By Jane Bokun
I recently went to a hockey game with my family that went something like this:
“We’re going to a hockey game in Chapel Hill. Do you wanna go?”
My anxiety riddled mind sent back this firm idea: no!
My mouth is many times in contention with my mind and I heard it saying, yes! Those two parts of my anatomy never get along and sentenced me to another football, baseball, hockey or man game I had to attend to spend a few hours with the family.
“How can I make this a palatable experience for all of us?” I thought.
The answer was obvious. Bring a book.
The book I brought was “Lessons in Chemistry” by Bonnie Garmus. It’s a big, hardbound book about women who were left out of the working world in the 1950s. I put it under my arm and took off for another game I never really understood.
Something strange was happening as I was carrying my book about two miles up a road flanked by hundreds of people to get to the box office of a man sport. Women were stopping me and asking me about the book.
“Is that Lessons in Chemistry?” one women asked. “I should have brought my copy.”
That was followed by about 10 other women marveling over my brilliant idea to bring a book. Some even did a thumbs up when they saw my book.
“What is happening here?” my curious sociological mind asked. “Why would women rather read a book then watch male dominated sports?
It could be the sexism. For myself, I think it’s just boring. Why? Probably because girls were never allowed on baseball teams when I was growing up. There was that team ? but that didn’t last. Plus, it’s boring. Baseball is too long by two innings I always say.
An article in the New York Times agrees with me. It is the sexism.
The New York Times article said, “What’s happened in baseball most recently is just a wake-up call,” said Renée Tirado, who joined M.L.B. in 2016 as its chief diversity and inclusion officer before leaving in 2019. “And it was inevitable. We’re in an age of social media. We’re in a different type of age that demands a different type of accountability.”
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