Rosa

Let me tell you a story about being a sporty woman in Australia today. And why it’s relevant to the #Matildas win. This story started when I was 2 years old and my grandpa registered my younger brother for membership of a football club after his birth … but didn’t do this for me or my older sister when we were born. It continued when I was 7 and my other grandparents won a big trailer raffle and saved the new basketball in it to give to my younger brother *in front of my older sister and I* as he was their oldest grandSON. It continued when I was 12 and the school banned all girls from playing footy on the oval at lunchtime because sometimes when we kicked the ball our knickers showed (and we weren’t allowed to wear shorts). It continued when I was in Year 12 and won the Open Cross Country Run event at school, yet that night my father asked my younger brother how he performed in the run (he came 7th or something) and my father didn’t ask me how I went till my mother made him. (My father was a kind, decent man who never deliberately hurt me but was also very much a product of his time.) It continued when my son played Under 10’s Aussie Rules and I ran water for the team the entire year but when it came time for end-of-year photos, the team coach wouldn’t allow the women team helpers in the photo (but my boy’s father who was the team runner and all other men helpers were in the pic). This is an incomplete list. And yes, it’s very minor in the general scheme of oppression and discrimination faced by so many people in so many ways. But almost every woman on earth has stories a bit like (or very like) mine, and they hurt. Because while most men certainly face unfairness in their lives, they don’t face systemic oppression just for being male. Yet for women such stories are part of the fabric of our lives. We never know when the harm will come or how much it will hurt, but we’ve been psychologically braced for it at all times since we were little girls. There are stories in the media already about the kinds of harm some Matildas players have faced since they were little girls, too. One of them talked about how she was forced to play for boy’s teams when younger and sometimes had no team at all: because she was a girl. One talked about her club having no women’s toilets or other facilities, which made their games very difficult. Others have spoken about the years and years where they played to crowds of just a few hundred, and have had to continually fight tooth and nail for fair conditions and pay (which was only kind-of achieved just a couple of years ago). This means their current achievements are even more extraordinary, because they were gained despite a cacophony of oppression and male derision running like a poisoned stream alongside everything they did on a sporting field (and off of it). It means the sheer guts they displayed last night is even more remarkable because they all had to overcome the myriad ways others tried to undermine their confidence at every stage of their sporting lives, as well as focus on the game. And still, they had the courage and mental toughness to stand up and win. For this reason, they’re true heroes in ways that male sporting stars rarely are. And this is why we women are so proud of last night’s victory, and so utterly absorbed by it. We recognise the unbelievably difficult slog it is just to survive in a world dominated by men’s power. We’ve all (in sport, and elsewhere) suffered the hurts of being regularly ignored, laughed at and demeaned. So the victory feels like a victory for all women, and an even bigger victory for the little girls who’ll suffer a little less in future because those incredible women have eased the path for those coming after them. There are literally no words for how wonderful they are, for what we owe them, and for how much we wish them well for whatever comes next. Forever and ever, let’s play like GIRLS. #PlayLikeAGirl #TilitsDone