I agree with you. Since it contains unassailable facts it automatically becomes trolling, tacky, trite, superficial, etc. When you cannot refute the facts just blow it off as worthless writing. Oh! It is sexist! Do they bother with facts? Nah! Why bother with reality. But in a way they are correct; it is sexist. How? Try these facts. According to ESPN, more than 70 percent of the viewing audience of its Ladies Professional Golf Association programming is male, while over two-thirds of those watching the Women's NCAA basketball tournament are men. By the way per Ad Age women represent a potential audience-base of 140 million. So it is the women who are being sexist by not supporting women's sports.
See the article below in Ad Age. Ad Age is a global media brand publishing analysis, news and data on marketing and media.
No Longer Just Fun and Games
From this article "The 2000 WNBA championship on NBC had an average of 312,000 female viewers over the age of 55, but only 275,310 female viewers ages 18 to 34. The same holds true for women's college basketball. For all of the NCAA women's basketball games shown on CBS in 2000, the average 18 to 34 female viewership was 91,350. However the over-55 group who watched the games more than doubled those numbers." So how will viewership of women's basketball increase dramatically when its primary demographic is literally dying and the ad placers most cherished demographic is not flocking to women's basketball. It is SEXIST I tell you! So typically those of us over 55 are considered from the sexist age but yet we are the primary supporters of women's basketball. Hmmm ... Where are "enlightened" 18-34 year olds? Seems the sexist argument is so much bovine scatology when applied to women's basketball. So why aren't the potential audience-base of 140 million women supporting women's basketball? I mean other than lip service.
ESPN.com - Page2 - A coming-out party<br>for professional sports This ESPN.com article states: "Though each WNBA team controls its own marketing strategy, the suggestion to target the lesbian demographic is one that came from the top of the league's hierarchy." This represents at most 3.5% of the USA population, not a huge market. Particularly so when you realize a smaller percentage are actually sports fans; the same as any demographic. "The new women's professional soccer league, the WUSA, has said its target audience in its inaugural season is families with children who play soccer, not lesbians." It will be interesting to see which marketing strategy works. Ya think Moms with soccer playing kids represents a much larger percentage of the potential audience-base of 140 million women?
Adam Silver sums it up: “By growing the business,”
Silver said. “The WNBA players are still paid significantly more than the G League players, certainly the top players, but ultimately
this is not a Title IX issue, this is a business issue and we still have a number of teams losing money. …
We haven’t figured out a winning formula, to be quite honest.”
Adam Silver: One of the WNBA’s problems is that not enough young women pay attention to it
