Give 'em hell, Lucy Small!
Longboarding competitions are usually not the times nor places to witness explosive fireworks but that commonality was radically challenged, this past weekend, when the very talented Lucy Small called out both event organizers and sponsors from the stage for paying the women half as much as the men.
Small, who won the Curly Mal Jam Pro, dubbed Australia’s premier one-day long boarding surfing event, was handed the microphone, along with an oversized cheque and beautiful glass trophy and wasted no time getting right to it (slide three).
“Hello… I finally won something,” she began, sun shimmering overhead. “Thank you so much for having us, super stoked to be here. I just wanted to point out, thank you so much to the sponsors for all the money for the event, but I would say it’s a bittersweet victory knowing that our surfing is worth less than half as much as the men’s prize money.”
Groans rose up from the audience but, undeterred, she continued.
“It costs the same amount to fly here, accommodation costs the same, and our surfing is worth half as much so maybe we can think about that for next time.”
The groans turned to half-hearted applause but, in my opinion, should have turned into wound up arms pelting those event organizers and sponsors with rotten fruit.
It is unbelievable, in this day and age, that the prize money would be different for the men and women. I understand how, if there are less women, the purse might be smaller, but not the amount paid winners.
And how does a statement asking equal money for equal work cause groans?
Has being a father of daughters blurred my vision?
Caused me to miss some key element where damned male longboarders deserve more a priori?
Nonsense, all of it, and I would go so far to argue that the women should get twice as much as the men in the world of professional longboarding.
Three times as much, even, as it is far more graceful, compelling, a spectacle.
Prove me wrong.
And bravo, Lucy Small.
Give ’em hell.
Give ’em all hell.
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Lucy’s argument is factually inaccurate, it wasn’t a mens division, it was an open division.
Anyone could have entered that division and won – male, female, or anyone in-between.
Here’s a question. It’s a question that a woman who held my future in her hands asked of me many years ago.
An aside: I don’t remember feeling any particular need to perform an efficiency / efficacy assay on her work to satisfy myself that she merited her (probably relatively modest) stipend or how it related to her ball-and-dicked colleagues. Some people should be careful what they wish for.
The question: “Define and distinguish between fair, just, and equal.”
What’s lost in this verbal attack on the oganisers and sponsors regarding unequal prizemoney is the fact that there was only one gender based division. The womens division. Which she won.
The opens division was open to both gender’s.
It’s the competitors when registering decide which division they are in and pay for.
Like any sport, getting there, by car, plane or boat is the competitors expense, unless they have a sponsor to help. The same with accomodation.
There sholud be no gender based comps, since we are all equal…
Since both of you opened the door wide, what exactly are you spudheads paid per word? Or is LT on salary? And does Drekka pay in non fungibles, furry hats or monopoly money? C’mon babycakes, no shame, spill it. Like Chukka says, you writers ain’t in it for the moola.
chaz’s missus gives em a starbucks gift card
piece rates Huli.
get paid per article.
same as in the surfboard game, fishing game, every game I’ve ever worked in.
I get paid for what I produce.
Clever deflection. No matter. I’ll pay both of you double if you convince Jen to have Surfline Man drive off a cliff in her next installment.
With commenters is this place a house of cards?
7.9billion people in the world an you know how many give a fuck about longboarding let alone women’s longboarding?
Not many if any.
Nobody knows , nobody cares…
#ClassicChas
Geez that escalated eh Jen?
hold on this VAL is wearing a leggie, everybody knows if you wanna get paid you gotta go bareback
I had a half-baked thought that perhaps women’s swimwear sales possibly was a bigger earner for the industry than men’s swimwear sales thus could logically extend to pay for equal prize money from event sponsors…?
Funny though how female swimming costumes with less material cost more than those which look like a 1 man tent …. Sometimes LESS IS MOORE …. I have no idea …would just like to see girls surfing like Carissa and not like …..Gidget ?
I do?
I think if any of us that contribute on here were concerned with what the others were making they’d be missing the point!
There’s a point?
Exactly
Is it a left or a right hand point?
If you gonna quote me, do it proper. I said if you come into this game expecting to get paid, fuck off. Learn how to write then play. Or something.
I’ve been reading Bill Burroughs bio by Barry Miles
Writers are sick depraved predators.
Fuk that.
Great book!!
Definitely if they’re in the same heats against each other in the same contest.
Or attract extra particular sponsorship dollars, in which case the women may even get paid more, especially if they get bikini, makeup and targeted clothing advertisers etc.
Otherwise it seems to be pandering for gender politics sake.
In a fair world all male models would be paid equal to women etc etc.
Are there any men who run womens magazines etc ? If not, why not ?
Life just isn’t always fair, nor should it be really, and trying to be fair to everyone can end up being unfair to all…
There are very few disciplines in world sport where women are better than men. Ultra marathoning (arguably) and some of the gymnastics (in fact few of the gymnastics disciplines overlap anyhow). That’s it. Remember when Serena thought she could lay shade on the 300th ranked man in the world and he said “ok let’s do it” and came out and spanked her.
The world doesn’t owe anyone a living and sponsors can give out as much prizemoney as they want.
But the men have a way bigger viewer draw, more ‘eyes watching’, isn’t that really what the sponsors want, what the advertisers are paying for?
It seems with the men, the sponsors, the advertisers, get more return, (more eyes watching, thus generating more income), for their investment.
Obvious to who? The men surf better, compete against more competitors, and get far more viewers than the women (which is the main thing) but should be paid out the same. Right. Sounds like Marxism.
It’s not righteous, but it is unfounded….you got that part right. Look here it’s real simple. Pro surfing (funny I know) has small pie of money. It’s like the opposite of soccer, NBA, boxing, whatever. Few people want to actually watch surf contests and that’s when it’s done by the best men in the world. The market (eyeballs) for women pro surf is like pretty much non existent. The few companies that advertise (Corona, Jeep) know this and buy adds in hope that they will be watched and knowing if they are to be watched, it’s not going to be during the women’s heats. Bottom line is that the men bring in the money (mostly) and women don’t (mostly). This is why the men should get way more $ than them. What they do is better, they compete against a larger pool of people, and their product is what brings in what meager $ it does. Anyway, all this gets sorted if mens and womens divisions just get eliminated for one unisex division.
Now that makes perfect sense.
https://www.youtube.com/wat…