Women's tennis and equal pay

[messyisthenewtidy]

Can I ask what everyone thinks re. the recent furore over women's equal prize money at Wimbledon?

Surely, the fairest solution would be to let women play 5 sets? Or am I missing something fundamental here?

^That sports people are entertainers who are paid to appear
My understanding was they were highly skilled, highly driven individuals who had a desire to compete and most of all to win^

Sardine both are true. From the sports person's perspective it's the second.

From the audience's perspective, it's the first.

and it's the audience who (directly or indirectly) pay for the prize money.

Well no it's the tournament organisers who decide what the prizes should be.

Successful tournaments attract more viewers, thus have more dosh and can afford bigger prizes. They also use bigger prizes to attract the top people.

It's still fundamentally a competition with a prize at the end. Same as the olympics, same as a local swimming club meet.

According to this thread the logic is that women are inferior to men in the vast majority of physical competitions and so are not worthy of equal prizes.

I find it so sad that there are people who would actively seek to change the current situation, and reduce prizes for female sports people.

Not even leave things as they are - but actively say - no women are inferior, they do not deserve the same rewards for their efforts.

Yes, Nadal gets extra for being sexy, just like George Clooney does.

DH gives Sharapova extra for her legs (I remove her extra because she squeals)

That's life. Sport is entertainment, it is not empty bins or making cars.

Davenport is a good player and a lovely lady, but she'll never earn what lesser female players with model for looks do.

Who'd look twice at Federer if he wasn't a dream to watch on court. Nike pay him because we hope a tiny bit of that magic is catching.

Nadal does not get additional prize money ay wimbledon for appealing to you sexually

Yes sports people are driven to win, but for better or worse some sports attract huge amounts of sponsorship and others don't.

Gymnasts work ridiculously hard, they will never be rich.
The Williams sisters would have been good at any sport, they choose tennis on purpose because it attracts big money.

Likewise many East European girls parents have sent them to US tennis schools,

I know, but if I was on the prize committee he would.

I thought we were talking about prize money, not sponsorship.

starball I don't think your idea is going to work.

This is all a bit depressing. Surely if they put in the same work as men they should be paid the same and female tennis players work just as hard throughout the year. Otherwise men are just being rewarded for having the good luck to be born stronger.

The idea that women's tennis isn't as interesting is surely cultural and would change if they were given the opportunity to play 5 sets, thus producing more nail-biting and entertaining finals.

I would hate to have a DD who worked just as hard as a DS but have to tell her that she'll never achieve the brilliance, respect or money, etc.. It's all a bit depressing tbh.

The male tennis players earn a lot more year-round as most of the tournaments are single-sex and the prize money for the male tournaments significantly higher than for the female ones.

The equal prizes in the grand slams works because Tennis has a middle-class, heavily female audience.

If women played 5 sets the tournaments would have to be extended by a couple of days. Also, a lot of the womens players are quite weak once you get down the lower end of the rankings.

I think one of the Williams sisters was trounced by a male player ranked in the 200s a few years ago.

Well of course men are stronger and a low ranking male is going to beat a high ranking female, but does that mean women should be paid less if they've worked just as hard?

Surely they could rearrange a few things to allow women to play 5 sets. Start a few days earlier. Or bring mens down to 3. Isn't it 3 in most other tournaments?

When it comes to extreme things I think women start to outperform men? The record holder for some kind of extreme running thing is a woman I think?

Maybe they all need to play 7 sets, and the women would start beating the men...

I always thought the old system where women got a little bit less than the men was pretty fair. Especially considering the women can play in the doubles tournaments as well.

Why can't men play in the doubles tournaments?

Also would you actively want to see it changed from the current system, so that the prize money is less for women again?

Yeah, why can't men play in the doubles? I thought they could...

I am genuinely quite shocked that people want to see the current wimbledon prizes altered so that the women get less than the men

the reason being that they are inferior

and that logically prizes for women across the board should be less impressive than prizes for men (and girls and boys obv if they are competing separately)

and that's the way people want it

i can only assume this is a "wind up the feminists" type thing?

OMG Rafa is OUT!

Men can play in the doubles but they can't because the singles games are so taxing on the body. Some lower ranking male players do enter but if they get to the latter stages of the singles they have to pull out of the doubles.

well I don't think that, although am not really people as have a minge etc

still at disparate paralympians/Olympians £££

don't know where I got idea that there was any sort of equality anywhere

"lower ranking males"

!

sounds like some kind of natural history prog!

Do you think that the women's wimbledon final is not taxing on teh body? interesting.

It's not pay alameda it's prizes, I would imagine that the paralympians get the same prizes in terms of medals.

i see no reason why at wimbledon the players who use wheelchairs should not get the same prize money as everyone else. they could reduce it all a bit for everyone.

The prize in a sporting competition is for winning in your group. You don't give different medals at the olympics (although I'm sure some on here would change that), you shouldn't vary the other prizes either.

So, if men can't handle the doubles because the singles 5 set is too physically demanding, but women can because the singles 3 set isn't demanding enough, then surely the argument that women don't have the stamina doesn't hold water.

It seems that the obvious solution would be for men's singles to be reduced to 3 sets, thereby allowing men to play doubles also. Everyone's happy, everything's equal opportunityish, girls will feel encouraged that they're worthy and no one's getting paid more than they deserve.

I really don't get it though, the fundamental logic.

So say DD is good at running one day.
At a competition she wins the girls competition. She gets a certificate, while the boy who wins the equivalent race gets a trophy, because "boys are superior".

Is there no merit in being the best in your group, the only thing that matters is best of everyone in all groups?

If that is the case, shouldn't people who use wheelchairs get the biggest and best prizes for marathons? Given that they do it in a better time than men or women who are not using wheelchairs?