The Times had a crappy article on girls and sports this week. The cover of the magazine has a picture of girl with her head wrapped in gauze getting bonked on the head with the ball. Ouch.
I skimmed through five pages of stories of how girls are getting terribly injuring playing sports. I was looking for the point somewhere. Way back towards the end of the article after it jumped to the page before the crossword puzzle, it said something about how coaches need to train girls differently than boys and then things will be fine.
How many people read that article to the end to find that point? How many people saw the cover, read the first couple pages, and walked away saying "girls shouldn’t play sports"?
The first paragraph of that article should have been a quote from one of the injured girls talking about how important sports were to her life and how she willingly put up with torn ligaments and stress fractures, because she loved winning games.
My knees are destroyed from running nearly fifty miles a week all through high school and into college. My back was so fucked up in my senior year that I could barely walk at the end of the cross country season. What did I gain from all that pain? A whole lot of self confidence. A work ethic. Leadership skills. It sure beat waving pom-poms around.
I have a box of medals up in my attic and two scrapbooks of press clippings. Each scrapbook has been carefully marked to note which races I won and which ones I earned a personal best. Twenty years later, I still remember my time for the mile, two mile, and cross country.
Warrior-girls rule, even if they limp a little.
Apt. 11d 
As the world’s least athletic professor–a considerable distinction–even I have notice a strong correlation: a number of my female students who have been very engaged with sports have also done academic work at very high levels. I have also had male students who excelled in both spheres, but a much smaller proportion.
One question, though: I have also taught cheerleaders, male and female, and in their case too I have had better work from the women. They have told me that their performances demand the same kind of intense conditioning and strong leadership as athletics and that they foster organizational skills and self-confidence. Is that wrong?
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Take your last four paragraphs and paste them into a letter to the editor. I did read the whole article (before moving on to the crossword puzzle) and you are right on the money.
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re: the difference between male and female college athletes. Male college athletes are recruited more than female athletes. The coaches coddle them and try to work out deals with faculty to lessen their academic requirements. (One coach this semester asked if he could proctor a kid’s midterm, while they were training in Florida this spring. Uh. No.) Female athletes are still a rare bunch and don’t enjoy the same privileges as their male counterparts.
My impression of cheerleading is that it can be of the pompom-waving, servicing-the-football-team variety. There are also cheerleaders who treat it as a sport. But even that second type has an entertainment element that doesn’t exist in other sports. I’m not sure that a sport can be played with a full face of make up. I also don’t think a cheerleader can ever escape from the fact that she’s second fiddle to the guys on the field. I’m sure that cheerleading fosters some important skills in girls, but basketball or valleyball is better.
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“But even that second type has an entertainment element that doesn’t exist in other sports.”
The figure skaters and
gymnasts are going to come and get you for that paragraph. Fortunately they’re all about 80 pounds, so I expect you’ll be OK.
I expect that it’s probably too early to judge the effects of these sports injuries.
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I didn’t read that article — because I guessed that it was going to annoy me.
“Warrior-girls rule, even if they limp a little. ”
Oh so true, and I so admire the girls (and the women) who are comfortable in their bodies, and know how to use them powerfully. I was not one (though I’ll admit I probably didn’t come endowed with the body for it to start out with — my comparative worth would always have me doing something else), and I very much want to teach my daughter the pleasure of using your body to meet a challenge (as well as using your mind to overcome challenges). I want this even if she (and I soon recognize) that she’s never going to win any races.
I think that there are some problems in sports training, but don’t really see the stats about girls v boys. Wasn’t there an article earlier last month in the times saying that young boys were getting injured by playing too hard? The story talked about knee injuries in boys, and how they were impossible to treat (when the boys were still growing). Girls and boys are physically different, and at some point the potential for injuries might be different for them, but it seems to me that the real problem is requiring too high a level of performance from bodies that are unready, and an inability to accept that one 7 yo body might be ready, while another’s isn’t (and not recognizing the difference).
As I’ve said, I think the same problem happens in determining the right level of academic challenge. Some seven year olds can do things that others can’t, and trying to make the average, or above average, meet the abilities of the extremes seems like a recipe for disappointment (and in the case of athletics, for injury).
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My daughter’s middle school lacrosse team won their invitational tournament this weekend. In the round robin competition they won four games and tied one, putting them in the number one seed for the playoff round. In the finals, they confronted the team they had tied earlier. It was a closely fought, see-saw battle. With the score tied, one of our best players inadvertently committed a major penalty and was sent off. With a minute to go, she rushed back on the field, took a pass from a teammate and scored what proved to be the winning goal, with only about 30 seconds left. Incredible! My daughter played goalie. She had the lowest goals-against numbers on the day, only eight goals allowed over the course of those five round robin games. She has a very large bruise on the inner left thigh, where her pads did not protect her. She is very proud of it.
Yes, warrior girls rule!
