Women’s Rugby World Cup renamed to gender-neutral title, in move likely to cause confusion
- The sentiment may be correct but the execution is bizarre given there is an obvious alternative as World Rugby takes another step towards equality
There is only one kind of rugby union. All who play it are taking part in the same sport. That’s why it’s high time we stop referring to it as if it was two separate things: rugby and women’s rugby.
When does women’s sport just become sport? The semantics of keeping the gendered specificity creates a process sociologists call “othering”. It means one is the norm – rugby – and the other is, well, the other – women’s rugby. For many, the difference might seem arbitrary, but it is just one jigsaw piece in the massive mosaic of gender norms that keep women “in their place”.
So, when World Rugby announced it would be dropping the “Women’s” from Women’s Rugby World Cup their sentiment was spot on. The governing body has taken a “landmark moment and a statement that we are treating the men’s and women’s games evenly and the potential in each is as powerful as the other,” said Brett Gosper, World Rugby’s chief executive, and he’s right.
The only thing is, it is a bit confusing. We now have two Rugby World Cups. They don’t clash in terms of scheduling as they are on different four-year cycles – the (men’s) Rugby World Cup is in 2019 and the (women’s) Rugby World Cup is 2021. But as World Rugby is desperate to grow the sport beyond its traditional heartlands, it would help if we made the tournaments as easy as possible for the casual fan to follow and type into search engines.
It would have been very simple to add “Men’s” to the men’s Rugby World Cup. It differentiates the two and removes the issue of othering by giving them equal weight. As one pundit, Nick Heath, pointed out on Twitter, the tournament name is likely to just change from Women’s to women’s – not much progress there.
But the decision has been made, and World Rugby should be commended for their move, even if the execution is a bit bizarre. The hope is it encourages more people to take up the sport, be they men, women or transgender.
The last three (women’s) Rugby World Cups have been huge successes, in terms of spectators and coverage. Thousands of people have crammed the stadiums to see the finals in England, France and Ireland respectively. The skill on show, and the excitement generated, illustrate it is on an equal footing with the men’s tournament in almost every regard.
It still faces two issues. Firstly, prejudice abounds.
It pains me when I hear the pale and stale point of view that it is not worth watching women’s rugby because it is simply not as good as men’s. For one thing, that is not true. Even if it were, it is just a way to rationalise sexism.
Fans rarely support teams because of the standard of sport. They support the teams because of where they are from. Scotland’s men’s rugby team were terrible through the 2000s, and yet Murrayfield would be packed for the England match because people want to support their nation, irrespective of the standard (neither England or Scotland scored a try at Murrayfield between 2004 and 2012, it was dreadfully dull and yet consistently packed to the rafters).
So why does women’s rugby have to be of a certain standard to warrant being worthy of nationalism, even as they represent the same nations? Luckily for rugby fans, the women’s game is an excellent standard – physical, fast, skilled and not a beat less exciting than their counterparts’ – so there’s no excuse any more.
The second issue is the shackles of history.
Women’s rugby is relatively new on the grand scale, so they are dealing with the sport’s existing identity. But men’s rugby powers and women’s rugby powers are not the same.
So, there is no point trying to emulate their male counterparts in terms of traditional tournaments. Having the Six Nations format, for example, simply because the men’s format exists, does not help the game as the likes of Scotland or Italy get an annual pasting at the hands of the English. The organisers are beginning to cotton on to this, and recently held a “super series”, between Canada, England, France, New Zealand and the US, all of whom are the great teams, to facilitate a competitive tournament.
As the game grows – and there is now talk of a women’s Lions tour (Lionesses?), I hope they do not feel obliged to follow the men’s format to South Africa and Australia, where women’s rugby is not so strong. They can create something new – why not a rotation between France, Canada and New Zealand? There’s no reason to copy what’s been done just because the men do it. It’s a chance to forge an identity.
The bottom line is, women’s rugby is on the up. The more coverage there is, the more it will challenge stereotypes. The more stereotypes are challenged, the more people will want to play. And that, is only a good thing.
