Jewel Woods is pissed that Venus and Serena Williams were left off the Australian Open's official Most Beautiful Women at the Open list:
As the husband of a woman who looks like Venus and Serena, it offends me that my standards of beauty are not recognized or validated in professional sports. And as the father of a 6-year-old black girl who loves to run, jump, sweat, grimace, grunt and do all the things that are necessary for her to excel as an athlete, it pains me to think of the choices that will be forced upon her as she gets older because of these standards.I have more sympathy for the latter than the former. I think, if I had a daughter, I'd spend a lot of time worrying about beauty standards. But here's the thing--if I were white I'd be doing the same thing. I guess I'd do more worrying as a black guy, but I've never been white, so I don't know.
Leaving aside the weirdness of judging an athlete by her appearance, my big problem with this argument is its rather cloying, begging nature. This is the old Malcolmite in me--I think Serena Williams is gorgeous by the light's of my standards (and Brett Ratner's. Jews FTW. Again.). Fuck their standards. Why do we care? Seriously is this the argument now, "Our women deserve to be leered over and have their professional achievements ignored too!!" Meh. Our ice melts just like their ice--just like all ice.
The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood 
Why do we care? Could it be that the stereotypes of black women actually have an effect on the opportunities that black women have in this society.
It bothers me that women like the Williams sisters aren't considered beautiful just like it bothered me the portrayal of Michelle Obama. Michelle was portrayed as an angry black unattractive woman who Obama would have to "watch out for." Why? Because this country doesn't value darker hue black women and I'm more than willing to bet that the skin tone of someone who looked like Michelle, Serena, or Venus led them to be discriminated against at some point in their lives. This is not an issue for whites.
It's a bit bizarre that you, as a black man who went to Howard cannot understand Woods' point.
I can't speak for the country, but every time I see Michele in the TV, I have to shift in my seat. That woman is fine!
Who ever it is in the photo on this post isn't too bad either.
Serena Williams is beautiful. Venus Williams is not. Just my opinion.
Good grief! I went to the Aussie Open web site; this pernicious list is just one sports reporter's opinion, and I dare say that his standard for "beautiful" is pretty much centered around long-haired blondes.
I can't see getting so wound up over this bloke's choices. As T-N.C. suggests, it's better to take offense at the very idea of ranking female athletes by their looks. I didn't see a similar survey of the hunkiest male players.
I do understand Woods' point, but I don't think it's the best journalistic practice to use a stupid online sports story as the hook to discuss a real, and unfortunately lingering, issue of discrimination.
Don't get me wrong. I would marry them both, and sign a pre-nup.
I think Serena and Venus Williams couldn't care less. I think they have the focus and drive to be considered among the greatest tennis stars of an era. I think they have lots of coins in their pocket and probably pretty men (or women - not sure how they roll) on their arms.
Most of the power people have over you is power you give them. V & S seem to be empowering themselves, not the snarky asshats of society who sit around and peruse "Most Beautiful...blah blah blah" lists. That's a lesson they can teach all women.
I feel you. There's a really absolutely horrible show on the Reality Channel called "Battle of the Bods" where 3 men rank 5 women in various ways (face, chest, overall look, etc). If the women can correctly predict how the men will rank them, they collectively win money.
Though even the premise of this show is pretty repugnant, I'm somewhat obsessed with and angered by the fact that black women are consistently ranked at the bottom. They're even ranked at the bottom by black men! I know it shouldn't bother me, but it does. There ya go.
Great post. Of course you're right. At the same time, the Williams sisters are an excellent example to establish a few interesting points that kind of overlap. They probably don't get enough credit for being champions than they should. Of course, tennis is in kind of a down phase right now, so whatevs. But more interestingly, I think their demeanor and grace are not often enough noted. When they came up, now quite a few years ago, I think they made tennis circles very nervous indeed, and now a decade's gone by, and they've won their may titles, and there's hardly a whisper of scandal or bad behavior of which I'm aware. Whenever they are interviewed, they never say anything remotely offensive or aggressive or stupid, they behave like the good-natured women they are. If you think of the Mike Tysons and Michael Vicks that people probably pegged them to be, the reality that they are actually the ultimate counter-examples of that, without losing a shred of their authentic black identities -- is interesting. Power to them.
black women deserve to be objectified and ogled and celebrated for body parts just like white women
kind of
this sort of thing makes my head hurt
women being objectified is crappy, and black women being left out of the objectification is crappy
but the williams sisters could totally kick that dude's ass
There's a really absolutely horrible show on the Reality Channel called...
