To everyone’s surprise, actress Sydney Sweeney starred in a controversial ad last week. Novig, a sports-focused prediction market, released the ad, and backlash to the overly sexual content unfolded immediately across social media and plastered itself across news headlines.
In a world where women’s sports continue to fight an uphill battle against degradation, Sweeney and the ad have been rightfully critiqued for playing directly into harmful narratives through both her dialogue and appearance. In the video, Sweeney is oiled, tanned, and completely nude apart from wearing sports equipment, which conjures the false idea that women should be physically flawless in the midst of athletic competition. Moreover, Sweeney’s homogeneous dialogue—ie. the repetition of “sports” and “just sports”—implies that women lack diverse opinions or knowledge on the sports world.
As Sweeney states in her ad, Novig emerged as exclusively a sports trading app that removes any other subject matter of trade. Thus, “just sports” became the basis for Sweeney’s ad. Novig is a prediction market, where users buy and trade event contracts priced between $0 and $1. It’s also now the subject of controversy.
Apart from the video’s dialogue, Sweeney’s heavy involvement in the creative process sparked further outrage. Her direct contribution to the blatant objectification of women in sports left many feeling personally attacked. The true harm of Sweeney’s video is the way in which it reaffirms harmful stereotypes of women across the sports industry, from journalists and fans to the athletes themselves.
Female athletes themselves have taken to social media to critique Sweeney’s ad, calling her out for oversexualizing and diminishing women in sports. Former NCAA champion gymnast Gracie Kramer has gained a lot of attention for her video showing her gymnastics, as well as other sports she plays, with the caption, “idk what Sydney Sweeney was doing, but this is what a woman in sports looks like.” This video started a trend of many female athletes posting similar videos of themselves playing their sport and making statements condemning the ad. From Australian Olympic swimmer Ariarne Titmus to English sprinter Amy Hunt, athletes from around the world are calling out Sweeney and highlighting the importance of women in sports.
Her dialogue implying a lack of knowledge about sports is also precisely the stereotype many female broadcasters, such as Rebecca Lowe, have continuously battled in order to establish themselves professionally. Hailing from England, where women only entered the soccer commentating realm for the first time in 2007, her journey into the industry was no easy feat. Nonetheless, she landed one of the most coveted soccer broadcasting positions this past summer during the World Cup as part of FOX Sports’ coverage alongside Thierry Henry, Alexi Lalas, and Zlatan Ibrahimović. Lalas and Ibrahimović gained considerable attention for their waves of passive aggressive comments made live on air, but it was Lowe who arguably deserved greater recognition for consistently remaining professional and the most well-spoken among the group.
And, despite Sweeney’s (and Novig’s) efforts to minimize female progress, women’s sports in the U.S. have continued to see nothing short of historic growth over the past five years.
The National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) Championship in 2021 had just around half a million viewers on CBS. Last year, that figure more than doubled to 1.84 million viewers, and many expect this year’s final in late November to yield even higher results. Interest in the future of women’s sports isn’t restricted to well-established leagues like the NWSL; it has also manifested in the formation of new teams and Leagues.
Up north and out west, the Women’s Professional Baseball League (WPBL) just wrapped up its first-ever season, selling over 55 thousand tickets across seven weeks of play. The WPBL contains four teams— Boston, New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles—and is looking to grow. The final took place on Sept. 22 in which the Los Angeles Queens took home the league’s first championship title.
Despite increasing visibility and access to women’s sports, the narratives perpetuated by ads like Sweeney’s continue to do lasting damage to women in sports. Just last week, an AI-generated video went viral for depicting University of Texas head football coach Steve Sarkisian slapping longtime ESPN sideline reporter Holly Rowe across the face after he had walked away from their interview early. Not only did the video garner over two million views online, but when asked if he had looked at any social media following a major win against Ohio State University, Texas quarterback Arch Manning said he had watched this specific video and found it “hilarious.” In the postgame interview room after a primetime college football game, male reporters, coaches, and college players alike laughed at the video of a man with a multimillion dollar salary slapping a female reporter.
We should also note the inherent danger of sports betting for women, which Sweeney fails to address. Domestic violence rates have been proven to shoot up 10% following unexpected losses in matches, with other statistics suggesting that violence increases regardless of outcome. In one case earlier this year, the game hadn’t even started before a husband shot and killed his wife for failing to switch the channel to Monday Night Football.
Ads like Sweeney’s only further the culture that deems this violence okay. The reaction to cultural moments like the video of Rowe and the backlash to Lowe only solidify how important it is to uplift women in sports and fight against the status quo that keeps them out. However, acts of protest are not the only reason to watch women’s sports— watching them for enjoyment and rooting for your team is support enough.