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The article is worth reading carefully, not skimming over. The writer’s point was not, “girls shouldn’t do sports.” It was far more nuanced. Children these days are likely to play one sport, at a high level, year round. It’s not school teams, it’s school teams plus club teams, plus tournament teams, etc. The talented athletes among them are not resting as they should, once they are injured.
Girls are more prone to ACL injuries, and sports such as soccer, basketball, and volleyball are more prone to cause ACL tears.
I don’t think that sports glory in one’s teens justifies facing knee replacements, or hip replacements, in adulthood. I know adults who can hardly walk, due to sports injuries. Some injuries are inevitable, and I am not arguing for a ban on competitive sports. I do not plan to sign my kids up for the competitive club sports, however, because it’s not healthy, in the long term.
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Laura, you may take issue with the tone of the article, but don’t you think it’s a disservice to ignore the science mentioned in that piece? Did no one else see the “girls have a rate of ACL injury that’s 5 times that of boys” statistic? Or are you saying you simply don’t believe that stat, or don’t think it’s important?
My 13-year-old niece had just gone down with a torn ACL not two days before this article was published. She’s 13 for chrissakes. We would be appalled by that injury if she were a boy, and we should also be appalled for the girl.
We forget that soccer came about in no small part in this country because parents of boys were not willing to see their kids get torn up. Also pardon me if I am not impressed by mentioning cheerleading as an alternative — cheerleading injury rates are worse than football, are they not? (I personally also dislike the beauty pageant nature of cheer.)
Several things were mentioned as problematic in the piece. One, the club system and the way it promotes year-round play of a single sport. Two, the trend towards early specialization, fostered by the club system. Three, lack of strength training for girls.
If we need to change the way kids are playing to keep them healthy, then that’s what we need to do. I don’t accept that a girl who wants to be treated as an equal — able to compete, able to take part in lots of activities — needs to simply pick up the sport that all the boys play and blow out her knees to prove herself. We found soccer as a replacement for football for boys. We can find something that works better, or teach it in a different way, if girls really are at risk.
One final point: I consider myself a warrior as an adult. I am absolutely in leadership positions, I work hard, I am confident. And I learned many of these things as a drama geek in high school. Risk of injury is not a requirement for adult leadership ability — being challenged is.
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A correction at the bottom of the article says that girls playing soccer suffer 1.5 times the concussions that boys do. Head injuries aren’t something to be taken lightly.
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If we were hearing about these serious injuries in the context of 19th century child labor, we’d think the practice horribly abusive. However, thanks to the fact that it’s a middle class spectator activity, it’s OK.
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Soccer did not develop as an alternative to American football. Soccer has its own distinct origins and appeal. Years ago, in my hometown, football was socially preeminent (cheerleaders, pep rallies and all that) but soccer was strong in its own way. Our boys team was a perennial state-level competitor. And this was due to a particularly good coach and the influx of a couple of foreign students. We played in the winter, in the gym, just to run and keep in shape. We played pick up games in the summer for the fun of it. We were not directed by our parents to stay away from football; we loved the flow of the game…
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Sorry if I was not clear — obviously soccer has its own traditions and fully existed before it was taken up by middle class America. And it clearly has a different culture and appeal.
As a 1986 graduate from high school I was right in the middle of the generation that pulled boys from football over to soccer. This despite the pep rallies and general adulation Sam mentions. No, I never ever heard a parent say, wow, I know nothing about soccer but it looks so much more fun than football! Let’s abandon the football I’ve been watching my whole life and love with all my heart!
Instead I have seen seasons where a sophomore is carted off the field on a stretcher, never to fully recover. And I have seen the *following* season, where suddenly everyone but the linemen are going out for soccer. I heard my sister and her friends having these arguments in the mid-90s when her kids asked to go out for football — and were turned down. And today I hear my parenting cohort turn down football in droves, and instead sign all the kids up for soccer. Some kids have stayed in football, it’s true. But many, many moved over.
I will also apologize in advance as I am fragrantly using anecdata here, a practice I would typically condemn. Does anyone else have a theory for the rise of soccer in the US? As a Minnesotan who was living in an almost diversity-free environment in the 80s and still saw soccer on the increase, I personally reject the more-hispanics-brought-it-with-them line of reasoning.
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I’m with Jen & Julia–I thought the article was pretty nuanced, and I found it had me thinking about the whole “equality feminism vs. difference feminism” thing once again. There’s no shame in noting that women’s bodies are different than men’s and may require different training. I also think–and I was not an athlete in HS or college, and would vie with Tony, above, for the title of least athletic professor ever–that there’s a huge difference between learning the importance of teamwork, gaining skills, even testing the limits of one’s body, and the kind of over-the-top commitment to sport outlined in the article. I have been so hugely grateful that my kids have NOT been engulfed in competitive team sports–I’ve seen it take over too many lives, to the detriment of family life and, probably, health. I completely agree that athletics can be all the things you say, and I have no problem with–indeed, I applaud–warrior girls. Neither did the article–indeed, there was lots in it about the commitment and dedication of the girls, etc. But wrecking your body for sport is neither healthy nor necessary.