I was having a much better day before I became aware of the fact that there was such a thing as the Reality Channel.
Similarly, I used to really love watching the Soup on E! but for whatever reason I hadn't seen it in awhile. I caught it last week and I have to say the parade of bad television they highlighted absolutely soured my mood. I don't think I would normally be described as a television snob but a lot of this stuff is absolutely beyond degrading.
What in the damn?
I think Serena has made a pretty penny from her looks in the U.S. at least. Think back to that all black completely spandex number a few years back. She done well with the beauty related endorsements. Australia just might not be per marketing demographic. Nothing wrong with that.
Serena is pretty but a lot on the chunky side.
Venus looks the the Predator. She ain't pretty at all. Scary looking is what she is.
"Serena is pretty but a lot on the chunky side. Venus looks the the Predator. She ain't pretty at all. Scary looking is what she is."
He wanted us to be objects...be careful what you wish for.
Don't feel Venus and Serena. Frankly, I never felt Anna Kournikova. Like dying in my sleep. I don't watch sports for how the athletes look, anyhow. And in that regard, unlike Kournikova, Venus and Serena have been outstanding professional tennis players.
"Because this country doesn't value darker hue black women and I'm more than willing to bet that the skin tone of someone who looked like Michelle, Serena, or Venus led them to be discriminated against at some point in their lives."
Oh, come on! A couple years ago a clearly drunk Australian Open commentator got in some trouble for going on and on and on about one of the Williams sisters' rear end. What the f*ck do you want? Do you want to be objectified, or not?
I was going to say I didn't give a shit what athletes look like, then I remembered my Steffi Graf infatuation. That girl had legs worth dying for.
I dunno. I think all athletes of both sexes have 'layers' of careerism. They play their sport, fine, and it's a perfect meritocracy. But are you good-looking? Are you articulate? Can you act/dance/sing/rap? Can you move product? Boom, double or triple your already substantial income. Yes, turning a sporting event into a beauty contest is kinda tasteless, but I'm sure the top two or three are crying all the way to the bank.
And women ogle male athletes. It's half the reason baseball is still popular. Beckham's current goal is patriating soccer in the US, and he's doing it with his face. And I'm certain that Michael Phelps will soon rebound from the Kellogg boot. He should pose for Abercrombie and Fitch - they do quite well having half-naked people sell clothes.
It bothers me that women like the Williams sisters aren't considered beautiful just like it bothered me the portrayal of Michelle Obama.
This. My adopted-Korean niece thinks she's ugly because she's got black hair and dark eyes and I hate, hate, hate it. You can call someone beautiful without objectifying or writing essays about their asses.
it offends me that my standards of beauty are not recognized or validated in professional sports
Listen to yourself, guy. This is your JOB to write this stuff? Isn't there some other crime worth your outrage?
Jewel Woods is an author and a gender analyst specializing in men's issues.
I stand corrected. It apparently IS his job to be offended about nonsense like this.
@Persia:
How old is this niece? I she'll probably quickly grow out of her current mode of thinking.
Your other point re: objectification. I don't necessarily disagree with you but I'd like to point out that I had an argument with a friend and her position, after all the rhetorical gymnastics, boiled down to her belief that even noticing someone's attractiveness is a form of objectification. We were talking about women and the point really revolved around my making on the fly mental evaluations of women as I pass them in the street, like most men with nothing else on their mind do, and she included men for the sake of being fair. However, and I love my friend dearly, I don't believe for a second that she ever gave a moment's thought to the possible objectification of men but couldn't say that without being hypocritical. My point, I guess is that the the point at which something becomes objectification is really blurry and/or subjective. So maybe you can't call someone beautiful without someone accusing you of objectification.
Speaking as a white male, I would say that professional tennis players are among the sexiest women on the planet, and that both Serena and Venus are as sexy as tennis players can get.
Coates,
Well said. We have to get out of the DuBoisian "looking at ourselves through the eyes of an other." We have already determined the Williams sisters to be beautiful, whether on the block, in our homes or through our media. The mainstream can be so slow on the uptake, it's amazing that we look to it for any type of validation.
