The physically challenged athlete is often treated differently. Depending on the form of disability, the athlete can be seen as being heroic or the disability can be seen as a sign of evil, weakness, or even failure. Often times when our culture thinks of athletes in general, we often first think of men. However, when a male athlete endures a disability, it is sometimes seen as a failure more than if it were to be a woman who underwent the injury or is dealing with the injury. At times, a physical disability can be more detrimental to the female athlete. This, I have heard, is because physical beauty is a big part of life for females. Many disabilities are not seen as attractive, and as unfortunate as it is, many female athletes are known for their physical beauty, such as Anna Kournikova. However, there are athletes that do not want their disability to inhibit their achievements, like Oscar Pistorias of South Africa. He has two prosthetic legs and tried to compete in the Olympics, and not be restricted to the Paralympics. Although there was much debate about whether he had an advantage, in the end it didn’t matter because he did not make it past the qualifying round, but he showed that just because you have a disability, does not mean that your life is over; you can still accomplish everything you wanted, you may just need to view your situation in a different light.
B.W.
Kin 339I
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You make a good point about female athlete with a disability. it is true that one of the first things a person may think of when they think of a female athlete is their beauty. I had the opportunity to listen to a double amputee female athlete (I'm sorry, I can't remember her name at the moment) who is an avid rower and at the time had just completed a world rowing competition with a male French double amputee. She was telling us that there was this able-bodied brother team that thought they were going to win against them by a large margin simply because they not only had a woman on the team, but that both members were disabled.
ReplyDeleteIt didn't occur that she had worked harder to get there than they did, since she uses her arms to get everywhere more than they do, her muscles were able to produce more power and last for a lot longer. So, the woman and her partner came in seventh place, well over and hour before the other team. What my point is, I'm backing up what was mentioned above, that they didn't let what others considered to be a disability to inhibit them; they used it to help them do better during the rowing competition and when they returned home.
Sarah Garcia
Kin 339I
M 7P