Size-ism in Sports: A Bleeding-From-The-Eyeballs Rant

Okay, readers. You’re going to have to bear with me because this is an issue that cuts close to the bone for me: Size-ism in sports, aka the notion that because a person doesn’t “look like” a runner or a ballerina, or a swimmer, they can’t possibly be successful at those things.

I read an article this morning about an 18 year old tennis player named Taylor Townsend which made me hopping mad. Ms. Townsend has recently been playing in the French Open where she was the first American woman ever to advance to the third round. During this, she defeated the #20 and #65 players In The World. Yeah, she got trounced on her third round, but meh. She did good for her first time out.

But… There is a problem. Taylor Townsend is “thick.” Now, I’m not going to say “fat” as many articles either insinuate or flat-out say, because there is no way in hell she qualifies as being obese, much less morbidly obese. But the New York Times article that ran about her 21 hours ago cited in the SECOND PARAGRAPH how she “needs to get fitter.” By the third paragraph, it’s talking about how she was “soundly and professionally beaten.”

No mention of how before she was beaten she was completely and utterly kicking ass.

See, she’s black. And non-skinny. They can compare her to Serena Williams, saying she “looks like her”—as if all black, non-skinny women look alike—but the lesson the New York Times and everyone is supposed to take from this is “If you don’t LOOK like a tennis player (white, thin, pretty) of course you’re not going to win.”

Back in 2012, the USTA (United States Tennis Association) refused to pay Taylor’s travel and entry fees for the U.S. Open Junior Tournament because of her weight. This, despite the fact that Taylor Townsend was the #1 ranked junior in the country at the time. Her mother paid her fees out of pocket and she went, did well, and from what I understand she eventually got reimbursed and also an apology from Patrick McEnroe who was the douchebag who’d said she couldn’t go.

I don’t know much about professional tennis, so I may be getting a lot of this wrong. And I’m not Taylor Townsend’s trainer or her nutritionist. I don’t know what the best competitive weight is for her, but I do know this—the chick ain’t ever going to look like Anna Kournikova. She’s thick. Muscular. Her legs are like rocket launchers. And hey, I know that professional athletes need a different level of fitness than your average “healthy” person. But is this really about her fitness?

Note this quote from today’s NYT article:

Kamau Murray, Townsend’s other coach, who has known her since she was 6, would also like patience from the public, particularly when it comes to her work-in-progress physique.

Umm… What in the f*ck? Her “work in progress physique”?????? What in the hell does that mean? More to the point, why should the public have any vested interest whatsoever in a tennis player’s “physique”?

Taylor Townsend competes in TENNIS, not a beauty contest. For what it’s worth, the top female players in the game have often NOT been beauty queens.

Articles keep citing that they worry Townsend is prone to injuries and possibly slower because of her body size. But is there proof? Has she actually been injured? Because I’m here to tell you—skinny athletes get injured all the time.

*deep breath*

The reason this annoys me so much because I’m a parent. Further, I’m a parent of two girls. And I want them to love sports and to enjoy exercise. I want them to feel confident enough to try activities whether or not they LOOK like the type of person to be good at it.

Of my two daughters, I have one who tends towards thinness (like my husband as a kid) and one who carries more weight (as I did as a kid.) Guess which one people tell me “must be athletic”?

Fashion, my skinny kid, sits on her butt eating junk food, texting her friends watching YouTube videos. Yeah, she CAN be good at sports. When she bothers to try. But that’s not often.

Mini Me, my rounder kid, does ballet and until recently was on swim team. She did track at the start of the school year. She runs non-stop at recess. Is she a great athlete? So far, no. BUT, she’s motivated. As an adult who’s lived a whopping 41.5 years, I can tell you that motivation goes a lot farther in this life than outward appearances.

Which one of these kids is more athletic? The one who keeps hiking!

Which of my kids would get invited to join a sports team? Or be picked first for an activity in gym class? Does anyone even care that Mini can swim faster than Fashion? No. Because girls are judged on what they look like, not what they can do.

When I was a kid, no one even questioned this logic. Like Mini, I was a heavy kid, particularly in seventh grade. I was constantly being chastised that I needed to “be more athletic” despite the fact that I did soccer, softball, tennis, basketball and roller skated, walked or biked all over town. Oh, and I was an amazing swimmer.

I weighed a lot more at thirteen than I do now. But apparently most of that was in my cheeks.

No amount of being actually pretty good at sports made anyone think I was athletic. But hey ho—when I developed anorexia in high school? Everyone assumed I was in peak shape! “Wow. Do you work out?” People would actually ask me that when they saw me.

I wanted to be like, “No. I’m a naturally muscular person who lost 35 pounds and am now emaciated and am losing bone density. But thanks for asking!”

Me, looking ever so “athletic” in my size zero jeans, eating tiny bits of food out of a measuring cup with chopsticks. You can tell my robust health by how I’m wearing a wool sweater indoors.

Maybe I looked healthy, but I didn’t get a period without hormonal assistance for five years. Those were five years when I was supposed to be putting on bone mass that would last me a lifetime. That’s five years I can never get back.

But hey—I looked healthy!

The fact is that some people carry more weight than others. Some people pack on lots of muscle when they work out and some stay leaner. There’s an advanced ballet class that practices when Mini has her ballet and I’m always watching them. Yeah, most of the class is skinny. But there’s one round girl (she happens to also be African American, but hey, white girls can be thick, too) who does every bit as well as her narrow counterparts. She doesn’t “look” like a ballerina, but she moves like one. As much as it’s easy to think “oh, but she won’t be able to jump as high,” who knows? Girl could probably launch the next space shuttle with those gams.

Likewise, I pack on weight when I work out a lot. Last year I started doing Barre (which is a mix of ballet, pilates and yoga.) Immediately I saw changes, and by Christmas you could see my abs. But then a few weeks ago I stepped on a scale…

I gained. A fair amount actually. My clothes still fit, but I’m certainly no thinner.

Barre studios advertise that their work outs make people “longer, leaner and more toned.” While I still love Barre, I have to say—a work out ain’t going to make me taller. Leaner? Hmm… Maybe.

As my husband said, “You were short and muscular before. Now you’re just short and more muscular.”

There you have it. For some of us, being in shape means staying the same shape, but with more muscle. That shape might be tall or short, slender or thick, rounder in the middle or broader in the shoulders, but we are the shape we are.

Body type should never determine who gets to play what sports or do which activity. At forty-one, I’m one of the fittest people I know, and if you asked a single person who saw me at age thirteen not a one of them would have called me “athletic.”

So, USTA, New York Times, and whoever else is criticizing Taylor Townsend for her weight—shame on you! She’s an inspiration to non-skinny girls everywhere, and a kick-ass tennis player. And if you think you can do better, then pick up a damn racket and try to take her on.

Roar,

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