A Feminist Look at Women’s Gymnastics

I find the leotards worn by women gymnasts distracting, so that while they are defying gravity and other laws of Nature, I ruminate about issues that I thought had been put to rest fifty years ago. What bothers me is not so much the bikini-cut bottoms, although more about those later, but the disparity between the women’s and the men’s dress.  The men’s clothes are strictly functional: singlets and loose shorts for the floor exercises and the vault, and long pants on the bar and pommel horse. When the men come into the arena, you are not distracted by the parts of their anatomy that are on display, and how beautiful or sexy those parts may be. You do not wonder about the outfits, whether they bind or pull or creep, or worry about the possibility of sudden wardrobe malfunctions. You simply watch the guys do their thing.

But now here come the women, ablaze in diamonds. Their necklines are modest and their sleeves are long, the better to accommodate all the encrusted bling. But except for the merest shred of fabric between their legs, their outfit basically ends just below the waist. Which means that the whole time I’m watching them, I worry. I worry that that bit of fabric is putting uncomfortable pressure on their girl bits, or that it will become dislodged in the course of their gyrations. And I worry that they worry about these things too, when they should be concentrating on not breaking their necks.

My worry about their worry is not unjustified. One Olympic gymnast has said that she is so concerned about accidents during her period that, when she’s competing, she goes on the pill to temporarily suppress the normal functioning of her body. Far be it for me to interfere, but are this girl’s mother and her doctor o.k. with this?

And here is the worst of it: nothing in the competition rules says that those leotards are obligatory. In fact, at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics the German female gymnasts wore unitards (leotards with legs) to counter the sexualization of women in the sport. Simone Biles has said that the high-cut leotard makes her legs look longer and makes her seem taller. Isn’t it sad that someone who is capable of turning umpteen somersaults in the air has to worry about making her legs look longer than God made them? As for the overall stature, I have news for you, Simone: we love every inch of you, but you still look short. And why should that be a problem? Do judges penalize those who fail to fit the golden ratio? In a sport rife with sex abuse scandals, you would think that we would have made more progress by now.

And here’s another thing. The men’s performance is all business, but the women’s is a weird hybrid of ballet and cheerleading. The guys stride onto the floor. They fix their eyes on their pommel, vault, or bar. They launch themselves off, do their somersaults or whatever, and when it’s over they pump their fists in the air. But what’s with the women’s floor routines? What insane choreographer has come up with those absurd prancings and posturings, those pert wiggles and shimmies, as if there wasn’t more serious matter at hand? It always makes me giggle when, having gotten past the silly bit, the gymnast suddenly wipes the smile off her face, goes from zero to sixty in two seconds flat, and catapults herself into the air. Isn’t that what we came to see?

In the 1930s, when Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire were dance partners, she had to do everything he did, except backwards and in high heels. There’s been a lot of brouhaha at the Paris Olympics about “gender parity,” meaning that, for the first time in history, equal numbers of male and female athletes are competing. Numbers are nice, but they’re not the whole story. As long as women are expected to be not only terrific athletes but eye candy as well, true parity will remain a dream.