We watched the AKA: Girl Skater, White Knuckle Extreme a couple of days ago and I keep going to back to it and thinking about it. I was so stoked to find a video that featured women skateboarders. Then I watched it. I am not thinking about it because it’s a great skate video. Far from it. I am thinking of it because I think it really portrayed an important, yet unfortunate idea in skateboarding- Women are a novelty.
The video features some of the best women skateboarders in the world. Women like Amy Caron, Jamie Reyes, Monica Shaw and Vanessa Torres who really rip. Yet, what are they doing in the video? They aren’t skating very much, that’s for certain. Instead they are talking, joking, watching the director put on a skirt and playing with animals at a zoo. Mostly they did a lot of talking about how it felt to be on tour, how they were used to skating with men and not other women, and then they talked about various things they were doing. They just didn’t show off their skating.
One of the defining moments in the video, for me, was when Dave Carnie made a comment about how these women don’t have that “girl style” of skating, but are real skaters. I’m not sure what that means. Is that supposed to be like the old “You throw like a girl” insult? I have seen a lot of women out there that are fantastic skaters and I think for them it’s about being a good skater. I don’t think that they have this idea that they are good “for being a girl.” Gender has nothing to do with it when you are trying a new trick or are carving around a bowl. There are levels of skill that both women and men skate at and it has nothing to do with their chromosomes.
I think that right now there are a lot of indicators that there is a growing population of women who skateboard. In fact, twenty-six percent of the skateboarders out there are women. That’s a lot of women on boards. Some of these women belong to the International Society of Skateboard Moms which is a group of Moms, Aunties and yes even Grandmas that skateboard and has a current membership of over 350, and is growing every day. In addition there are lot of younger women and girls that aren’t represented by a group, but still pick up a board daily. There are women only events in most major skateboard competitions like X-Games, Gravity Games, etc. There are ever increasing local contests that have female competitors that aren’t in “girl” contests, but are out there with the boys and holding their own. Another indicator is the amount of female focused skate product that is out there. While a lot of it is fashion based I see companies who make these products sponsoring more and more women in “extreme” sports including skateboarding.
Taking all these factors into account I think that the idea of women in skateboarding is not a novelty so why are the videos that feature women exactly that? A novelty. There are a lot of women/girls out there that skateboard and that’s been the case since skateboarding got its start way back in the 50’s. The first Z-boys team even had a girl! We are not a novelty and we are not going away. In the end I’m still happy that there is a video that features women who skate, but am disappointed that they are treated as a novelty instead of as representative of the 26% of skaters out there. And yes, we do skate like women because quite simply we shred.
The video features some of the best women skateboarders in the world. Women like Amy Caron, Jamie Reyes, Monica Shaw and Vanessa Torres who really rip. Yet, what are they doing in the video? They aren’t skating very much, that’s for certain. Instead they are talking, joking, watching the director put on a skirt and playing with animals at a zoo. Mostly they did a lot of talking about how it felt to be on tour, how they were used to skating with men and not other women, and then they talked about various things they were doing. They just didn’t show off their skating.
One of the defining moments in the video, for me, was when Dave Carnie made a comment about how these women don’t have that “girl style” of skating, but are real skaters. I’m not sure what that means. Is that supposed to be like the old “You throw like a girl” insult? I have seen a lot of women out there that are fantastic skaters and I think for them it’s about being a good skater. I don’t think that they have this idea that they are good “for being a girl.” Gender has nothing to do with it when you are trying a new trick or are carving around a bowl. There are levels of skill that both women and men skate at and it has nothing to do with their chromosomes.
I think that right now there are a lot of indicators that there is a growing population of women who skateboard. In fact, twenty-six percent of the skateboarders out there are women. That’s a lot of women on boards. Some of these women belong to the International Society of Skateboard Moms which is a group of Moms, Aunties and yes even Grandmas that skateboard and has a current membership of over 350, and is growing every day. In addition there are lot of younger women and girls that aren’t represented by a group, but still pick up a board daily. There are women only events in most major skateboard competitions like X-Games, Gravity Games, etc. There are ever increasing local contests that have female competitors that aren’t in “girl” contests, but are out there with the boys and holding their own. Another indicator is the amount of female focused skate product that is out there. While a lot of it is fashion based I see companies who make these products sponsoring more and more women in “extreme” sports including skateboarding.
Taking all these factors into account I think that the idea of women in skateboarding is not a novelty so why are the videos that feature women exactly that? A novelty. There are a lot of women/girls out there that skateboard and that’s been the case since skateboarding got its start way back in the 50’s. The first Z-boys team even had a girl! We are not a novelty and we are not going away. In the end I’m still happy that there is a video that features women who skate, but am disappointed that they are treated as a novelty instead of as representative of the 26% of skaters out there. And yes, we do skate like women because quite simply we shred.
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