Think back to the last sporting event you attended as a spectator. You’re sitting in the stands, maybe enjoying some game-day snacks and drinks as you observe the action. The referee makes a call, and you and your fellow spectators jump up in protest as your team, your player, gets a foul.
In between cheering for your team, following every moment of play and protesting the occasional referee call, the question stands: when’s the last time you noticed a female referee or umpire officiating a sporting event?
This past weekend, Serena Williams, one of the world’s greatest tennis players and all-around athletes, competed in the U.S. Open Women’s Singles Championship match against Japanese-Haitian Naomi Osaka. Williams lost to Osaka in straight sets, but at the end of the match, rather than talking about the extraordinary showing of tennis and showmanship at the match, the world was captivated by an encounter between Williams and the (notably male) umpire.
In the second set of the match, Williams received a violation from the umpire, Carlos Ramos, for supposedly receiving instruction from her motioning coach in the stands. Williams immediately and politely, if sternly, challenged the violation, stating, “I don’t cheat to win. I’d rather lose.” The set continued, with Williams gaining a momentary 3-2 lead over Osaka.
The Japanese-Haitian player, who was playing in her first Grand Slam final, broke Williams’ serve at a critical point in the set, leading Williams to smash her racket out of frustration. This led to another violation. It must be noted that Williams is not the first player, nor will she be the last, to smash her racket when losing a point or game. The second violation from Ramos led to a point loss for Williams, which she challenged again by calling Ramos a “thief.”
This second verbal exchange between Williams and Ramos, which the latter considered to be verbal abuse, led to Osaka being awarded a game, thus placing her just one game away from winning the championship.
Since the match, there have been several debates about the way in which Williams, Ramos and even Osaka should have conducted themselves. Many are saying that Serena, as one of the greatest of all time, should be held to a higher standard, and thus should have conducted herself more properly. Others are calling Ramos out for asserting unnecessary power over Williams, thus overshadowing both players’ performances and ruining the game.
I could go on about the various social and athletic nuances involved in the way this match was played and officiated. One of the biggest questions to raise, however, is whether or not the situation would have escalated as much if the match were a Men’s Singles Championship, or if the umpire had been a woman.
Historically, it seems that women are punished much more harshly and quickly for the same actions as men, particularly in sports and particularly by other men. A relevant example of this in tennis is when Alize Cornet, a French tennis player, was given a code violation early in the U.S. Open for taking her shirt off on the court when she realized it was on backwards. The violation, given by a male umpire, is completely unnecessary when one takes into account the number of times male players have removed their shirts to no consequence on the court.
All of this speaks to a greater issue in sports and sports culture: why are most of the officials in sports male, particularly at the college and professional stages? I cannot think of having seen a single female referee or umpire at any of the sporting events I’ve attended over the years. When I tried searching for demographics, it appeared that very few people, if any, have thought about the unequal distribution of male to female sporting officials enough to gather relevant data.
Moreover, one former female umpire even sued the U.S. Tennis Association’s Pacific Northwest Section on the grounds that male umpires are given higher-ranked matches more often than women. The NBA currently only has one female referee.
Ultimately, no matter where you stand on the interaction between Williams and Ramos, the fact does remain that a disturbing lack of female referees and umpires in high-ranking sports leagues leads to a power imbalance that could affect the outcome of any game. Sports are often emotionally charged, and to expect every athlete to remain unaffected by official calls they deem unfair is to expect too much.
Furthermore, to expect female athletes to never challenge the calls of male referees and umpires, even when the calls are unfair or sexist, is to remain complicit in the continued perpetuation of sexism against women in sports culture. Until men can be trusted to make fair decisions when officiating women’s sporting events, and even long after that, more women need to be in officiating positions so as to ensure fair sportsmanship and playing all-around.
