Not just the Footballers
As usual, its another week another football scandal. Mostly it been the story of the gang rape of the NZ woman, but there's been a soccer story or two. The blogosphere has written some great articles about the stories.
I recently saw Shane Warne: The Musical. I enjoyed most of it very much, it captured the highlights and lowlights of his sporting career and sometime tabloid fodder. I'd seen an interview with the man himself at the beginning of the year and he admitted that he himself enjoyed it, and that his main concern that it wasn't too hard on Simone and his family. That I would have to disagree with.
There was one song, which although it was a great song vocally for the singer playing Simone, the lyrics made her out to be very stupid and that's why she couldn't understand Shane and perhaps that was an excuse for him cheating. A few songs later there was another song that made me cringe and also remember that cricketers too could get involved in sex scandals. The casual dismissal of the women in his bed as sluts reminded me of the footballers and their attitude to women; ie. the women had no personal agency, were interchangable and were essentially 'prizes' for being a sucessful sportsman. Yet another song seemed timely and that was about Shane having to apologise to Australia for some of his behaviour. The song pointed out that everyone appreciated his ability to bowl for Australia and that should be all that mattered. That to me raised the issues of the expectations we place on our sporting heroes to be role models and to live 'perfect lives'. I'm quite willing to be OK with the drinking (as long as its not used as an excuse for other behaviour such as drunk driving or assault), smoking and partying etc, but when it involves other human beings being used for group bonding or as rewards, that where its stops being cheeky & larrikin and starts being a crime. As for the role model thing, as long as they making money from the endorsements to represent a product & brand image, then yes they are signing up to be role models.
I recently saw Shane Warne: The Musical. I enjoyed most of it very much, it captured the highlights and lowlights of his sporting career and sometime tabloid fodder. I'd seen an interview with the man himself at the beginning of the year and he admitted that he himself enjoyed it, and that his main concern that it wasn't too hard on Simone and his family. That I would have to disagree with.
There was one song, which although it was a great song vocally for the singer playing Simone, the lyrics made her out to be very stupid and that's why she couldn't understand Shane and perhaps that was an excuse for him cheating. A few songs later there was another song that made me cringe and also remember that cricketers too could get involved in sex scandals. The casual dismissal of the women in his bed as sluts reminded me of the footballers and their attitude to women; ie. the women had no personal agency, were interchangable and were essentially 'prizes' for being a sucessful sportsman. Yet another song seemed timely and that was about Shane having to apologise to Australia for some of his behaviour. The song pointed out that everyone appreciated his ability to bowl for Australia and that should be all that mattered. That to me raised the issues of the expectations we place on our sporting heroes to be role models and to live 'perfect lives'. I'm quite willing to be OK with the drinking (as long as its not used as an excuse for other behaviour such as drunk driving or assault), smoking and partying etc, but when it involves other human beings being used for group bonding or as rewards, that where its stops being cheeky & larrikin and starts being a crime. As for the role model thing, as long as they making money from the endorsements to represent a product & brand image, then yes they are signing up to be role models.
posted by susan @ 7:10 PM
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