Feminist critics of this new ‘sport’ sound like snobs

The Lingerie Football League will be launched in Australia this June. Photo: Supplied

LATE last month, Australia’s Minister for Sport made a public statement about an emerging spectator sport with which, it seemed, she had no truck. On the website Mamamia, Labor senator Kate Lundy marked the arrival in Australia this month of the Lingerie Football League with a blast of fury that began with ”cheap titillation”, ascended to ”degrading perv” and did not end with a calming coda.

Lundy’s is perhaps the most official among those many voices who would decry ”lingerie football” as an affront to all women. Critics of this rarely played but much-discussed demonstration sport have included reliable wowser Melinda Tankard Reist and, somewhat little less predictably, ABC radio broadcaster and Chaser alumnus Dom Knight.

More lately, Melbourne academic Dr Michelle Smith wrote in The Age that the Lingerie Football League was ”undoubtedly sexist” and that the act of dismissing its impact on the social lot of women was not only itself sexist but evidence of ”insidious” sexism (”Frills and spills of lingerie football tackle all women hard”, in these pages on Wednesday).

To be clear: it is generally agreed by feminist persons that the Lingerie Football League is sexist. The league is not only proof of sexism but a source of sexism. Further, if one elects to think of the league as less than sexist, one is sexist.

I was surprised by this reasoning, and not just because it was so dizzyingly syllogistic. In my view, the Lingerie Football League is less ”sexist” than it is just a little distasteful. (Please note: This is possibly because I am a sexist.)

If you have not previously heard of the Lingerie Football League, be assured, it is every bit as gaudy as it sounds. Young women play a laudably brutal version of American gridiron football in their underthings. These women, who are reportedly paid for their participation, sign an ”accidental nudity” clause in the case of, oops, temporary uniform loss.

We could probably place the Lingerie Football League in aesthetic proximity to pole dancing and athletic proximity to a bar fight. It is not very nice and it is probably not terribly hygienic. But, particularly when compared with something like wage disparity or Neighbours, it is not especially sexist.

What it is, as noted twice by Lundy in her sermon, is ”cheap”.

We can commend Lundy, Reist, Smith et al for having tastes more refined than the intended audience of lingerie football. Less easy to applaud are their elaborate rationales for wanting to see ladies in nicer outfits playing something more wholesome than a sport-and-strip hybrid.

The objections to this pseudo-sport are feeble. One might as well object to Monster Truck rallies on the grounds that Monster Trucks diminish our respect for automation and give us unrealistic expectations about the capabilities of the average domestic vehicle. Using feminism to condemn a tatty peep show is a bit like trying to play football in lacy underpants; eventually, your flimsy concealment is going to fall off.

Crucial to the ”feminist” critique of the Lingerie Football League is the idea that the participants in this spectator sport have no volition or are, at best, victims deluded into the idea of ”raunch” liberty. This missionary reflex is one we can see in response to women in hijab just as well as we see it extended to those in French knickers. The poor things. They just don’t know they’re being oppressed.

Surely there are few things more demeaning to women than the incessant reminder that they are being demeaned.

Equally crucial is the gloomy belief that people are so pathetically suggestible that they cannot be trusted to watch or do racy things. In the Smith view, even the merest exposure to lingerie football will crash the stock of an entire gender.

While it may cause a nasty rash, lingerie football does not cause diminished respect for my gender. The argument that this sport signifies anything but a lack of taste and clothing is simply not convincing.

Just as the Minister for Sport is ”offended” by the debut of this faux sport, I am offended by the snootiness that sustains her critique. If Lundy is genuinely and knowledgably worried for women playing dangerous sport in brief and sexy outfits, then she must step in and immediately outlaw roller derby.

Of course, this will not happen because roller derby is played chiefly by middle-class women in Brunswick who wear their hotpants ”ironically”.

Volition, it seems, is a matter of class and distinction. People with good taste have free will and people with bad taste do not. We fret for the violence we imagine video games produce but we’re fine with the films of Scorsese. We campaign against the garishness of pornography but we permit the sepia tones of erotica. We condemn strippers; we applaud ”burlesque”.

An aversion to tat is entirely pardonable. What is not so defensible is pressing feminism into the service of snobbery.

Feminism, after all, has far more important work to do.

Helen Razer is a Melbourne writer and broadcaster.

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New lingerie football league features New Orleans Lady Dollz

The Lady Arena Football League is in its first active season, after launching May 19th, and the league consists of four teams during its inaugural season, including: the Lady Houston Panthers, the New Orleans Lady Dollz, the Los Angeles Rideretts and Texas Mighty Diamonds.

The New Orleans Lady Dollz were founded by Roame Lowry (of the RB group Maze) and wife, New Orleans native, Alycia Lowry.  It’s a family affair, as General Manager Zipporah Chase is the stepdaughter of Roame Lowry and daughter of Alycia Lowry.   Chase, who is very passionate about the sport, says “It’s classy, it’s sexy and they’re out there playing aggressive football….These women are actually out there playing full contact football.  There are a lot of us ladies were never able to do it, and so here’s a platform for us to do it.” 

Saturday will be just the team’s second home game at the Pan American Stadium at City Park in New Orleans at 7PM. 

Nearly a month into their inaugural season, the Lady Dollz are in the lead. 

Click here for the Lady Arena Football League website.

Alycia Lowry says  “The LAFL includes women of all ethnicities and professions, mothers, teachers, models, housewives, etc.”  She adds, “I began the LAFL to help young women reach their goals in athletics and life in general and I want to build self-esteem and empower women to know they are able to achieve anything they put their minds to.” 

Chase, who says she herself has played in a football league, lingerie style, and she says “This league is for real, everyday women of different careers where it is not expected for these women to play a man’s sport, football.”

The LAFL already has a celebrity supporter in rapper Snoop Dogg, according to West Coast media reports.  Snoop Dogg, reports say, is part owner of the Los Angeles Rideretts through owning shares in the team.

The Lady Arena Football League website says this league is formed by female athletes. “We understand being female Athletes and not being appreciated for our talents. LAFL Staffs works hard at setting a platform for ladies to be beautiful on and off the field.

“We are a 8 on 8 Full Contact Football League which play in Lingerie Style Uniforms. LAFL are of the same By Laws and Rules of the National Arena Football League. Ladies of the LAFL are not just Football Players, there are other opportunities under our umbrella.
 
“Ladies of the LAFL will not just be Football Players but  Role Models to young women. Letting them know you  can compete in a ‘MAN Sport’ and  embrace being a lady at the same time.”

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