Why this AFL-loving woman wants her sport to change - Women's Agenda

Why this AFL-loving woman wants her sport to change

I am something of a female expert on Australian Rules Football. My father played for Melbourne, my brother for Hawthorn. I accompanied Dad to every single Collingwood match when he was their Head Fitness Coach, swotted up on all the match plays and made a point of getting to know every player.

I won footy-tipping competitions, memorised all the statistics, collected AFL card sets each year and adored being a middle-class bogan in my Collingwood jumper, duffle coat and cap at every opportunity. I even used to fantasise about becoming the first female footy player, while I practiced drop-punts in the backyard.

Over the past few years, however, my enthusiasm for Aussie Rules has waned. This has nothing to do with the sport itself – I still believe it is one of the best sports in the world. Rather, it’s the negative impact that our Australian footy obsession has on diversity.

I find it disturbing that our major media publications so readily report AFL updates and the shenanigans of outdated male coaches, players as front page news, over and above more important global interests – something you would never see in other mature democratic nations.

As for the Footy Show, suffice to say, I wont be letting my boys watch until they are old enough to understand that it’s smutty jokes and boys’ club approach are an embarrassing regurgitation of now outdated cultural practices.

This dim view of the industry surrounding our great Australian sport may appear disloyal. After all, we love our footy because it’s raw and passionate and one of the few things founded and owned by us.

As sons and daughters of upwardly mobile immigrants, we identify with it as a symbol of hard fought and won Aussie battles that everyone is welcome to participate in. As a symbol of Australia, it proudly reflects our strong, hard working men and women who ‘hold the fort’…and therein lies the problem.

The way in which we perceive AFL football, as a ruling faculty and symbol of Australia, contributes substantially to our relative lack of progress in changing gender expectations. I’m not blaming men in football for our diversity problems. Nor am I pointing the finger at women who prefer to support old paradigms. I also commend the AFL on all its great work to improve gender equality, by encouraging female football teams and employing increasing number of women in a professional capacity.

But I am calling on all Australians to take a collective responsibility for acknowledging their prejudices, built from birth, through exposure to parents that behaved as stereotype and a society that promoted Aussie Rules as a cool boys club.

I am asking that we work together to actively change our cultural preferences, starting with a repositioning of AFL. We need to protect what is great about footy by removing what is not helping. We need to make our unconscious biases towards gender role modeling, conscious. 


In my case, it took a number of years living overseas, getting married to a European man and a battle with career inequality to want to improve my biased judgments and ways of thinking. Otherwise, I’d have continued to love Aussie Rules, not just as a sport, but as a representation of the great Australian way.

The choice to change a mindset is never easy. I still regularly challenge innate preferences around housework, motherhood, career, schooling and a range of other topics. However, while I can confirm that equality isn’t a battle that can be won overnight, progress can definitely be made. Those who choose to make their unconscious biases conscious, will help create a more diverse Australian culture and pave the way for a new and better symbol: the great, inclusive Aussie battler.

To find out how brains develop and store unconscious biases, and tools to help confront thinking and preferences, you may like to read this

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