Can we get over the women’s bodies thing?
Alize Cornet realized her shirt was on backwards and needed to change it around. It’s happened to all of us. Every. Single. One. It happened to me last week on the way to the gym. I fixed it in the car. Nobody cares.
Except chair umpire Christian Rask, who gave Cornet a code violation warning.
Now the tennis powers are parsing silly rules, the letter of the law, whose rule it is… and the US Open says it regrets that she was given a warning at all.
Cornet made the right decision. Rather than inconvenience her opponent by leaving the court, she did a quick turnaround. It was the opposite of disrespetful— it was considerate.
There is a modicum of satisfaction that I get out of this incident. Cornet is from France, and it was the French Open that tsk-tsk’d Serena Williams last week for the bodysuit she wore at Roland Garros this year. Williams’ outfit was both stylish for a post-pregnancy look and functional in that it improved her circulation, which she needed after struggling with life-threatening blot clots. Now that same country, which has so much national pride, will naturally want to rush to Cornet’s defense— only to realize it’s being hypocritical. That makes me smile a little.
But can we get over it please?
Enough.
Reasons we need to get over it:
1. Brandi Chastain celebrated World Cup glory by taking off her top to reveal a sports bra in 1999, and we loved it. We applauded and put her on the cover Sports Illustrated. Girl power. Yaaay. Been there, done that. Women wear sports bras, and it’s absolutely tasteful, appropriate, and FINE.
2. The USTA promotes its classy athletes— as it should— by sending out photos and articles of female tennis players in sexy dresses, short tennis skirts, and covered in various stages of sweat. It’s called being a woman in 2018. Check Instagram much? There are entire pages dedicated to the female tennis form in and out of tennis-wear. Genie Bouchard takes off her shirt with a sports bra underneath and squeezes out the sweat on a practice court at the US Open. Caroline Woznicacki poses in nothing but body paint. It’s all gorgeous. It’s wonderful. But most of all, it’s everywhere. So why do we suddenly get an extreme bout of prudishness over the sight of a modest sports bra? It doesn’t make any sense. It’s not logical.
3. Big reason right here: The men take off their shirts. (You knew that was coming.) I have seen probably every man in the Top 100 without a shirt on. The horror. Seriously? Have any of them been warned, fined, slapped on the wrist? No. They’re encouraged to take those sweaty shirts off and throw them into the crowd.
4. A sports bra is much like a shorter top. Do a Google search for “sports bra.” Are sports bras really that revealing these days? What’s the big difference between a crop top and a sports bra— the technicality of one being a racerback? Sports bras are not generally smutty. In a famous First Amendment case, US Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart once said he could not define pornography, but “I know it when I see it.” Well I can guarantee you a sports bra is not it. I’m sure Justice Stewart would agree, god rest his soul.
5. We need to accept that women have breasts. Yes I wrote that, take a deep breath and read it again. We need to accept that women have breasts and be ok with it. Since the dawn of mammalian life, breasts have sustained human and animal populations. They’re a big reason we’re still here. Time to stop acting like breasts are shameful.
Is there anyone on this planet other than that umpire who’s mad that Alize Cornet took her shirt off?
I will now ask the chirping crickets to please get over it.
