History has not always been kind to women. To make history women must act out and defy norms. Their acting out is not something …show more content…
Women must act out to make history because history has held them to restricting standards. Society sees women as the same person who wants the same things in life and has the same feminine traits like being a wife or being emotional and weak. It makes it harder for them to make any changes because along with the changes they are trying to enact, they have to go through the barriers of society. If women followed society’s idea of what a woman should be, they would not get anywhere because of the limitations that come with it. There is nothing wrong with being a full-time mother, but women should have the option to have a career. Their ambitions are merely an attempt at getting something done. We must wipe the slate clean and allow women to fill it with their individual roles. These gender roles carry over into women’s sports. There has been widespread debate throughout our country on the portrayal and under representation of the WNBA compared to the NBA. In a journal on sports media, John Lisec and Mary G. McDonald write, “ While male athletes are represented as the standard barriers of masculinity as strong, assertive and powerful, according to Messner, Duncan, and Jensen (1993) female athletes are often described by sport commentators in ways that undermine their power and strength” (156). The gender roles that are present in so many aspects of our society even extend to sports. Basketball is not an easy sport and it takes a lot of power and strength. As sports commentators refer to these women with the general terms girls or young ladies, they are trying to reinforce the femininity of these women (157), which establishes a dangerous precedent. The sports world sees women as weak and not as athletes. In our society, people do not take the WNBA as seriously as the NBA. People see it as a joke and not a grounded organization. Women in sports are not necessarily acting