I apologize about the length of this following post. I've tried to make it as short as I could.
From reading the last few posts, I think there are related, but ultimately two distinct issues.
One is regarding the treatment of women in figure skating. Women being seen as more disposable and thus mistreated and not being fully appreciated for their skills is a major problem in both ice dance and pairs. Men being treated as hotter or rarer commodities and treated much better (or like stars of the rink) because of it. Women are damned if they are and damned if they're not with regard to body and weight and are often compare to one another unfairly. These are very important issues we need to deal with.
The second is the idea that is misogynistic to criticize any female ice dancer. I think there can be a prevailing misogyny because why are there more female ice dancers who are seen as weaker than their male counterparts? Whether or not there's something to that critique, it's strange. Maybe it's the fact that we fans are not truly appreciating ALL aspects of ice dance and overly celebrate the great qualities that men bring but not the great qualities that women bring to ice dance. (Actually, even thinking that men bring certain qualities and women bring other specific qualities is sexist).
For the first issue, that will require changing the way we treat female skaters in general and requires a cultural rethinking, and explicitly, will require us to change the way we express our opinions. This will be a long-term commitment and will require time and generational shifts in positions of authority to ensure there is institutional support all across the spectrum and hierarchy. We all need to do our part.
As for the second issue,
I think the following counter is important point to consider: This is a sport with specific scores in specific categories. If "objectively" weaker skaters in terms of skating skills (depth of edge, speed, ability to do clean turns, etc.) are scoring higher than other skaters in that specific category, then people should be able to comment on it without being accused of being sexist. This is also a sport where teams compete against one another, so comparing athletes who are competing against one another and being scored in the same category is not only fair, but it's exactly what the competition of this sport is designed to do.
My question is, with the point and counterpoint both in mind, what can fans do when discussing a competition and when comparing scores in skating skills and other aspects of each ice dance team while being more considerate and stopping behaviors that are destructive to women?
As I said before, the first thing we fans can do is make less blanket statements that ultimately don't mean anything or tell us anything but are effective at simply putting that specific partner down. This sort of expression is also leading many to observe that many people who are doing that are focusing or putting so much focus on the female partner.
I think a very simple solution to solve these issues is to just focus on the elements and execution, and aim your comments and critiques at that (like we do for singles skating and pairs skating). Not only is it informative, but it makes it less of a personal attack on the skater.
For example, I've seen people argue that Hawayek/Baker deserved much more for their one-foot sequence over Gilles/Poirier, and everybody else. As an ice dance fan, that sounds very simple and almost as much of a blanket statement as saying so-and-so has bad skating skills. However, just for this specific discussion of reframing how we say things, it's enough and I think it's fair we ask for that bare minimum.
This can even be adapted to more performance/choreographic-oriented criticisms too because there's reasons why you feel someone is a better performer than the other or why you think someone's program is stronger than another, and, likewise, we can adopt that into arguing specific GOEs of elements and PCSs using the bullet points and whatnot. This may expand our minds somewhat into seeing how some judges are evaluating skating skills and GOE to explain some scores that don't make sense to us upon first impression.
One thing I do see happening is when one female partner does start off with somewhat of ability gap to their partner, people not only observe that, but then adopt it and never let go of that sort of thinking. First, I also think we need to stop being married to ideas or judgments, as if skaters are in a state of permanence rather than transient in terms of skaters have the ability to improve, especially when we're talking about periods of four-eight-twelve-whatever years. Second, I do believe that if we keep it focused on the person's actions and execution of elements, and stop framing things against the person itself, it may also open our eyes a bit as well and help us see that skater's current abilities actually are as opposed to us being clouded by prejudicial thinking heavily informing us of what that skater's abilities are.
I also think if keep it focused on the skating itself and not the skater, that'll also help in treating the first issue.
To hear that about someone at the level that Virtue was at, especially toward the end of her career, is ... interesting. (Especially since, regardless of anything else, Virtue was, at the end of her career, possibly the best pure performer and dancer I've ever seen among women skaters, IMO.) No matter how good you are as a woman in this sport, it's never quite enough.
don't believe that most skaters take the effort to drastically improve year after year. There are skaters competing at the top levels who have seen increases in PCS, including skating skills (especially after the Olympic cycle ended) who have not really changed all that much and choreographically they are doing more of the same, if not less intricacy. Skating to better music and more engaging programs? Yes, and it goes a long way with the psychological game of skating.
It's twitter, yeah yeah, but I'm still stunned the consensus on there is that HE is the best ice dancer ever, or the man with the best skating skills ever.
