Women's Ballon d'Or Winner Ada Hegerberg

Virtually everyone in this thread has looked at it from an entertainment point of view. Football's sole function as a sport - to entertain. Wrong. It is more than that. It is a means to good health, to making friendships, having a social life etc.
I agree 100% that Women's football is not as entertaining as men's football. It can't be. Women are slower, weaker. The game will be slower, weaker. However, women HAVE 100% been discriminated against in football. I was allowed to play hockey and netball at school. Not football. Why? Absolutely no reason on earth why women shouldn't play football.
So, the archaic system needs to catch up and realise that it IS a game for everyone, not just men, lesbians, and tomboys, as per the stereotypes, and jokes. Women and girls want to play football.
Who are the best advocates for that? Women. Women, breaking the ridiculous framework that prevented me playing the game I loved, until I got to University. I had 4-5 years maximum to play the game and get to a level before I had to give up due to starting a family. My male counterparts were playing football from age 8 and some are still playing.

So if you look at Football's function as being totally an entertainment industry, then yes, a tiny % watch womens football, but it's growing.

If you look at the role of football as something to help the health of the nation, something to keep our kids active, away from antisocial behaviour, teenage pregnancy etc, then there is a HUGE role for women to play. We need women as role models, and if that involves Women's Super League Players taking a microscopic percentage of what their male equivalents earn, then I'm all for it. I'm not talking equivalent wages at this stage, just proper remuneration to help develop the game.

Things are shifting, and rightly so. The balance may have to tip one way, before it comes back again. I find it ironic that some people find the obscene wages that some of the Premier League players earn, acceptable, but that women, who happen to be playing at the top of their game, albeit in front of smaller crowds, (yet helping to promote the sport for the benefit of others), don't deserve a salary because their genetics made them weaker.

 

I've stopped watching Mens tennis. Seems to me that the days of long enduring rallies, skill etc are gone. Just a series of 40 - love games with serve. Boring.
;-)

 

[. So they don't deserve a lower salary because of genetics but because there is no money to pay the hem with. The same reason why Morecambe players get less than Manchester City players.[/QUOTE]

Not entirely true. Clubs are drawing down funding purely on the basis of them opening opportunities for girls and women. There is money. That's why the top Premier League teams, with no long history of Womens Football, (Man Utd, Man City) etc are overtaking the traditional Womens Football teams (Doncaster Belles etc).

However, in any event, my argument would be that the clubs drawing down billions of Sky Sports money, have a social responsibility to make equity a priority anyway.

 

Where are they drawing funding from? If it's the FA then it's still money generated by the men's game.[/QUOTE]

Why does that matter? The FA has a responsibility to promote football for all.

 

It does. It doesn't have a responsibility to make sure that people in an industry that generates 0.01% of the income of another get the same pay. So if funding is coming from the FA then the men's game is subsidising the women's but it's still not enough.[/QUOTE]


I haven't suggested same pay. I've suggested that they should get some pay. I think that the top Womens footballers should be entitled to go professional / semi pro, and be expected to fulfil a role of developing the sport. The issue is generations of inexplicable discrimination (women being told they can't play football for no reason), which needs to be readdressed.
The FA gets its funding from many sources - Sky Sports being one. Yes, Men's football is the big draw, womens' football isn't. Who pays for Sky Sports though? Is it exclusively men? Even if you look at football purely as an entertainment industry, and totally discard the input of women as entertainment providers, there is still a huge amount of money going into the system from women. Not that anything should be divided up as such.

 

It does. It doesn't have a responsibility to make sure that people in an industry that generates 0.01% of the income of another get the same pay. So if funding is coming from the FA then the men's game is subsidising the women's but it's still not enough.[/QUOTE]

By the way, the men's game is also subsidising everything else. Mental health football, disability football, etc. Are we arguing about that?

 

So you're ok with a fraction of the billions in mens football being made available to subsidise disability football, and mental health football, but not Women's Football, because women (at the top only) are asking to be paid a modest wage? A wage to be able to develop a sport for the better of that population by working in developing and promoting that sport, (which has the potential to become sustainable), whilst also training to be elite athletes who then become role models for their gender, local community and country?

It's a very "haves" and "have nots" argument. Almost Tory.

 

I've not seen anyone arguing that disabled footballers turn pro and get wage parity with the men's game. That could change though.[/QUOTE]

I'm not arguing for women to get wage parity at this stage. I'm saying it's a reasonable thing for the FA to subsidise Women's football, to a certain extent, via the Men's game in view of the sport development needs, health argument, and previous discrimination that has put back the women's game.