Beauty aces talent at Wimbledon
Image copyright Annette Marie Hyder
Here I am raising my daughter with an emphasis on talent over looks — no baby beauty pageants or child modeling for her. No false equations of beauty with merit. I do not want her to depend on her looks to get ahead. Activities with the focus on skill and talent rather than pulchritudinous posing are the order of the day. Naturally I am teaching her that when it comes to excellence vs. beauty, excellence is more important.
Well, apparently I've been misleading her and excellence is not more important than beauty. At least not if you are a tennis player at Wimbledon. It's not how good you are proven to be at tennis that gets you center court at Wimbledon — it is how pretty you are considered to be.
Center court schedules are planned around physical appearance rather than athletic ability
The Age is reporting that:
A spokesman from the All England Club, Johnny Perkins, was quoted in the Daily Mail newspaper in London: "Good looks are a factor. 'It's not a coincidence that those [on Centre Court] are attractive."
The following women have all played on Wimbeldon's hallowed Centre Court in the past week: Maria Sharapova (unseeded, ranked 60th in the world), Gisela Dulko (unseeded), Victoria Azarenka (8th seed), Sorana Cirstea (27th), Caroline Wozniacki, (9th) and Maria Kirilenko (unseeded, ranked 59).
They are hardly household names, but have one thing in common - they're easy on the eye. Major champions Svetlana Kuznetsova, who won the French Open and is seeded No. 5, and Serena Williams, No. 2, have been pushed to outside courts.
The Daily Mail reports that:
A BBC source said: 'It's the Wimbledon play committee, not us who decides on the order of play.'But obviously it's advantageous to us if there are good-looking women players on Centre Court. It's not a coincidence that those (on Centre Court) are attractive.'
'Our preference would always be a Brit or a babe as this always delivers high viewing figures.'
That's sad.
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This makes me angry. Women in sports judged on their looks = fail!
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I would've never thought this, but at the same time, I found myself saying, "Of course." Thanks for writing about it.
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This does not surprise me either. What surprised me the most is that there obviously seems to be no honor amongst the Tennis players themselves (i.e., no honor among thieves). I remember a while ago, some sort of statement Maria gave to an interviewer when he asked her about the possibility of making money from endorsements, which did she prefer; the game or the endorsements. She said something to the fact that she was concentrating more on her game and if she continued to be the best, “the money will come”. Unfortunately, we now know which was more important.
This is not a problem that is limited to just Maria, but with all the Maria’s of the game of tennis and women’s sports period. It’s the mentality of the zippers who unfortunately and shamelessly are allowed to determine a player’s value and court assignments based on whether or not she looks good in a skirt and lipstick. It’s a catch 22. Play or sell.
The pathetic part is that when thieves like them take their place on center court, they are very well aware of the fact that they did not earn this coveted spot, yet they smile and acknowledge the crowd as if the crowd is actually there to see them play. No honey, you are simply merchandise for sale. Meanwhile, the real players and the real games are being played over on Court 1 and Court 2.
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