Serena Williams's Detractors

[Wondering]

I read this article this past weekend, following Serena Williams's Wimbledon win the weekend before. As one might expect, since she's a woman in the public eye, she gets a lot of hate. But this article details a lot of the intersectionality of her race and gender in the insults thrown at her, and I think it's an important read.

http://www.vox.com/2015/3/11/8189679/serena-williams-indian-wells-racism


Also, in case you haven't seen it, JK Rowling's response to a Serena hater on Twitter:
http://www.businessinsider.com/jk-rowling-tweets-about-serena-williams-2015-7

[reboot]

I get (because miogynoir), but do not really get, the amount of hate directed at her. She is such an amazing athlete and wins freaking everything. If she was a man or white you know the tone would be different. I mean, how many other great athletes get a pass on a whole lot of shit, but yet she gets slammed for so much silky, petty stuff?

[Wondering]

Bartoli was insulted for being fat and mannish when she won Wimbledon two years ago, so there is some incredibly problematic history with women tennis players, it seems. But yeah, no one was calling Bartoli a gorilla.

[lonelyoffices]

Martina Navratilova tweeted yesterday,

"Sorry but who are the losers trying to put down Serena Williams for her body?!?STFU-Serena is an amazing athlete and tennis player. The End."

Although they lacked the racial component, Navratilova caught a lot of the same type of hateful comments regarding her appearance and style of play in the 70s and 80s.  Williams' race gives hateful people another target for their hate.  Times have changed, except in all the ways they haven't.

[PintsizeBro]

Maria Sharapova is nowhere near on the same level of athleticism as Serena Williams but she makes a lot more money and nobody says hateful shit about her in public the way they do about Williams.

[Wondering]

Sure. Sharapova is blond and white and thin. She's what a female tennis star is supposed to look like, y'know!

[reboot]

I never followed it much, but did Tiger Woods when he was on the top in a predominantly white sport get similar backlash!

[PintsizeBro]

Yup. And while Navratilova was white, she wasn't straight or conventionally feminine.

It's almost like Westerners give shit to people just for being minorities. Fancy that.

[Wondering]

I never followed it much, but did Tiger Woods when he was on the top in a predominantly white sport get similar backlash!

Good question. I've never followed golf, but I just found this article, dated 2013, about it:

http://www.cbssports.com/golf/eye-on-golf/22285275/a-history-of-racist-remarks-aimed-at-tiger-woods

[reboot]

I never followed it much, but did Tiger Woods when he was on the top in a predominantly white sport get similar backlash!

Good question. I've never followed golf, but I just found this article, dated 2013, about it:

http://www.cbssports.com/golf/eye-on-golf/22285275/a-history-of-racist-remarks-aimed-at-tiger-woods

God damn. So definitely racist but without the body shaming Williams gets.

[Chickpea Sarada]

"Sorry, can't hear your racism/sexism over the squeaking of all her trophies being polished!"

^What I would tweet if I had a twitter.

[Wondering]

I read this article by Kareem Abdul-Jabar regarding the body shaming of women athletes, specifically focused on Serena Williams.

http://time.com/3964758/body-shaming-black-female-athletes/?xid=fbshare

(Side note: Time, who the heck is your article editor? It's Xena: Warrior Princess not Xena: Princess Warrior. )

[Wondering]

Under the "smile more!" category of gender issues, some reporter asked Serena the other night, after she beat Venus to advance in the US Open, why she wasn't smiling as much as she normally does. Her response is very Marshawn Lynch ("I don't want to be here"). Also "I'm tired."

http://www.themarysue.com/serena-williams-smile/

[OtherRoooToo]

I never followed it much, but did Tiger Woods when he was on the top in a predominantly white sport get similar backlash!

Similar, but as bad, because he's a guy.

So the whole ... narrative ... that goes along with the whole "mannish" thing, he didn't have to deal with.

[OtherRoooToo]

Under the "smile more!" category of gender issues, some reporter asked Serena the other night, after she beat Venus to advance in the US Open, why she wasn't smiling as much as she normally does. Her response is very Marshawn Lynch ("I don't want to be here"). Also "I'm tired."

http://www.themarysue.com/serena-williams-smile/

Well ... that whole thing had extra weight because every time Vee and Ree play, there are extra interviews. So of course she was exhausted -- not to speak of which, did you see the match itself? I was exhausted just watching



-- and of course she was going to get slammed twice as hard for not answering "graciously".

