NEWSFLASH: Olympic Events, do we Maximize or Minimize?

Yuki Tsubota of Canada crash landing in ski slopestyle

As Sochi 2020 comes to a close, I thought it only right to read through some of the articles and reports from one of the most interesting and also controversial Winter Olympics. Doing this I found a curious article by the New York Times entitled “The Harder They Fall: Shared Slopes Take Bigger Toll on Women.” The author, John Branch, reported that a lot of female athletes were sustaining Olympic ending injuries on the gender neutral courses of the Rosa Khutor Extreme Park. While male athletes were also sustaining injuries on the challenging slopes, of the “22 accidents that forced athletes out of the competition or, if on their final run, required medical attention”, 16 involved women (Branch, 2020). In his article Branch explores this statistic that has come out of the winter games and questions whether a Minimizer approach is safe for women. Should women be treated as equally capable to men when it comes to sports, or should there be separate courses for both men and women? As someone who leans towards being a Maximizer, I think that there should be accommodations made for women athletes, but in a world where women are striving to prove their equality, perhaps those accommodations would set back what has been achieved in women’s rights.

Historically, courses for events that both men and women compete in have been different for each gender. The older sports such as downhill skiing, luge, and ski jump have shorter courses or smaller jumps for women. Smaller tricks are expected from women as a result of this. Men attempt triple flips while a high score is given to a woman who can achieve a double. These older sports were introduced at the founding of the Winter Olympics at a time where women were seen as less physically fit or capable. The course and event creators assumed women could not achieve the same level as men, and no one argued against them. Branch writes, “The Olympics have a history — sexist, perhaps — of trying to protect women from the perils of some sports”. This so called protection of female athletes by male authority figures stems back to the Patriarchal model. Allan Johnson’s essay titled, “Patriarchy, the System: An It, Not a He, a Them, or an Us” clearly explains how allowing the continuation of the patriarchal system, keeps the old world beliefs about men and women alive. If we create a system in which women compete on easier and smaller courses, the athletes and audience will become socialized to believe that women need those separate courses because they are weaker and more delicate. It will become a biological fact in their mind, and so the mindset that women are fragile will play into the creation of future systems. The cycle will continue.

Because of this, many female athletes have felt the need to fight back against the assumption that they are not as fit. Most athletes competing today, “grew up in a time when they view themselves as capable as men.” (Branch, 2020). Equality Feminism reins and many women will not let the biological physical differences between men and women hinder their goals. Tough female athletes strive to prove their worth out on the slopes. Because of this, all of the Winter Olympic events added since 1992, most of which have been to the Extreme Park, have had the exact same course for both men and women. These are most of the alpine skiing, freestyle skiing, and snowboard events. The new system is equal, and one that will hopefully lead to the socialization that women are just as capable.

However, this push for equality comes at a price. The female athletes who sustained injury left the games with fractured spines, concussions, broken legs, torn knee ligaments, or at the very least a broken helmet. After this Winter Olympics it seems that popular opinion has shifted. Some athletes have been quoted saying that, “Most of the courses are built for the big show, for the men,”, or that, “I think they could do more to make it safer for women.” (Branch, 2020). The feminist within in me wants to shout and scream at these remarks. Women can do anything that men can! But if one takes a step back, as I did, one would realize that these athletes have a point, and the injuries do bring up a major concern. Did we push too far? Is this fair on the female athletes? With this data I do believe that you could answer that yes equality feminists have pushed too far. It would be wonderful if men and women could be treated completely equally and that biological differences between the two sexes could be ignored. However the fact remains, there are physical differences between men and women, and in this case, it is detrimental to athletes to ignore them. A Minimizer approach, while empowering and successful in many aspects of life, may not be the best belief here. And so the other route to take would be the Maximizer approach, accommodating the different biological differences as much as possible. The Olympic committee would perhaps shorten the courses, and lower the jumps and half-pipes so that women could perform to their best.

But would these accommodations just be limiting female athletes instead of helping them? Lowering the standard for women further hammers home the old beliefs that men are better than women, and that women are fragile. Allowing this belief to continue sets back many of the gains that women have made in society. If female athletes are not capable enough to perform the big jumps, what else are they not capable of? While lowering the bar for women could lead to better safety, admitting to the differences could be our downfall. Until all other aspects that can achieve equality have done so, it would hurt the cause to act on biological differences. This may sound rather selfish, but many athletes too would rather the courses stay the same. First of all due to the hope that women can prove to the world they are equally as capable as men. Two other factors that play into this hope are peer and societal pressure. If athletes see a competitor attempting and succeeding at bigger and more complex jumps, they will step up to try and perform even better. Remaining on the more challenging courses allows for greater growth in athletes, and often times they find the danger exciting. Many extreme sports are based on this very thrill. Also, the worldwide audience tunes in to watch the most daring feats and incredible talents that they can find, and this is where societal pressure comes in. It is a worry that less people will watch women’s extreme sports if the courses are shortened and lowered because audience members may not find it as exciting. They’ll watch the men’s version because they can perform more tricks on the bigger jumps. We’ve seen this before. People tend to watch men’s hockey over women’s hockey because it seems more exciting. More people watch men’s basketball over women’s basketball for the same reason. Keeping the playing fields equal keeps interest towards both genders alive. In figure skating for example, men and women perform the same difficulty of jumps and spins. Most audience members would have no preference towards a certain gender in that sport, they would watch both equally.

While an argument can be made both towards the Minimizer and Maximizer approach, it is very possible that the statistic of higher injury in female athletes was a sheer fluke. The courses at Sochi have been noted to be some of the hardest ever created for a Winter Olympics. Unusual weather patterns contributed to the difficulty creating overly icy or partially melted course areas. The challenging courses were reportedly strenuous for any athlete regardless of their gender. Some courses were simply too difficult, even for the best. Branch reported, “Men and women worried aloud about the course during training, complaining mostly about jumps bigger than many had seen before.”. Even Shaun White who most would consider to be the best of the best pulled out of an event because he was worried about the greater possibility of injury. And then for the athletes with even less experience, the Sochi courses were even more daunting. Then if the higher injury rates were simply a result of overly challenging courses, the question becomes, why report and create the statistic in the first place?

Again we turn back to the system-individual cycle that Johnson describes. Given that journalists are socialized to believe that women are weaker, they will seek out stories to report that affirm this belief. They only see what they want to see. It’s not only reporters, newspaper companies want to print what will sell. Given the mindset of the general population, it’s to their advantage to publish articles that follow the patriarchal model. I can only hope that individuals will continue to push for equality on the slopes as preparation for the next Winter Olympics begin. Creating a system where all athletes compete on the same courses will push away the fragile female model. As more data is collected over future competitions, we will see whether there is validity in the statistic. If there is, then it’s time for Maximizers to step in. Until then, minimizing differences between the two sexes will allow for greater equality in competition. The whole world will watch as men and women fight for the gold on equal grounds.