![](https://www.mediafactory.org.au/2017-everyones-a-critic-studio/files/2017/10/484427-tlsnewslandscape-12h6s04.jpg)
Kicking goals for equal rights
by Andreas Mavridis
Between 1900 and 1914 leading up to the years of the First World War, a man was regarded as the leader of his household. His wife, along with all of her belongings were considered his property. Her sole purpose in life was to foster a large family of six or more children, decorate and clean the household and ultimately do whatever was within her power to make her husband’s life more seamless.
In 2017, a group of Year Nine girls attending Footscray City College made a fantastic documentary titled Play Like a Girl. Its focus being on gender equality, more specifically, the recent introduction of Women’s AFL. It does a fantastic job of celebrating women in what is referred to as “a man’s world” and features a host of interesting interviews with women associated with the game, the general public and even some actual players including Darcy Vesico who currently represents the Western Bulldogs. What’s more remarkable about this work however is that it recognises the introduction of the Women’s league is a step in the right direction, however it encourages the viewer to not become complacent as there are still many issues regarding gender inequality both in Women’s AFL and wider society that still need to be addressed.
The introduction of the Women’s league is certainly welcome news and an assertive step in the right direction. This being said however, we mustn’t forget that it has taken over 100 years since the introduction of football, for women to be granted their own AFL league.
The facade of women receiving the same opportunities and benefits as men in AFL reveals itself on many fronts, but none more than in relation to player wages. Whilst even a mediocre male AFL player makes just over $300,000 per year and can survive kicking an oval shaped ball around, unfortunately their female counterparts don’t have this luxury. 21-year-old Pepa Randall of Melbourne FC said that she had to continue to work in a cafe whilst playing AFL just to keep herself afloat, “It’s exhausting playing a footy game and then going to work and standing up for nine hours” she said. In fact, females are paid 125 times less than the male players. Disturbingly, an entire Women’s team costs less than an average male player. The top two players in each team receive $25,000 per season, $10,000 for high profile players and $5,000 for everybody else.
Unfortunately, the issue of unequal salaries is also evident in everyday work places Australia wide. In the vast majority of workplaces, women are still being paid less than men for the exact same job. For instance, a male software developer makes on average, 4% more annual income than his female counterpart and a male nurse makes over 2% more annual income than his female counterpart.
Nonetheless, it would be narrow minded and ignorant to pretend that sexism doesn’t exist not only in Women’s AFL, but all facets of society.
Recently, female host Rebecca Madden became the first female panelist ever on Channel Nine’s The Footy Show. Since her debut, ratings for the show have been at a six year high and she has demonstrated that women are just as capable if not more capable of talking about footy as any man. Whilst this comes as a breath of fresh air to many viewers, especially women as it shows modernisation and progress, unfortunately a minority chose to place more emphasis on what she was wearing and how she presented herself rather than what she was saying. A number of perverted Twitter users couldn’t help but speculate whether Madden had a nipple piercing and insensitively attached the #MILF hashtag to their tweets. In truth, the bulge around her bust line was a seam that had surfaced based on the way she was standing. In response, to place emphasis on how women are wrongfully objectified and judged based solely on their appearance, Today Show host Karl Stefanovic wore the same suit for an entire year of filming and nobody noticed.
Credit where credit is due we have come a long way. The role of women in modern society has developed and evolved. Women are offered many of the same opportunities that men are, they are no longer thought of as inferior by the vast majority of men, and they most certainly don’t ‘belong’ to anybody. Women’s AFL has been a key body in reflecting the issues that take place on a daily basis in wider society. However, don’t be tricked into thinking that our work is done for even one second. We are kidding ourselves if we ignore the fact that there is still a lot of work that needs to be done to achieve gender equality, both on and off the field.