Can't win, can't break even, can't get out of the game.

Especially now that she lost to Vinci in her quest for the CYGS.

I'm pretty deflated. I was supposed to be out there - at Ashe; I have a ground pass (I couldn't get in to watch from my regular seat; the prices in that section had started at $500 when they're normally around $100 or so) and just couldn't bring myself to go.

(Karma has punished me; I just found out Roger is practicing right now as we speak and I could have gotten some shots, sigh )

[Wondering]

There is now a debate about whether Serena Williams should have been named "sportsperson of the year" by Sports Illustrated (she was) or whether American Pharaoh who won the triple crown should have been.

That's right, folks. You heard it here. In 2015, a black woman is being compared to a horse. In a category that includes the word "person." Black people being compared to animals.

If we still can't give black people personhood over animals in this country, we'll never get to a point where black lives matter.

Salon's article on it: http://www.salon.com/2015/12/16/the_truth_about_serena_american_pharaoh_heres_the_real_reason_why_the_comparison_is_so_insulting/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=socialflow

[WJMorris3]

I put that story on my Facebook and not two minutes later I get this:

"please don't feed into this race BS" "I would have voted for American Pharaoh too"

[Wondering]

Sounds like you're not the person feeding the race BS.

[WJMorris3]

I am curious to see who AP names. I fully expect Serena to win female; I wouldn't be surprised if Victor Espinoza wins male.

[OtherRoooToo]

ReRe won!!!

And not some HORSE.

/geez

Here are some notes from her speech

[eselle28]

This is the most ridiculous debate I've heard in a long time. I paged through an infograhic of every past winner. Sportsperson of the year has always been awarded to either a person or a group or team of people. Secretariat didn't win the award in 1973. Jackie Stewart did, probably because he's a sportsperson and not a horse.

If this were a conversation about any other athlete as dominant in his or her sport as Serena Williams is, this wouldn't even be up for debate. I blame Sports Illustrated for even putting American Pharoah on the shortlist.

[Werel]

:grrr: ARE YOU SAYING HORSES AREN'T PEOPLE, YOUR HATE SPEECH IS APPALLING TO THE NASCENT HORSE PERSONHOOD MOVEMENT :grrr:

No but seriously FFS it is a sportsperson award. I don't know anything about sports, but I'm pretty sure that is an award for people, which cannot be sloughed off on a horse because some jackasses don't like the human person who deserves it.

[OtherRoooToo]

This is the most ridiculous debate I've heard in a long time. I paged through an infograhic of every past winner. Sportsperson of the year has always been awarded to either a person or a group or team of people. Secretariat didn't win the award in 1973. Jackie Stewart did, probably because he's a sportsperson and not a horse.

If this were a conversation about any other athlete as dominant in his or her sport as Serena Williams is, this wouldn't even be up for debate. I blame Sports Illustrated for even putting American Pharoah on the shortlist.

I was actually a little surprised with SI for doing that too.

I can’t imagine they didn’t know what they were doing, instigating like that … but Jon Wertheim has always been her champion, for starters. Not really sure what happened there (although it’s not like Jon is King of SI; he’s only King of Tennis – I can only remember bringing home 4 SI covers since 2008 – these two recent ones with Serena, the one where Roger won RG and got his Career Grand Slam, and the one with him and Rafa on the cover for the Wimbledon 2008 Men’s Singles Final, otherwise known as the Greatest Match of All Time (even one of the participants in the other contender for that title, Borg-McEnroe, says so)).

[JP McBride]

ESPN listed Secretariat as one of the top 100 athletes of the 20th century, so it's not exactly unprecedented.

[OtherRoooToo]

ESPN listed Secretariat as one of the top 100 athletes of the 20th century, so it's not exactly unprecedented.

That was ESPN. This is SI.

Different media empire, different publications.

And different objectives. I'm wondering - would you know whether or not Secretariat was listed along with the other SportsPERSONS of the year the specific year s/he won the Triple Crown (or whatever feat it is that horses accomplish)?

Because if s/he wasn't (I also have no memory of whether that horse was male or female), your analogy doesn't apply.

Even if the horse was listed (and without even getting into the other ramifications, because I've been reading about it for days and frankly, I don't have the bandwith) in Secretariat's year ... the fact remains that a horse is not a person, and the award is / was for a SportsPERSON. Period.

So there's, you know, that.

[Sponsored content]