Press Box
LIFE without sports ... are you kidding me? There was never a
time I wasn't allowedI couldn't do it and I can't imagine it.
It's how I occupied myself growing up and it's what I do for a living now. These days, without sports I would have nothing to obsess about. What a horrific thought.
The 30th anniversary of Title IX is a pretty compelling reminder that I'm part of a generation that never grew up with a want of sport. I can't conceive of a world where girls were denied opportunities in sports, and luckily I hardly ever have to think about it. If it weren't for anniversaries like this and women's stories about the days before Title IX, one could go through life thinking it was always like this -- that girls are entitled to every opportunity in the classroom and on the court like the boys.
Too bad it wasn't that way for some of my colleagues.
In one of my earliest conversations with sportswriter Cindy Luis, we were trading stories about the sports we had played (or attempted to play). She clearly had inside knowledge of basketball, so I assumed that was her sport. When I asked her what else she played in high school, her answer shocked me. It smacked me upside the head with a big fat 'duh'!
That she didn't have a lot of athletic choices was as foreign a concept as telling me not to breathe. Her generation missed out, but mine didn't.
Title IX was the landmark amendment that happened five years before I was born. By the time I was picking up bats and balls, I never had to think about, much less notice, whether or not girls played sports. We just did. My gang of gals ran around with the boys on the playground. We played soccer, kickball and basketball and hooted and cheered when we beat them.
There was never a time when I was growing up that I wasn't allowed to participate in sports because I was a girl.
As my best friend Kelli pointed out, our lives would have been hell without sports. We were a couple of hyperactive kids who needed sports to help us focus. When we got older, we were gym rats who learned valuable lessons in discipline, perseverance and teamwork because of athletics. The lessons we picked up on the court were things we couldn't get in the classroom.
It was through sports that I made friends after I moved between junior high and high school. High school is always a tough time and mine was exacerbated by having to leave the safe little cocoon of a tiny private school to go to a much bigger and scarier public school. Thankfully, I had sports to break the ice.
My generation has profited from the work of women who didn't get the same chances.
Though girls participation in high school parts has risen dramatically from 300,000 pre-Title IX to 2.8 million now, gender equity in other facets of sports is still missing. Sure, we can be proud of seeing young girls have tangible opportunities of playing professionally in the WNBA, WUSA and the USPV. But promoting women in sports doesn't stop at participation. This anniversary is a reminder that's it's important to look back so we can look ahead and continue to strive toward athletic equity.
Grace Wen can be reached at gwen@starbulletin.com