Jewel Woods is ticked off because some guy in Australia doesn't have the same taste in women he does?
Beauty standards are always going to be fickle and changing. Serena's forehand is always going to be devastating. Be strong, be powerful, be confident, and everything else will fall into place.
Well, I'm an old guy, but when Venus has her smile on right after winning or out there on the court where she is seriously as lithe and graceful as any tennis player in history, that is, in her own element, I find her more appealing than Serena.
But what I think most about these women is what refreshing, intelligent, uptempo, discreet women they are, what effortless barrier beaters they are. And then from an older perspective, anyone in their prime in the kind of tone and shape those women are in--really you young folks have some surprises in store when it comes to your ideas about beauty.
The Williams sisters are serious players in our world, not just female celebs: I take them both seriously and can't help but admire their athletic beauty.
You must be crazy. There is not a damn thing "chunky" about Serena. Her natural build is thick, for sure, but she's straight muscle. On what planet does being muscular = "on the chunky side." Oh, I get it. Because she's not "thin" and/or svelte and actually has curves (hips, booty) she's automatically "chunky". People who think like you are half the problem.
My point, I guess is that the the point at which something becomes objectification is really blurry and/or subjective. So maybe you can't call someone beautiful without someone accusing you of objectification.
Yeah, that is a good point. My niece is ten. (Classmates tell he she should be 'going out' with the only other Korean-American boy in her class because they're both Korean. Oh, enlightened New England.) I suspect things are going to get far worse before they get better.
Adrienne, you're right..but the tone could be a little friendlier...
Nobody playing tennis on that level could ever be "chunky"...that's all muscle...period...however... it's up to the beholder to judge the beauty of it. And no one can critize them for that! Statistically i've dated about 5 times more brunettes than i have blonds...i'm counting black chicks as brunettes too. But i can't deny that Kournikova and the Serenas are foxy as hell...And i would hit that in a minute if given the chance!
"Though even the premise of this show is pretty repugnant, I'm somewhat obsessed with and angered by the fact that black women are consistently ranked at the bottom. They're even ranked at the bottom by black men! I know it shouldn't bother me, but it does. There ya go."
CDG,
There's either something wrong with the men who are picked to be judges on the show,or there is something wrong with the show's process of selecting black female contestants, if the black female contestants consistently rank at the bottom. As someone who has patronized strip clubs, I find it hard to believe that no black female contestant on that show ever ranked toward the top. In my experience, no matter how racist a straight man may be, when he sees a black woman with a booty like Beyonce's or even Vivica Fox's, his eyes will definitely pop out of their sockets. So either the men who are invited to be judges on this show have poor taste in women, or the producers are stacking the contestant field with very attractive white and Asian women but relatively plain Black women.
The issue is not that adult women allow themselves to be objectified in order to make money,m but that we force feed our daughters this crap so my nine year old, who is built like her mom, tall, strong and muscular,feels like she is "Fat" and there fore lower status.
Lord I hate this crap.
Being offended that some lame-ass Aussie sports reporter didn't include the Williams sisters on his "hot tennis players list" is like being offended that Camryn Manheim didn't get on Jimmy Kimmel's "hot TV lawyers" list.
Meanwhile, somewhere out there Martina Navratilova is remembering Chris Evert's endorsement contracts and saying, "Now you get offended about this shit?"
Serena Williams is beautiful. Venus Williams is not. Just my opinion.
Not just yours.
I'm a white guy who always thought Serena was good-looking, but not Venus.
This man's argument is clumsy, and the fight he chose to pick, strange, but his fear that his daughter will have no chance to be considered beautiful because she is a black girl, is a justified anxiety given American standards of beauty thus far. I personally think the whole, "you want to have a right to be leered at?" meme is a red herring. Most people like to be appreciated for whatever makes them attractive, at least a part of that, and a larger chunk for women than for men, is physical appearance.
One does not have to approve of the objectification of women to realize that the fact of that objectification will have different effects and variously detrimental effects on women in different phenotypic categories. As pretty much every person who has experienced will tell you, figuring out what it means to be an attractive person in a dark brown female skin is not an easy thing and involves sorting out issues that other women do not have to deal with, even though all girls can suffer image issues at the hands of popular representations of beauty.
