the nicest person I ever met in my life” — Talk to many women who are the target of male aggression and they’ll describe a lovely family man, a charmer or someone with lots of friends. That means nothing. It also makes it more likely, in cases of assault and worse, that the man is believed by default.

“Look for problems in other situations. Not in this one”. An interesting one this; not only is he dictating what women should and shouldn’t see as problematic, he uses the word “look” to imply that we’re going out and searching for things to be offended by, and employs relative privation to dismiss us. There are other problems in football (or the world, depending on how much of a reach you need), so go away and worry about that.

“Anyone would think he’d groped/raped her “— again, relative privation at play. Other tried and tested versions include “You were lucky you weren’t raped” and “Count yourself lucky you’re not living in a country where women aren’t allowed out of the house.” Relative privation is never relevant. It’s like telling someone who works at donkey sanctuary that they should care more about dogs, or dismissing someone with arthritis because they’re not actually dying of it.

“Men do it to each other too” — Interestingly, almost every photo that was flaunted in defence of this argument showed the guy putting a flat palm either on the near-side shoulder (ie. not reaching around the body of the other guy) or the upper back. No cupped hands, no pulling off balance, no possessive encircling of the other person. (When you see the exchange from other angles, you can see she’s pulled off balance.) There was quite some force behind that little hand on the neck there; it wasn’t resting gently.

“She can cope” — First, this doesn’t make it right. I’ve written recently about a woman laughing off a piece of casual sexism which nevertheless served as a poor example on national TV. Second, yes, I’ve no doubt she can “cope”, but that’s not the same as being okay with it. Working women have been “coping” with sexist BS for decades, but it doesn’t mean it’s welcome. Given the uproar when others objected to the action, how on earth would she fare if she came out and said “Yes, I did feel that it was an aggressive power move”?

“Women want equality then whine when they get it”. Okay so voicing an objection to something isn’t ‘whining’; here, it’s defining boundaries of respectful behaviour. If those boundaries cause you problems as a man, then you are the problem personified. Claiming that treating women like this is “equality” simply excuses the man’s disrespect. It may be how men treat each other (which in the game of football can still get you a yellow card), but it doesn’t make it right. When the person on the receiving end of your aggression or disrespect is not your equal in power, in the workplace or in society, it’s not “equality”.

“I wouldn’t do it myself, but….” — Here, let me finish that sentence for you. “…. but I am more concerned about the feelings of another guy than supporting women.” This, by the way guys, is the message you send when you don’t call out the guy at work who’s disrespecting your female colleague.

Women were “throwing tantrums on her behalf” — this is similar to the line from MP Tracey Crouch that because it was a personal joke between colleagues, it didn’t matter (see previous link). In this case the argument goes that the female ref didn’t make a fuss on the field (as if), so we shouldn’t be highlighting this as a problem. Women have always worked on behalf of each other when it comes to respect and equal treatment. We tend not to get far when we try to take a stand individually; heck it’s hard enough acting as half the population.

Whether or not the individual woman “cares” is also not the point here because we’ll probably never know how this ref really felt. Most working woman dealing with sexism don’t report it, often because they fear the repercussions or because they’ll get no support from HR. Seeing the furor on Twitter and the backlash against women objecting to the power move, who could blame her for saying nothing? You don’t have to look very far to hear and see women physically threatened for rocking the boat. Can you imagine what she’s already been through as one of few female refs in a man’s world?

We “throw tantrums” (way to dismiss us again boys), for wider reasons. As Daily Mirror football writer Darren Lewis said-

“What we have to do is set a standard to protect referees. My boy was playing last week, the game was being officiated by a 17-year-old girl, some of the players in the team were bigger than her. What if one of them, seeing what kind of conduct in the top division — I used to think it was all a bit of a myth — and then I go and watch my son’s games and I see actually they do copy stuff they see at the top level.”

It’s not nothing.

And, as if to illustrate, it was quickly announced that the referees’ governing body, PGMOL, (football’s equivalent of HR, but with men), wouldn’t be looking further into the incident because touching an official is only against the rules if it is deemed to be done in a ‘aggressive or threatening manner’ . PGMOL has decided this was not the case on Saturday.

T’was ever thus.