Stereotyping Sports

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When sports began to integrate in the early 1940’s, stereotypes began their reign over the lives of the minority players. Every minority that began playing sports was open to prejudice. In an article called “Blacks, Sports, and Lingering Racial Stereotypes,” author Salim Muakkil chronicles the evolution of stereotypes in sports. How did stereotypes in sports begin? Well that depends on who you talk to. Paul Gallico, writer for the New York Daily News in the 1930’s spoke about the South Philadelphia Hebrew Association’s all-Jewish team playing basketball, “is that the game [basketball] places a premium on an alert, scheming mind, flashy trickiness, artful dodging and general smart aleckness." Back in the times when only white people and non-minorities were allowed to play sports, sports enthusiasts needed some way to explain why the minority players were beginning to dominate the sports world. White individuals explained why African-Americans were so good at sports saying such things as: blacks can have bursts of speed and are good because they are more animalistic in nature. At the time, these explanations were perfectly fine to show why all of the white players were getting beat, but now after all of the civil rights movements we have gone through, these stereotypes need to end. Muakkil brings up a good point saying that our current sports leaders are mostly from minorities. Barry Bonds, the William’s sisters, Kobe Bryant, Ladainian Tomlinson; these black players are all some of the greats in their sports, and they are all currently stereotyped against. These great players are great because they are black. This statement can no longer hold true. Now we should be saying, “these great players are great because they are the best in the game.” It is not only stereotyping between blacks and whites, but between men and women as well. Women have had to lead through the stereotypes in sports. In 1972 Title IX was passed and has forever changed how people look at women’s sports. Suddenly, women had equal access to everything that men had access to. Even though sports were originally not the main point of Title IX, throughout the years, the idea of what the law stood for changed to fit more towards high school and collegiate athletics. Just within the last 10 years, women have finally had the chance to play professional basketball in the WNBA, whereas the men have been playing in their own league for over 60 years. Still women are not given the respect they deserve in sports. In my high school, school officials actually made the guys play first before the girls so that the girl’s games would have some attendance from people already seated. This tactic didn’t work very well because even though the stands were packed for the guy’s game, the eventually nearly unfilled before the start of the girl’s game. I can’t tell you how many times I have been listening people talk about women’s sports, saying that women’s sports are slow and women are not fun to watch because they are not very good. This is completely untruthful; women sports are just as entertaining as men’s sports, and I know plenty of girls that could probably beat many men at any sport. These stereotypes that we have created need to be ended. Minorities are slowly becoming the majority, and are doing just as well in sporting events as are their white counterparts. The stereotypes of the minorities have reached their end, and we are starting slowly diminishing the amount of prejudice between blacks and whites, and men and women. Just like Muakkil said, “Stereotypes die hard, but die they must” (Muakkil 2002). (606)