Not that it's impossible to give a black girl a sense of herself and her own beauty that is cultivated separately from what she'll get from mainstream images. It's not. In fact it has to be done for healthy self development, because there will be little positive feedback from the outside world.
Wow, talk about stepping over a dollar to pick up a nickel....
Look, it is a fact of human nature that we discriminate. Making judgements about people based on looks and divvying up people into classifcations based on body type or skin color or hair color is simply an outcome of humans organizing the world into discrete chunks. Everyone, with the exception of the Dalai Lama, needs someone to look down on (and come talk to me after he's been in bumper-to-bumper traffic for three hours on an LA freeway) and this is how we do it; we take classifications of people provided to us (or we make one up if we're created) and then we rationalize how the components of that classification translate to marl terms (the fundamental attribution error, for the psych geek minded amoung us). And the fact remains that the world is segmented by race. Maybe on TV not quite as much as say thirty years ago, but in where we live and where we go to school and where we go to eat, not a lot of places where the races mix (trust me, if you live in one of the places where races do mix, like Oakland, CA, then you are the outlier).
So it seems to me the only people who should be surprised that Venus and Serena didn't make the hot list of some Aussie guy are either a)people not paying attention or b)liars. And further it seems to me you wanna change this guy's mind get him laid by a black woman who pays him compliments. You'll see Venus and Serena rocket to the top of the list.
Is it bad? Is it good? I dunno. But let's all please drop the shock at how the world works cause it seems like everyone should know by now, even people like Jewel Woods who are paid for their outrage.
Personally I think Serena is beyond hot into ridiculous, but Venus doesn't do it for me.
"Making judgements about people based on looks and divvying up people into classifcations based on body type or skin color or hair color is simply an outcome of humans organizing the world into discrete chunks. Everyone, with the exception of the Dalai Lama, needs someone to look down on (and come talk to me after he's been in bumper-to-bumper traffic for three hours on an LA freeway)"
The Dalai Lama bit was hilarious. That said, I don't know that the human habit of classification comes from a need to place things in a hierarchy or to give people a way of making themselves feel better by looking down on others. Its a pretty efficient way to order the massive stream of information our environment innundates us with. Do people use this tool for malignant ends? Yes. Does that make the habit necessarily a bad thing? Absolutely not. The most aggravating thing in the world (or funny depending on how much time I have) is watching someone, usually a white person trying to describe someone else, usually a black person, without mentioning race. If they'd have just started with "the black guy" or the "asian guy" and then started with the personalized characteristics we could all save some time.
@Persia: What part of New England? You talking about Masshole territory (wherever that may be) or a more college town or what? Either way good luck to your niece.
"As the husband of a woman who looks like Venus and Serena, it offends me that my standards of beauty are not recognized or validated in professional sports."
Wow. Sounds like someone is terribly insecure about their taste in women.
Get. The. Fuck. Over. Yourself.
Well, as a 50+ white male, I think Serena (especially) and Venus are gorgeous women. The fact that they were left off of the Open's bogus list is unforgiveable and asinine.
As a white parent, i worry about my daughters being influenced by others' opinions of their looks a lot. I can't imagine it's any different for black parents.
I don't however worry about this for my son.
Very little love for Venus in this thread i see...Poor thing...
As a white guy who's had a big crush on Venus for several years, I can't understand her exclusion from the list. Or why you all are so blind.
This guy seriously has too much time on his hands.
My mother is an avid tennis player and has often gotten into near physical alteracations with other white women who say that Venus and Serena "look like animals."
THAT SHIT will not and should not fly. It's that type of language and attitudes that concern me. People's concept of beauty is shaped by an number of different factors and I don't think any PC Beauty Police will change that. On the other hand, teaching mofo's that in NEVER acceptable to refer to a female athlete as an animal is a VERY important issue in terms of female self-worth. Teaching people that it's 100% unacceptable to refer to any black woman.
Like TNC appears to imply, I take greater issue with the idea that women forfeit their femininity when they become good athletes. That speaks to greater issues about a woman's self esteem than whether she gets told she's pretty a lot. In fact, one could argue that this man is sending the wrong message all together to his daughters, "Society is not fair because they don't celebrate your beauty."
