Can A Young Girl In Malaysia Pursue Sports Properly

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My eldest daughter Athena Azlee is very interested in sports and athletics, and I am very proud.
When she was 11 years old, she did a gold medal clean sweep of all the sprint events (100m, 200m, 4x100m, etc) during her school sports day and won the Future Female Athlete of the Year.
She also played cricket for the school team and was district runner-up.
When she turned 12, she also did a clean sweep of all the sprint events and was awarded the Female Athlete of the Year. She also continued to play cricket and her team became state runner-up.
ADSAthena represented her school in other sports too like handball and gymnastics, and she was always telling us how she loves playing sports and we supported her, of course.
Then, she went to secondary school and things took a bit of a downturn. The school she went to didn’t seem to be very encouraging when it came to sports for girls.
There was no cricket team, and actually no other sports team for girls other than athletics and netball.
Even when it came to athletics (which is Athena’s favourite sport), there are no real dedicated teachers or coaches. It wasn’t like nothing was happening, it was just that things were done in a very “cukup syarat” (bare minimum) way and this slowly started to affect Athena’s enthusiasm.
Luckily, it was her enthusiasm for being in that school that suffered and not for sports.
So, we decided to change her to a different school. To be honest, it wasn’t just because of sports.
It was also the demographics of the school, which was very homogenous and not diverse enough to our liking, as well as the fact that girls like Athena, who were active in sports, were somewhat discriminated against because of the way they dress and their dominant and alpha personalities.
Different schooling experience
This is a little bit different from when I was growing up and in school. I wasn’t as multi-talented as Athena, but I did have the sports that I was interested in, which was basketball.
I played throughout secondary school and into university as well. It was much more encouraging, from teachers who were enthusiastic to just the general environment that rewarded and praised us who participated in sports.
Talking to my wife Sheril, she gave me the perspective that it is most probably due to the different treatment boys and girls get in school.
For boys, it was always considered a jump in status if you played sports. You were like a hero or superstar in the school, whereas for girls, you would be made fun of and accused of trying to be a man, or even called words like “pengkid” (lesbian) and “jantan” (male).
ADSIf you do a little bit of research, you can also find out what the situation is like around the world.
The gender disparity
According to the United Nations and the Women’s Sports Foundation, there are several main reasons why women and girls usually drop out of sports at a young age (usually around their mid-teen years).
The major ones are; lack of access and opportunities, social stigma and decreased quality of experience.
These reasons are so similar to how I see Athena experiencing in school. She had a really good teacher, Surenthar Sahotharan, in her primary school who did everything he could for the girls who were interested in sports, but once she went to secondary school, none of the teachers were like that.
However, there is a teacher in her new school, Jacob Mathew, who is very encouraging of the girls and everyone.
So, although things are not ideal, there are pockets of the environment where it is good. Of course, we would like it to be better overall instead of just here and there.
Therefore, I think that it is pertinent that the government, particularly the Youth and Sports and Education Ministries, prioritise this and make it systematic. Access to sporting programmes should be equal for all boys and girls.
We should also aim to eliminate all kinds of prejudice towards women who are in sports. Sports do a lot, from the physical aspect to mental development and abilities.
A survey done by EY found that 80 percent of female Fortune 500 CEOs played sports in their formative years, and a Deloitte report stated 91 percent agreed that sports contributed to the skills they have for their professional lives.
As for athletic girls who eventually chose sports as their career, things are slowly getting better as well.
I remember last year when one of the highest-profile drafts happened in the US Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA). Caitlin Clark, a high-level basketball player from the University of Iowa, was drafted by the Indiana Fever.
She is a really good player and soon, a lot of attention started coming to the WNBA.
Malaysian role models
Due to this, there are now discussions to increase the salaries of the women professional basketball players in the WNBA, along with better infrastructure and systems put in place to protect the rights of these women athletes.
This is the same in Malaysia too, due to some very good female role models in the likes of Nicol Ann David, Farah Ann Abdul Hadi and Pandelela Rinong.
As for me, I will do everything I can to make sure that Athena continues with the sports that she is passionate about.
It doesn’t matter if she ends up having a career in sports or not; I believe that it will contribute to her being a better person.
And will fight for her to have everything she needs in order to do this, and in the process, hopefully, fight for all the young girls who are strong, independent and confident as well. - Mkini
ZAN AZLEE is a writer, documentary filmmaker, journalist and academic. Visit fatbidin.com to view his work.
The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of MMKtT.

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