Female high school soccer fans at a glance
2010-04-18 14:40:00
I saw this picture on the Springfield Missouri Soccer site this morning and immediately wanted to post it:
The photo inexplicably accompanied a post which contained the first two results in the round robin "Lebanon Central Bank Tournament", which apparently involves teams of high school girls. From the colors I'm guessing these are fans of the Lebanon Yellow Jackets, but the letters painted across their stomachs vaguely indicate support for "futbol", perhaps dictated by their limited numbers. We see a couple with their overshirts on the railing, and a third with what looks like a bag to carry more shirts. All are wearing jeans, most ripped, and the first three confidently put their hands on the railing, while the last three are putting their hands behind them to show off their letters. They've all got eyeblack below their right eyes, except for one in the center who has it under her left. Each of them is wearing a black sports bra, although one looks like she's got on a cropped camisole.
In the background lots of people are milling about, not paying much attention to anything in particular, least of all the young women smiling for the camera with their shirts off. Only one or two people besides the ladies seems to even be aware of the camera.
There's no caption and no context given at all for the photo, and it inevitably leads to questions. Was this during a game? After a game? At another tournament? Were these girls fans of their school? Were they players on a team who painted themselves up to watch another game? What's the significance of the eyeblack? Are they friends? Who did they come to see?
I thought of a lot of reasons to not post this picture. The young women are all fairly attractive, they're all white, they're half naked, clearly this is an incomplete picture of female soccer fanhood, and it's one that seems to get distorted, sexualized and pushed to extremes when soccer culture celebrates female fandom.
But there's a lot of things I like about the picture too, including the fact that it's *not* distorted, sexualized or pushed to extremes. Although they're posing, it's a very informal sort of pose. With the exception of being socially expected to cover their chests, they look an awful lot like male soccer fans might. These young ladies are just there being fans, and while they aren't the total picture of female fandom, they're certainly a part of it. I like the thought that went into the look, the absence of people leering at them, and most of all, their apparent happiness to be supporting high school soccer.
Sometimes at games, and especially on the internets, female fans have to deal with a lot of crap that comes their way purely because they are female. Complaints about soccer marketing and copy being aimed at teen girls abound. Who knows what went on before and after the photo was taken, but it's nice to see, for a moment, a group of young women allowed to express their fandom and just "be."
*****
On another note, last night I watched the internet feed of the Chicago Red Stars/St. Louis Athletica game. It looks like the Chicago feed was directed in house, and as such, had a lot more crowd shots than the FSC broadcast in Boston did today. I sort of noticed it, but not until the FSC game did I recognize how strikingly different the two productions were.
One thing stood out. At the beginning of the Chicago game, I noticed that in the first crowd shots there were a lot of young adults and children, many young women and girls, who were *really* excited and enthusiastic about the game, and a bunch of parents who looked like they were waiting for the whole thing to end so they could go home.
But then later in the game, it wasn't just the young people, but everyone was getting into the act and showing enthusiasm for the camera. The parents were smiling and happy and excited, too. The atmosphere had apparently become infectious, undoubtedly helped by the Chicago Red Stars getting themselves sorted and proceeding to play most of the second half in Athletica's penalty box.
*****
These sorts of things make me happy, and I think that if American soccer fan culture becomes too focused on what the young, urban male wants, we'll be losing something important.
-FS
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