Maybe so, but I wonder if he'd be this bent out of shape if Jeff Blake missed the hottest man list.
Green sez
Paraphrasing our boy Mixalot:
Cuz it's all for her sister,
red beans and rice aint missed her,
BABY GOT BACK
Yeah, I know it's stupid. Much Ado About Nothing I say. Who gives an A-1 Flying Zipless about what one guy in Australia think.
I'd also like to add that a much more compelling case for white racism in the tennis world can be made in the form of the U.S. tennis world's failure to truly embrace Serena and Venus' success.
With the dearth of US tennis talent, they should have been treated like goddesses of the sport the past decade. However, it's not unusual to be at Flushing Meadows and hear an AMERICAN crowd act uncharacteristicly indifferent to an american athlete taking on a foreign one.
They're tennis players and they should be judged and celebrated on their tennis abilities. White (tennis) America should be called out on it's failure to appropriately celebrate the remarkable achievements of these two women. They're not models and as such, I don't feel that they're being slighted. Even if they were each Halle Berry in a tennis skirt, I'd be much more concered with how society embraces their tennis achievements.
That THIS is the author's choice of issue probably speaks to his own "Gender Issues."
"Maybe so, but I wonder if he'd be this bent out of shape if Jeff Blake missed the hottest man list."
Well, considering that Jeff Blake is a retired NFL QB, I'd find it very strange if he was included on the hottest tennis players list! James Blake, on the other hand, is a hunk. (I've made this mistake more than once)
@Persia
Maybe you could sit down with her and watch one of the Sun-centric "Lost" episodes or one of the Boomer-centric "Battlestar Galactica" episodes. Or maybe a movie with Michelle Yeoh in it, such as Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
I'm thinking of those in particular since they all show Asian women as being tough, smart, and desirable, without being trashy or overtly sexual.
In fact, one could argue that this man is sending the wrong message all together to his daughters, "Society is not fair because they don't celebrate your beauty."
Wouldn't go that far. Yeah, Jewel probably shouldn't worry about on Australian reporter's opinion when, in my opinion, the dude's list shows that he has poor taste in women any how. And he certainly can't reasonably demand that other's find beautiful what he does. That defies the notion of taste. But I don't know that he's wrong for fearing that his daughter's will run into beauty standard issues. Despite the fact that a woman's worth, self-esteem, general prospects should not be solely or even largely determined by her looks, in our society they are. And Jewel probably realizes that this is unlikely to change during his daughters' lifetimes and worries about an additional hurdle they have to face.
Women's tennis is hit or miss. This guy seemed to be half right....
Yes: Maria Kirilenko, Sania Mirza, Ana Ivanovic (and Serena! who should have been top 3)
No: Jankovic (really???) Wozniacki, Vaidisova, Dementieva
I want to see Sharapova vs. Ivanovic soon.
Well, if nothing else, you got me interested in tennis again after a long-ass break. wb44 has already said everything I'd like to say cept that I think Venus is pretty attractive as well.
I'm kind of surprised at the lack of frustration here, only because I saw the list and thought it was the most ridiculous, sexist white frat-boy bullshit list ever. But I do think it raises a whole series of pretty serious issues about standards of beauty for non-white women. The response by Jewel Woods is annoying, but the original list itself is so much more annoying, indicative not only of the asinine objectification of female athletes, but of the inability of many white men (who, let's not forget, still occupy a position of social, economic, and political power in the world) to recognize non-white women as beautiful. Unless, like Frieda Pinto, they have 'white' features.
You see it not only here, but in advertising, in the modeling industry, on TV, in films. Yeah, it's just one idiot journalist, but he's representative of a dominant way of thinking about female beauty, and it's really problematic. We don't have to get outraged, but the 'whatever' reactions here surprise me.
You know who was a fox? Gabriella Sabatini.
That is all.
wb44: "With the dearth of US tennis talent, they should have been treated like goddesses of the sport the past decade. However, it's not unusual to be at Flushing Meadows and hear an AMERICAN crowd act uncharacteristicly indifferent to an american athlete taking on a foreign one."
I've noticed that the tennis-watching crowd tends to be coastal liberal types, who sort of frown on "America first" type of rhetoric. Is that a possible explanation for the lack of nationalism shown at tennis matches?
Note: genuine question. I don't watch tennis and I know few people who do. But all the ones I know who do fit that mold.
