Privacy Threatened for Female Sports Journos

Opportunities for women in the sports world are a dime a dozen. Proving athletic knowledge, a love for the game, and the ability to be the best in your career is a tough and daunting task for any applicant, while females have the added pressure of being a minority and looking good in the process. Recently, females have had to pay a pretty penny for a career in sports journalism, where jobs are already few and far between.
Erin Andrews, a reporter for ESPN, was secretly filmed through a peephole in a hotel, and the video posted across the internet for public viewing. Andrews pressed criminal charges on the man who videotaped her and anyone who dares to publish the material. As a highly popular, and well-known, attractive female reporter, she has quite a following which are particularly male viewers. Being a face on ESPN, most of her fan base has its roots in men.
I worked in a sports store throughout my first two years of college, and even then I was subject to male discrimination. Someone would ask, “Can you grab me a Boston hat?” followed by, “You do know what team that is, right?” I know what it feels like to be subject to male discrimination because I put myself in a world where I am a minority. Every woman is aware of that fact coming into the field, but what can you do besides proving yourself? There is constant doubt in the sports world that a female could possibly know a fraction of what males do, and even then it’s only for a job and not because they’re doing what they love. I don’t know that the stereotype could ever be overcome, and still a female is taken advantage of in a situation like Erin Andrews. These women work as hard as anyone to earn on job on a network like ESPN, and after overcoming that feat they are brought back down at the hands of a man looking to get his 15 minutes at the mercy of an unknowing and defenseless woman.
Andrews was a victim of wrongdoing and given the history of women in videos and sex tapes, it was no surprise there was speculation that she had staged the incident as a publicity stunt. From a position of having your privacy invaded and dealing with naked videos of yourself on the internet as well as fighting off accusations that you had done this intentionally, the girl can’t catch a break. As a journalist, your credibility is everything. This incident could and may have already damaged both her reputation and her credibility to those whom believe she was purposely filmed.
Pursuing a career in this field has made me question what is worth it, and what I really want to do with the ambition to be a sports journalist or photographer. For many people in the field, traveling is necessary and hotel rooms become your home. As a female, it makes me feel unsafe to know that it’s as easy as finding my potential hotel room and a peephole with a video camera to tarnish my career. If it’s that simple to find me, what else could happen? There are some crazed people out there and if you can find me, who else knows what you may want to and have the ability to do. Being as you are already accessible, the general public has the ability to know exactly where you are and when you are going to be there. You work in sports. Games are designated for months ahead, at a specific time and place. Hit up ESPN.com and you can figure out a schedule of Erin Andrew’s travels. Become a beat writer, and you’ll be in whatever city the team takes you. It’s a scary thought to be subject to an industry that broadcasts where you’ll be the majority of the time. As a female, and with these kind of occurrances , it makes the industry that much tougher and frightening.
I have a determination to one day be a member of the sports media, and I know what to expect coming in. I can work as hard as any male in the business and compete along with the best because I have enough drive. But when someone can so easily videotape you and bring down everything you have worked for, there is nothing you can do. The scandal with Andrews may have only been one time, but how many times does this have the potential to occur? For me, it’s not even a matter of fighting off discrimination as a female, but feeling safe in my career. Is that really too much to ask?