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22A

Bye bye Gate girls?

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The way these young women are encouraged to parade and pout is decidedly sleazy.

Eighty years ago, a woman's place was on a speedway bike, competing alongside the men - until they were banned for getting too good.

Now, it seems we're telling our daughters that if they love speedway, the best contribution they can make is to squeeze into a leather outfit and wiggle their backsides into the lens of a TV camera.

Worse, we're passing on the message to our sons that women are there to be ogled and drooled over, and if ogling and drooling are OK, why not groping (and worse) too?

Plenty of other sports manage to attract big audiences both on TV and in the stadia without resorting to "glamour" (what a euphemism that is, dating back to the time when the top-shelf w*** mags called themselves "glamour" magazines).

Speedway fans deserve better.

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I am sure my eyes did not deceive me but wasn't there dancing girls on the stage at the Premier League Darts on tv last night so make your mind up. You either have them or not but for the girls, it is a paid job.

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People are pointing fingures in the wrong direction in the banning of the girls.

It's not the sports themselves that are removing them, it's the television channels putting the pressure on, trying to be politically correct. 

If Speedway insist the girls stay tv will pull the plug

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We could always replace them with  one legged,Muslim lesbians smoking a pipe, with a suicide vest on.That should keep the lefties happy.

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26 minutes ago, dave69 said:

We could always replace them with  one legged,Muslim lesbians smoking a pipe, with a suicide vest on.That should keep the lefties happy.

Alternatively, they could dress in the uniforms of Nazi Storm Troopers, and ask them to distribute "Britain First" literature before and after the meetings. That should help make certain right-wing loonies ecstatic!!

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2 hours ago, IronScorpion said:

I am sure my eyes did not deceive me but wasn't there dancing girls on the stage at the Premier League Darts on tv last night so make your mind up. You either have them or not but for the girls, it is a paid job.

Yes they did and they are keeping the dancers 

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Didn't this all come about cos some rich dudes couldn't keep their hands to themselves at a charity event the other week.

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50 minutes ago, Mr Snackette said:

Alternatively, they could dress in the uniforms of Nazi Storm Troopers, and ask them to distribute "Britain First" literature before and after the meetings. That should help make certain right-wing loonies ecstatic!!

We could have both.A win win situation.Lefties on 1 and 3,Nazis on 2 and 4.You sir are a genius.Now to put it to the BSPA.

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Of course, no objectivisation of women as sex objects or sexism has ever been intended in the use of young women at race starts. That's why they have often been referred to as "start tarts" on this forum and elsewhere. Also no discussions of the "fittest" start tart at the GPs has ever  appeared in the GP section of this forum. From the avatars of some posters seen here, we can also assume that all our posters favour of the fair portrayal of women associated with the sport.

This is not a major issue for me but I would defer to the opinion of women and in particular those who follow the sport as to how they see gate girls. And certainly if F1 and Darts and other sports start to drop them I would hope that speedway would not continue with its old fashioned Hi-de-Hi form of presentation.

And as a father of two young women I would not like to see my daughters twirling and pouting in mock "come on's" at the beginning of a speedway race. I know they would consider it demeaning. Perhaps, we need understand that times and attitudes do change and we have to adapt and see the benefits.

Edited by bluebee

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2 hours ago, Daniel Smith said:

People are pointing fingures in the wrong direction in the banning of the girls.

It's not the sports themselves that are removing them, it's the television channels putting the pressure on, trying to be politically correct. 

If Speedway insist the girls stay tv will pull the plug

If the Monster Girls go then probably so will Monster and without SGP's biggest sponsor there may not be a GP series.

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Absolutely rediculous whats wrong with adding a bit of glamour to the procedings, political correctness gone mad, what is the world coming to..

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52 minutes ago, bluebee said:

Of course, no objectivisation of women as sex objects or sexism has ever been intended in the use of young women at race starts. That's why they have often been referred to as "start tarts" on this forum and elsewhere. Also no discussions of the "fittest" start tart at the GPs has ever  appeared in the GP section of this forum. From the avatars of some posters seen here, we can also assume that all our posters favour of the fair portrayal of women associated with the sport.

This is not a major issue for me but I would defer to the opinion of women and in particular those who follow the sport as to how they see gate girls. And certainly if F1 and Darts and other sports start to drop them I would hope that speedway would not continue with its old fashioned Hi-de-Hi form of presentation.

And as a father of two young women I would not like to see my daughters twirling and pouting in mock "come on's" at the beginning of a speedway race. I know they would consider it demeaning. Perhaps, we need understand that times and attitudes do change and we have to adapt and see the benefits.

So is that a for, against or possibly a maybe from you, as you seem to have all gates covered. :P

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13 minutes ago, Tsunami said:

So is that a for, against or possibly a maybe from you, as you seem to have all gates covered. :P

You were quick off the mark  with that. :)

I really wanted to point out that attitudes change. What might have seemed glamorous in the past could seem seedy today. I am almost 65 and in my lifetime some things that have changed dramatically for the better and that includes the position of many women (also minorities and gay people). This might be seen as political correctness gone mad by some on here but I think that it is a matter of respect and manners for others. If the general perception is that it is a demeaning  and old-fashioned  then there is no point in speedway going against the trend.

As for affecting sponsors then surely they will find other ways of advertising their products

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