Deleted. Come on.
Ninja,
I think that might be a fair point if we saw similar type of indifferent reactions to Roddick, Agassi, Davenport, Sampras, etc. The crowds at the US Open went nuts for these players. I'm not a huge tennis fan, so maybe someone can correct me if I'm wrong about this.
Is that a possible explanation for the lack of nationalism shown at tennis matches?
I think in general that the US has been watching less and less tennis. The TV ratings for the US Open seems to back up this notion, that the ratings have been dropping and are at their lowest levels.
http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/sports/us-open-historic-television-ratings/
Do note that neither Venus nor Serena have won the US Open during this time. Could it be that the US is interested in them, but since they haven't been winning the US Open the interest has dropped?
I'm a huge(white lesbian) fan of both Venus and Serena, but I tend to favor Venus because Serena seems to be a bit of the spoiled younger sibling...more talented, sure, but I like to see Venus give her the older-sister smackdown at Wimbledon every so often.Heh.
As for looks, I actually find Venus more attractive because her personality seems more complex and compassionate. When she smiles that broad champion smile, it's such a beautiful thing, like Michelle Obama, who always tries to hide it...but when it comes out it's like being bathed in light...such a revelation.
Other than that, the other black women that come immediately to mind that I crush on are:
Condi...a very sexy woman apart from her politics...love that split between the teeth and fantastic body with skirts! Too bad she gave too much respect to Rummy and Cheney...I think she's very misunderstood, under-estimated.
The woman on the show 'Bones' who is the lab director something like that. Wow! Foxy lady!
@Ninja and Byrk
No, because those same people stay in their seats at Arthur Ashe stadium for the next match and cheer like madmen for Andy Roddick or even Lindsay Davenport or Jenn Capriati (and Yes, JAMES Blake).
I'm married to a black woman so I think I'm fairly sensitive to the underappreciation of black beauty amongst white society. That said, they're TENNIS PLAYERS, not models and the only duty the public has is to appreciate their considerable and in some instances, unmatched achievements on the tennis court. When they fail to do that, I take offense.
When a bunch of white people think Maria Sharpova's way hotter than Serena, I could care less. When they cheer at Flushing Meadow more for the Russian girl than they do for American made Serena, THEN I call racism and then I get mad. This happens and any fair-minded dedicated tennis fan of the past 10 years will tell you that like the Dream Team at the Olympics, when it comes to Venus and Serena, the gung-ho patriotism goes missing.
...the original list itself is so much more annoying, indicative not only of the asinine objectification of female athletes, but of the inability of many white men (who, let's not forget, still occupy a position of social, economic, and political power in the world) to recognize non-white women as beautiful.
Someone please help me understand what serious social/political/economic problem is solved when powerful white men view beautiful non-white women to be just a "beautiful" as beautiful white woman.
And even if that happens, the not-so-beautiful ones are still not-so-beautiful, right? And still have to live in the same world they're in now?
The woman on the show 'Bones' who is the lab director something like that. Wow! Foxy lady!
Totally agree.
@AMT
Couldn't agree more. The simple truth is that skin color is one of the more granular and easily agreed upon descriptors when one is talking about a minority color. Just is. If someone had orange irises that person would be "you know that cat with the orange eyes?" Actually, if that person were black they would be "that black cat with the orange eyes," but that's just America for ya.
Anyhoo...
Venus is not at all pretty, where as Serena has a nice face.
But Serena, and to a lesser extent, are far too muscular to be considered beautiful women. Men generally find excess muscles to be a turn off.
I can't speak for society, because I'm not society.
I do know that I've never seen a beautiful woman fail to gain appreciation. Regardless of her race, her class, or anything else a beautiful girl is always beautiful, and always appreciated by someone.
Not everyone's opinions about what is beautiful are the same. This is to the good. The truth is that no fashion mag, no commentator, no amount of advertising can shape our view of what is beautiful unless we allow it to.
Conceptions of beauty are like stereotypes they can only shape our opinions about what is beautiful unless we accept them.
There is no formula, nothing says that X is hot but Y is hotter. Truth be told I know girls that tip scales that are more attractive than girls that only eat half a salad at a time.
After all this ain't exactly rocket science. Beauty is something you wear, it means being comfortable in your own skin, and not being fundamentally insecure about who and what you are.
