Saturday, May 2, 2015

Female Athletes Need Cups Too


Most boys and men I have ever encountered carry with them this "protect the male private parts at all cost" mentality, some of which is perfectly understandable.  To be hit in a sensitive area is no laughing matter.  However, for males, this topic has become so cliched that nearly every movie about boyhood or that involves potty humor involves a boy or man being hit in the crotch, to wit he immediately falls into a fetal position.  Boys and men viewers groan along with the character on the screen and are in disbelief or ready to tell females  "you don't understand because you don't have anything there" if a female nearby makes a comment like "here we go with that again."

One thing I truly hate is potty humor, particularly about males peeing or their crotch shots.  This is all heavily-laden with messages to females that "you aren't a part of this club because you are without male genitals."  As a former fastpitch softball catcher, I will explain how this concept plays out even in softball, a tradionally female-dominated sport.

The problem with the ideology that "females are without male genitals" is that they are viewed from a perspective which is lacking, which as I have shared in previous posts, has the capacity to turn into abuse and discrimination of females.  This obsession with the blows to the male crotch has forced women to feel they have to allign with males on this as if to say "you're right, your genitals are so ultra important that we have to recognize this repeatedly and admit that we have no value between our legs."  

When I entered the realm of baseball, playing with my brothers and my dad, as a young girl, I was immediately aware that the fathers and male coaches elevated the need for boys to wear a cup to a ridiculous level.  Again, I am not saying that I don't encourage this (my son wears a cup at every practice or game).  What I am saying is that males in our society have a fixation with it, looking for opportunities to talk about it.  My assistant coaches (male) last season must have commented a dozen times about cup rules in our Little League despite any effort on their part in helping me coach effectively.  Already this season, I have gotten emails about the almighty cup and overheard the coach repeatedly asking the boys if they have one and fathers elbowing each other as they talk over and over about the boys wearing cups.  It's an obsession.

The position of catcher in baseball requires in the rule books that the player wear a protective cup.  However, in my years playing at the varsity level of softball in high school, no one ever mentioned that my female genitalia was worthy of any kind of protection.  The equipment given to me didn't even have a flap that juts down from the chest protector.  And, of course, that softball coming in at a high rate of speed, found my crotch.  It became very apparent, at least to me, that yes, while they are not male parts, there certainly ARE parts down there that were now in serious pain. 

 I think the injury I sustained while riding on a male friend's bike several years previous was worse pain, because I fell on the bar of the bike which then forcefully jammed up between my labia.  I could barely walk for most of the afternoon I was in so much pain.  Nonetheless, following the blow to my vulva on the softball field, my pelvic bone was so deeply bruised that I couldn't withstand any sort of pressure on it for quite some time.  But, I never told anyone about it because I knew it would fall on deaf ears.  I made a note to myself to consider inventing a cup for female catchers one day.

I am sad to report I didn't have the opportunity to carry out my idea for my invention, because someone else beat me to it.  But, I am delighted that he did, and that he told reporters that he did this because he was told to by the Holy Spirit.  That was so comforting to me when I read about it, because it was like God was confirming to the world that female sex organs are equally important to males, and they deserve to be protected too.  The female cup, or as it is often called, the pelvic protector, has a similar design to the male cup; the wider part is placed at the top to protect the gonads, which for women are internal.  The thinner portion of the cup covers the vulva.  

This whole fetal position phenomenon and the demands of males to recognize it deeply offends me.  It's not that I don't understand that it's painful, it's that I don't understand how males can forget that our genitals are made out of the same tissue and nerve endings and that we suffer through many painful gynecological experiences throughout the duration of our lives that last longer than a crotch shot.  Female swimmers are not allowed to curl into the fetal position; they're told to shove a tampon up their vagina and keep on swimming (while on their period).  I had my uterus pulled through my abdomen and told the next morning I was ready to leave the hospital.  Respect flows both ways.  


2 comments:

  1. I often wonder why the idiot who invented the modern bicycle put that stupid bar where it is. For either gender the existence of that metal torture device would be devastating and would render the use of the bike mute for at least a sizable amount of time. Too often we forget that while differing in appearance the physical make up of the sex organs is highly similar and that women have just been told to suffer in silence far too long.

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  2. I often wonder why the idiot who invented the modern bicycle put that stupid bar where it is. For either gender the existence of that metal torture device would be devastating and would render the use of the bike mute for at least a sizable amount of time. Too often we forget that while differing in appearance the physical make up of the sex organs is highly similar and that women have just been told to suffer in silence far too long.

    ReplyDelete