Athletes in Body Paint

A few days ago I picked up the new Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue, and as usual I flipped through it quickly and wondered why I wasted my money. I mean, sure, this is a catalogue of the winners of the genetic lottery, women who are so perfect that the mind reels, but year after year of this had provided little in the way of surprises, and we can see all of this on the Internet anyway.

But one thing has me interested. For several years now the magazine has used female athletes as models. This year they have Ronda Rousey, Caroline Wozniacki, and Lindsey Vonn pose in nothing but body paint, reducing the idea of "swimsuit" to new depths. I enjoy this on a purely visceral reaction, but I wonder what this does for other female athletes, both at the top of their games and not--is their are a hierarchy of attractiveness, that is absent in the world of male athletes?

I've been around a while and I don't remember this as being a long-time thing. For one thing, female athletes rarely received the kind of attention they do now. Back in the day Chris Evert and Nancy Lopez were considered attractive, but never posed in bikinis. I think it may have been Anna Kournikova, the beautiful tennis player who never actually won a tournament, that turned things around, and made it possible for mediocre athletes to gain fame as eye candy. Since then, Danica Patrick, Maria Sharipova, Hope Solo, and even Serena Williams have traded in on their looks. Williams, who is the most dominant female tennis player right now and perhaps the best player ever, posed on the cover of Sports Illustrated, having won the Sportswoman of the Year Award, in heels and long, bare legs.

What do female athletes who do not fit the norm for beauty think of all this? Certainly using one's attractiveness for money and fame is nothing new, but it is in the world of athletes. When a woman like Patrick, who is not the only female race car driver, becomes world famous based on her looks and not on her accomplishments on the track, what does this say about society at large? Plain Jane athletes need not apply for for endorsements?

The case of Ronda Rousey is fascinating. If she was just someone walking down the street she might turn a few heads, but given her stardom in MMA she is something of a goddess, despite her defeat some months ago. I admit to be captivated by her. I don't think of her as some kind of imaginary girlfriend--I don't think I'm secure enough to date someone who could beat the tar out of me--but her skill in marketing herself as a great athlete and a sex object is pretty skillful. I note that Holly Holm, who beat her, and Miesha Tate, who beat Holm, are also what most men would find attractive, and in a sport that one might expect to find women who look more like men.

All of this is a reminder of the double standard of gender in our society. No one really cares what Michael Jordan looks like, or Clayton Kershaw, or Peyton Manning, who has a forehead the size of an acre. Male athletes are celebrated for their accomplishments. In fact, pretty boys can be jeered. But women athletes still are judged by their appearance, and those that take the step of appearing in sexist publications, no matter how much lechers might like me might want to see them, are doing their sisterhood no favors. Rousey might want to concentrate on winning her title back, not frolicking on the beach in nothing but paint.