US athletes in the non-major sports (Football, Basketball, Baseball) need to be astoundingly great to generate public attention. Chris Evert won 18 majors singles and had a fierce rivalry with Martina Navratilova (who also won 18 majors). Even then, I don't think they got the same press/adulation as Venus (7) and Serena (8).
And frankly, who gets a shorter shrift than Steffi Graf (22 singles titles?).
"it offends me that my standards of beauty are not recognized or validated in professional sports"
Waaaaaaah. Make me feel special!
Also, the fact is that the vast majority of people are not beautiful, never will be so, and just have to deal with that somehow, as much as some would like to molly-coddle everyone's precious little ego.
"And frankly, who gets a shorter shrift than Steffi Graf (22 singles titles?)."
Steffi Graf is German, dawg. She just likes short, bald, American men.
Now I understand the meaning of the phrase "tennis hot". The term tennis is obviously a negative qualifier to the adjective hot. I'd say we're talking about a correction factor of 2-2.5 on the Bo Derek scale. Sharapova is therefore about a 7.5-8. Most of those girls are 5s. That's about where I'd put Venus and Serena. Bad skin and big bones. FWIW, I've always thought Venus was the better looking of the two.
It's not their job to be pretty though i think both are. Serena is more conventional pretty (or as unconventionally conventional as one can get) but the list talks about 'the most beautiful'.....and dang Venus is beautiful; athletic, graceful, intelligent, articulate, gifted.......*gush*
The silliest aspect of this topic is how seriously some folks are taking it. This ain't exactly Tuskegee syphilis, and getting all Eric Dyson about it shows a marked lack of perspective.
@wb44: "teaching mofo's that in NEVER acceptable to refer to a female athlete as an animal is a VERY important issue in terms of female self-worth. Teaching people that it's 100% unacceptable to refer to any black woman."
Setting aside the nearly impenetrable syntax in you psycho-babbling kvetch...
Cat quick? Graceful as a gazelle? Strong as an ox?
Harmless, apt animal metaphors abound in sports writing--for both genders and all races... Stop complicating matters with arbitrary rules.
Interestingly, another Australian tennis commentator, Roger Rasheed - who is also a famous and very successful coach of tp seeded male players - got in heaps of trouble last year from the public, prominent feminists and fellow sportscasters, for his overly enthusiastic praise, on-air, of Serena's ample curves.
The controversy over his practically drooling objectification of Serena was treated with enormous grace and great good humour by both William sisters, who are favourites with the Australian public and media, for their astonishing skills, personal style, intelligence and wit, on and off the tennis court. If I was Mr Woods I'd regard that far wider held genuine adoration as vastly superior to either one commenter's indifference to their beauty, or another's leering appreciation.
@unclesmedley
Uh, no. I'm talking about, "they look like animals." While you were enjoying being officer snarky of the language police you apparently forgot your reading comprehension skills in the squad car. I said nothing about "strong as an ox" or any other nonsence like that. I said, "they look like animals." If you can't see the lack of humanity in a statement like that, than I'm wasting my time.
I hardly think it's an arbitrary to say you shouldn't ever say a black female athlete looks like an animal. Seems simple. Kind of like it's not an arbitrary rule to remember: Read the complete post and engage your brain before you post and sound like a complete dick.
That shouldn't be hard for you to follow.
OK, my problem with Venus and Serena is that they have NOT been as dedicated to their game and their training as they could have been. If they had been, they would be smashing all of Graf's and Evert's records and would be sweeping all of these blonde, anorexic -shikovas off the court every time.
As to judging female athletes by their looks and not their performances-well, that's beyond moronic, IMO.
Serena and Venus are beautiful by all standards as far as I'm concerned.
As a white boy who lives by the "the darker the berry.." proverb, the beauty of these two women is undeniable,from the lithe to the bootyfied, and are the only intersection of beauty and talent on the tennis court today.
I think men who are threatened by a little extra muscle are either insecure, or are playing for the wrong team to begin with, as are most guys involved with publishing 'most attractive' lists anyways!
Also, objectification of women is too maligned generally. It has its place in the evolutionary game, and can turn on men and women alike!
