Wimbledon says “Go Make Me a Sandwich, Bitch!”*

June 29th, 2009 • baby mario, bb safina, bepa z., caro the danish cutie, demented, kiri is 2 hot 4 u, kuzzy, radek sexynek, sorana banana, vika azarenka, virginie razzano, williamses

*This was written by a good friend of mine, Ivy. I told her if she wrote an article blasting the sexism regarding Wimbledon organizers (admitted by them), I’d gladly post it here. So there you go, enjoy the read.

Hey, remember in 2005, when there was all that controversy about Wimbledon refusing to pay equal prize money to men and women? And then we all LOL’ed when the women’s final was longer than the men’s final?

Yes, quite a few of the arguments were legit. Women DON’T play 5-sets and MAY not have the depth of the men’s draw (But seriously? Andy Roddick made slam finals. UR POINT IS MOOT. LOL). But that’s not the point. Equal prize money is a principle, validating men and women as equals. Because here’s the truth: women work just as hard as men to compete at a professional level, incur the same costs as men on the tour, and bring in just as much tournament revenue through star power as the men. So why not equal prize money?

Then Wimbledon finally acquiesced in 2007 and we all said “Yay! Sexism is over! Whoo Margaret Thatcher!” (Because it’s England, bitches.)

So, imagine my surprise when I noticed that only women deemed “attractive” by the Wimbledon organizers were being put on Centre Court. At first I was like, “Woah, been watching way too many specials on The History Channel about the Kennedy assassination.” But then I realized, Wimbledon is a sexist ponce that deserves to get called out on its shit.

The two big matches that had people (i.e. me) bitching? Caroline Wozniacki [9] vs Maria Kirilenko and Victoria Azarenka [8] vs Sorana Cirstea [28]. Why the bitching?

· Compared to the men’s seeds on CC (with the single exception of Marin Cilic), these girls were seeded too low/didn’t have the accomplishments to play on CC

· On the day that Caro was playing, DEFENDING CHAMPION Venus was playing on Court 1, World No.1 Safina was playing on Court 2, and 2009 French Open Champion Kuznetsova was playing on Court 3.

· On the day that Azarenka was playing, World No.4 and 2008 Wimbledon semifinalist Elena Dementieva was on Court 1, World No.2 and the infamous Serena Williams was on Court 2. FFS, even Zvonereva [7] vs. Razzano [26] were on Court 18, when BOTH women were seeded higher than the Centre Court match.

· Some other fun facts. During the first week, Dinara Safina did not play on Centre Court. Neither did Elena Dementieva nor Svetlana Kuznetsova. Venus played on Centre Court once, and Serena twice (out of three times, which isn’t a huge injustice.)

I guess you could say I was fairly pissed off that people who actually merited CC were not getting it.

a) It’s outrageous that women are judged on their looks and NOT on their merit.

b) It’s outrageous that men are judged on merit but not women.

Seriously? If the “pretty people up front, ugly people in the back” rule applied to the men’s side, Radek Stepanek would be bloody playing underground in the Subway!

I did a little investigative digging (basically, looking at the schedule of play on wimbledon.org) and noticed that on Centre Court and Court 1, the WTA matches: ATP matches ratio was 6:13 and 11:12 respectively. Not only are women getting on the big stage less, but the ones who DO are the ones who look the best, NOT the ones who have earned it.

The icing on top of the cake was when a Wimbledon representative actually CAME OUT and said that looks do matter in determining who gets Centre Court. Thanks, you asshat. My suspicions were confirmed that Wimbledon is not only sexist, but damn stupid as well. Cheers xx

BÁRBARA’S NOTE: I wish this blog had a less stupid name so the article would look less out of place. Sry bb.

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