60% Of Girls Have Quit a Sport Because Of Their Looks
When I became a synchronized swimming coach during college, I realized how insecure young girls really are these days. Not a practice would go by without a nine-year-old girl asking me why swimming made her shoulders so wide or how fat she felt in her bathing suit that day. Some even refused to do certain assigned exercises out of fear that their muscles would become too big. Body-image problems were something that these girls just couldn't leave at the door. It followed them all the way into the activities that were supposed to be the most empowering and fun for them. They were so talented and yet, I often got the sense that their insecurities didn't allow them to fully enjoy the sport.
That's why I'm not surprised that a study from Dove came out today showing that six out of ten Canadian girls has quit a sport they enjoyed because of insecurities about their body. Now that really makes me want to whine.
The study conducted on girls aged 10-17 concluded that girls were missing out on the vital developmental benefits of organized sport because of intrusive body-image thoughts.
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http://www.policymic.com/articles/34125/60-of-girls-have-quit-a-sport-because-of-their-looks
I meant to share this here last week but forgot all about it till I saw an OP about another of Dove's campaigns.
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no man would ever marry a woman with muscles. I was allowed to catch for my brother as he learned to pitch but my dad threw the ball back. I also had my vaccinations put up high on my thigh so I would not have scars on my arms because no man would ever want to look at that. The list goes on and on. 
There is a reason for my feminism. The first, my father.
It is very sad to me that this is coming back around in such force. 
I got the same messages from my dad and others, that muscular women were unattractive. I used to lift weights as a teen and I did it even more just to spite him. 
The women I see who train regularly and enjoy it have big shoulders, defined muscular arms, and I thought of those messages and wondered how much my daughters might be absorbing them.
It is a really huge problem if we are conditioning girls to think that strength is not sexy. We condition girls to think submission and weakness is a positive, what the hell do we expect but capitulation on a mass scale?
I was the only girl in the weight lifting class in high school. At 5'7" and 115lbs my build was very obvious. My chest was flatter and my shoulders were broader. I didn't give a damn. The guys in my class were in awe, so they apparently didn't give a damn, either. All of the girls I knew thought I was crazy and would mention my 'odd' build. Many of them had a negative attitude towards the female athletes in our school. Those athletes were often ridiculed.
This is really sad. I understand a young girl wanting to look 'feminine', but being muscular is not 'not' feminine. Even with the broad shoulders, flat chest and larger than average musculature, I could rock a dress better than most. Of course, a lot of that may have been my attitude. 
They need to post pictures of our FLOTUS in every gym in the country. That woman has gorgeous arms. Those don't come from sitting on the sidelines and batting your eyes at the football players.
I love Cathe, though.
Fitness, though, is important. But instead we have a societal obsession with appearance, so we get girls and women starving themselves and getting surgery to be 'beautiful'