Oh, and eltoro: no such thing as a 'plain black woman'
And even if that happens, the not-so-beautiful ones are still not-so-beautiful, right? And still have to live in the same world they're in now?
This is the thing: skinny-ass blonde white chicks are what the media tell us is the ideal, like Scarlett Johansson, Kornikova, etc. Women of color will NEVER be in this group, as the vast majority of Black women can't wake up tomorrow and be White (the history of passing and the success of uber-beautiful light-skinned women like Halle Berry to the contrary notwithstanding. They're the exceptional outliers that prove the rule, IMHO.).
So the communication to Black women is: "This ideal CAN'T be you because of your race: never gonna happen."
But, White women already have the main ingredient of the ideal: whiteness. So the media communication is: "Why DON'T you look like this ideal? Hit the gym, throw up that lunch, dye your hair, get that size 0 body -- because you're white, and if you don't look like this, it's YOUR FAULT."
I mean, let's look at this thread. The majority of comments are discussing the following: Venus and Serena are either attractive or they're not, depending on how you see race - thumbs up or down, it's binary. Nobody has commented that Venus or Serena WOULD be hot if they: a) lost 20 lbs, b) got their teeth fixed, c) had their boobs done, or d) any other physically-altering procedure.
So, Black women live with knowing they'll never be the ideal. White women live with knowing it's their own fault if they're not the ideal.
Just another perspective (on beauty alone, btw, I'm not talking other advantages of privilege which any white woman has, regardless of looks.).
The only person on that list who has won a major is Ivanovic, and the only thing people can say about her this year is, "WTF happened to Ivanovic?"
Five years ago I thought Serena was gorgeous, but I didn't care much for Venus. However, after seeing Venus at Wimbledon last year, I have to say she is very elegant and sexy. Serena still looks great, but she is fatter than she was in her prime.
zacksback writes: Nobody has commented that Venus or Serena WOULD be hot if they: a) lost 20 lbs.
No, but there was a dude upstream who said they were too 'muscular' to be considered pretty, and that's not a black or white thing. Otherwise, we all know that Oprah gets a lot of crap about her weight. So did Starr Jones. So, I'm not sure your theory holds up, at least in that regard...ie. black women still get blamed for not living up to the so-called ideal, just like white women do.
"Oh, and eltoro: no such thing as a 'plain black woman'"
Ohmicron,
I must disagree with you on this point. Just as there are plain-looking white, Asian, and Latino woman, there are plain-looking Black woman (although many plain-looking Black woman do possess great figures).
Nevertheless, I heartily agree with you about Serena and Venus; their beauty is truly undeniable. In addition, as someone who argues that the most beautiful behind ever belonged to Florence Griffith Joyner, I have no problem with muscles on female athletes.
Yes, eltoro, you are right. Maybe excessive subjectivity on my part. However, there's just something about the sistas...
Had to google Ms Joyner, before my time...wow.
I objectify people constantly, but as a general rule I keep it to actors and actresses who command their salaries based on their looks or mojo. As an individual or among friends, it is not a big deal to debate who is the hottest in any particular field, but it is insulting to have professionals in a field objectified by other professionals in that field. Especially when broadcast or published. The bottom line is that women's accomplishments are commonly tossed aside with these entertaining, ancedotal, common-on-be- a-good-sport contests over hotness. And that sucks.
As the American writer Bill Bryson once put it, Australia is the last country in the Anglo-Saxon world where racist sentiments of a type not heard elsewhere in 50 years, are still found in casual speech...(I paraphrase).
Knowing that, or having had much contact with White Australian culture, this list is no big surprise.
The average white anglo Aussie would be mystified by the fuss-he simply thinks everyone thinks blondes are prettier, and black women not in the running... Yes, I'm generalizing, but Oz is where the US was 35 years ago...
Mike Stearman - I'm an American ex-pat living in Australia and you're not only generalizing, you're completely wrong. I witnessed first hand American racism 35 years ago, living in Texas, and Australia by any comparison is a truly cosmopolitan, multinational country that welcomes diversity. Your stereotype of the "white Anglo Aussie" is an outdated, laughable cliche that doesn't account for the enormous changes in attitudes and demography that have occurred here in recent decades. Your comments are a flippant, ill-informed insult to a nation and people who have made enviably enormous progress in the treatment of both their indigenous population and their growing, non-white populations.