My initial reaction is huzzahs to the folks at Wimbledon for equalizing the prize money between the men and the women competing at the Big Tennis Shindig there.
Genteel and old-fashioned Wimbledon discarded one of its longest traditions – unequal pay. The All England Club yielded to 21st century realities Thursday, agreeing to pay women the same as men and falling in line with the other Grand Slam tournaments.
Six-time singles champion Billie Jean King, a pioneer for women’s sports, said the decision was “a long time coming.”
“With women and men paid on an equal scale, it demonstrates to the rest of the world that this is the right thing to do for the sport, the tournament and the world,” she said.
[…] “It’s good news for all the women players, and recognizes their major contribution to Wimbledon and we also believe it will serve as a positive encouragement for women in sports,” club chairman Tim Phillips said. “In short, good for tennis, good for women players and good for Wimbledon.”
[…] “This is an historic and defining moment for women in the sport of tennis, and a significant step forward for the equality of women in our society,” WTA Tour chief executive Larry Scott said.
But … is it?
The All England Club previously held out against equal prizes as a matter of principle. Phillips had cited that men play best-of-five set matches while the women play best of three.
I heard some complaints on the radio this morning making just that point — that one reason why men “deserve” more prize money than women is that, essentially, they work harder for it. Taken a step further, from a purely competitive standpoint, why offer the same prize money if we assume that the male champions could beat the women (generally speaking an issue with women’s sports overall). If we want to reward the best, then setting aside half the competitors (the women) and
telling them that we’ll reward them for their best, but protect them from competition against the other best hardly seems “fair.” We’re not promoting “equality” we’re furthering artificial distinctions between the genders.
Be that as it may, bottom line we’re not rewarding the best players here — we’re rewarding successful investments. As Terry pointed out, and as is hinted above (“recognizes their major contribution to Wimbledon”), women’s tennis draws as many advertising dollars as men’s tennis these days, so why not treat them the same? And I have no problem with that, and that shows a broad public interest in female athletics. To that degree,
then, we are promoting parity, if not equality, That that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
Men and Women are different on many levels, Biology being a big one. So to treat them as the same just doesn’t make any sense. If there was a huge disparity between what the Women got paid and what the Men got paid, I could understand complaints.
But Men do play more games, and even a man in the lower 50% of the bracket could likely beat most Women in the top 50% of their bracket. This is not due to a Woman being inferior to a Man. But due to Biological and Physiological differences.
Well, it’s not due to Women being inherently and utterly inferior to Men — just that in this particular endeavor, Men have an advantage over Women (not surprising, as it’s a sport designed by/for Men).
In areas where it makes no difference, women should be paid as much as men. The question in this case is whether the “no difference” is physical prowess (evidently not) or commercial earnings (evidently so). In that latter category in this context, women are as “valuable” as men. (And that has nothing to do with their worthiness as human beings, of course.)