This Girl Can....

[TheCadoganArms]

....step to one side.

Nice of Goldsmiths Student Union to celebrate women getting active in sports by featuring four men in their campaign material.

Especially interesting is that Britton-Gibson is Education Officer: Campaigns are the remit of Isabelle Tarran, who apparently didn’t think of using the opportunity to promote Goldsmiths’ Talented Athlete Programme by featuring Greata Spence 🤦‍♀️

Or, of course, they could have tried asking Princess Beatrice if, as an alumna, she’d do something on running the London Marathon. (They’re decidedly short on the sporty alumni - they’d a male footballer & equestrian [one of each, not one bloke with a very unusual career path] but that seemed to be it.) They could have asked the members of their women’s teams which athletes inspire them & profiled the top 4 &/or tried to get an interview with one of them.

Then there are local girls Imani Lansiquot & Daryll Nieta - just perfect for promoting so. Lewisham even has inspirational winter sportswomen: Montell Douglas & Mica McNeill. The former is in fact an insanely talented athlete across multiple disciplines - a woman good enough to compete in both the summer & Winter Olympics? THAT IS INSPIRING GOLDSMITHS SU YE BUCKEEJITS; CHEATING MALES INSPIRE ONLY RAGE!!!!!!! 🤬🤯

It just drives home to me that the inner self of womanhood has absolutely no relationship to being a woman.

These men would have seen girls drop off in droves from sports. If they think that all it would have taken for the girls to stay on is determination, inspiration and drive or testosterone then they've got absolutely no clue. And they are in fact seeing it from the most male perspective ever.

And this student body of, most likely women who, couldn't stick it in sport, don't know why and believe this male narrative are now sending even more girls to a solution which will never work for them.

Girls don't need more assertive determination, they need tips, tricks and tools to deal with the female body that female elite athletes would have let them in on.

I'll never forget finding out that one of the leaders in my field was a man in a wig and a dress with a necklace. The disappointment in realising he had not overcome anything that I was dealing with. 😑

I doubt anyone at that SU cares a whit about widening participation in sport, much less women's. They found out about This Girl Can and thought, "golden opportunity to wind up those pesky women that remind me of my mum".

That's all it's about.

Interesting variation of spelling for the name of the Education officer.
As spelled, it doesn’t exist as a name. The closest variation is:

1. gomorrah
2. Gomorrah is a biblical city mentioned in the Book of Genesis and other books of the Bible and Torah, often in reference to its destruction alongside Sodom. The exact sin for which Gomorrah was destroyed is not specified in the Bible, but it is often associated with sinful behavior, largely sexual immorality and lack of hospitality to strangers. The city's name has become synonymous with ultimate depravity and divine retribution.

Yeah, I must admit I saw that and thought, well sod'em.

😁

This Girl Can.......F. Off and compete in their own category.

These were the objectives of 'This Girl Can' (taken from Sport England's campaign summary document https://sportengland-production-files.s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/2020-01/Campaign-Summary.pdf?Yu_jmNiqPxjL8IlJC0EqvKXjJ_GOFpfx }

• Increase the number of girls and women taking part in sport and exercise
• Change how they feel and think about exercising and playing sport
• Change the opportunities available to women to become active

Hard to see how the Goldsmith's campaign fits positively with these.

Guffaw. 😁

The upside, I guess, is that the photos are illuminating. And anyone who sees the content and does a bit of googling will learn a few things.

It's so infuriating - come on girls, you know you want to play sport against these lovely ladies.

What do you mean 'what's the point, we can't win' - that's defeatist talk, just put more effort in. 'You're worried you'll get hurt' - that's all part of sport surely, no reward without risk.

I know it would be a difficult decision for biological females to just refused to engage in any sport against these men, surely its possible to legally start a biological woman only category, as these cheats are just not gonna stop.

I don't understand how anyone could look at Hubbard and see 'girl' rather than middle aged bloke, and a privilege white male who took places from indigenous women of colour to boot.

Took women's rightful podium places and also displaced women who should have had their chance at the Olympics.

Has anyone drawn the attention of Sports England to this campaign? I mean it’s jaw droppingly tone deaf which of course Goldsmiths won’t care about but SE may.

Thanks to the pp who provided the email address. I (and I suspect many others) complained. The Goldsmiths tweet has been taken down and This Girl Can have tweeted about how it is done without their knowledge/permission.

Oh, that's interesting! Do you have a link/screenshot (in case they get bullied into retraction)?

RandySavage · 25/02/2024 23:02

They should have gone for: "This bloke can't ... so he's cheating instead".

That's the nail hit firmly on the head!

Does this work?

Thanks! Good, that looks very clear and firm.

Good. I contacted them too. It's like playing whac a mole, isn't it? Sigh.

I've just gone to check and, although the cyclist poster seems to have been removed the Goldsmith's Student Union f/b still had the pink and black pictures of four more men identifying as women saying that this was 'part of our This Girl Can week'. Is the phrase 'This Girl Can' seen to be linked to SE's original campaign. I would read it as that. Might contact SE again.

Maybe it’s a misspelling of this

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamera

Very pleased to see the response from This Girl Can.
As for the people at Goldsmiths attempting to undermine a programme to encourage women into sport, what a despicable thing to do.
If you want to create your own campaign to celebrate men who are successful at pushing women out of sport, start your own, don’t steal a campaign that has been conceived with the aim of improving women’s physical and mental health by involvement in sport. It’s as if you don’t want women to have those things….

Men doing moderately well in women's sports just isn't that impressive; stop trying to convince us otherwise.