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I thought the article took a long time to get to the nuanced part. Indeed, we were talking about this article at my sister’s mother day brunch and my dad walked away from that article with the message that girls were too delicate to do sports.
Yeah, there needs to be better training of girls, but there is no escaping injury and pain when you do sports seriously. Actually, pain is part of the point of competitive sports. You want to run until you can’t take the pain anymore. You work through some kinds of pain and learn what kinds of pain mean sitting down.
Sure those injuries may mean permanent injuries. My knees are shot. But overall, I think that my early sports training has helped me stay slim into my 40s. My overall health may be better because I did sports in high school.
Sports aren’t for everyone. Not every girl or parent has the stomach for the pain that goes along with doing competitive athletics. Others don’t mind the pain.
I was chatting with a student-athlete after a final today and she rolled her eyes about this article. She said that she knew about girls who ran with stress fractures all the time. It’s hardly news.
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but, Laura, wasn’t it about a lot more than just “playing through the pain”? It was about a significant differential in injury rates, one that could be addressed by 1) different training methods and 2) a different competition schedule. I’m sorry if your dad got the wrong idea from the article, but it *was* the wrong idea–the article never said, nor even implied, that girls are too delicate for sports; indeed, in many ways, it made clear, they can be tougher than boys, more competitive, more dedicated.
I’ve actually been thinking about it a lot because it’s the subject of my IHE blog tomorrow, I think, so I’ll stop now and save it for that site.
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Laura, I just find it really surprising that you’re blowing off these injuries as somehow self-improving. You almost sound like you believe women have to self-injure to prove they’re “just as good”.
I would argue that we should stop trying to prove any points and instead focus on changing the system so the girls can get their exercise and compete without risking long-term injury.
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Does anyone else have a theory for the rise of soccer in the US?
I do, although I haven’t done any research, I just have anecdote. In the 1970s there was a big push on professional soccer in the US. I still remember our city’s team’s fight song (it was played on the radio very frequently, as an advertisement). It seems like a causal possibility for the rise in soccer playing in the 1980s; lots of the parents of school-age children in the 1980s would have been exposed to that soccer push in the 1970s.
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I don’t mean to blow off the injuries. I think that many of the injuries could be prevented by good coaching. But not all of them. I do think that injuries are just part of sports. The girls are getting injuries not because they are trying to prove that they’re better than boys. Their scores and times will never equal the performances of the boys. They are racing against other girls and their own previous best times/performances. If we try to protect girls too much, then we’re going to put them on the sidelines with pompoms. I really don’t think there’s anyway to avoid injuries when you get involved with serious sports. Or dance. Ever see the feet of a ballerina?
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I would want my kids to do sports mainly for the health benefits, so crippling injuries seem counter-productive to me. If they want leadership skills and high-level competition, they can do science fair, debate club, or chess club and not run the risk of decades of pain. (We didn’t have any of that stuff at my high school, but I’m married to a former chess club president and science fair guy, and it sounds like it was a lot of fun.)
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I can vie with anyone for the least athletic of all, and I’m very disturbed by it. As I’ve grown older, I’ve realized the impact my non-athletic lifestyle has had on my body. I think that a lot of the other parts of sports (dedication/passion/confidence/risk-taking) can be taught with other activities. But, I think there’s a real life-long benefit to learning how to push your body (not over) but to its limits.
I’m not going to advocate for competitive sports for everyone, but I do advocate for “running until it hurts” (even if that means that you’re going to be pretty slow when you stop). I’m trying very hard to teach my daughter that, even if it means she’s not going to win any races. For folks who have great strengths in other respected areas (academics, for example), learning to push yourselves where you’re not as naturally gifted is a good thing, too. (Of course, I think the sports stars should have to push their intellect, too).
bj
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I know a 13 year old who’s been in a back brace for two years. The doctors are now speaking of surgery, because the vertebrae aren’t healing. 13. The sport which may have precipitated this? Tennis.
The thought that sports should hurt is outright dangerous when applied to children, whose bodies are still growing.
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Actually, cheerleading is the most dangerous sport if you go by death, major head injury and paralysis statistics.
A NCAA study found that, while male varsity athletes are less likely to graduate than male students overall, female varsity athletes are more likely to graduate.
The AAAS (American Association for the Advancement of Science) performed a study to look into which factors influence the choice of women to go into science. Not surprisingly, the top factor was teacher encouragement. The second most important factor, beating out parental encouragement, was participation in competitive athletics.
This is very true in my case. High school was deadly dull and slow. I won the “adios muchachos” award from my latin teacher for the student that cut class the most often and managed to pass the course.
During high school, I spent 30 hours a week on conditioning and practicing two sports. Sports helped me develop the discipline necessary for a PhD program in physics. I certainly didn’t learn those work ethics in class.
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I follow you VIA GFC and I love your blog!
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