Opinion | The Obscenity of Curves - The New York Times

Oversexualizing female athletes is dangerous.

By Amanda MacLean

Ms. MacLean is a writer.

• Sept. 14, 2019

Last week, a 17-year-old champion swimmer in Anchorage was disqualified at a swim meet because of how her team swimsuit fit her body. After successfully beating her opponent in a race, Breckyn Willis of Dimond High School was stripped of her victory because her suit was deemed to have violated code: Her buttocks were exposed.

Although her win was later reinstated, the story gained national attention for the discriminatory treatment the teenager received because of her body type. The suit was the very same as the swimsuits her teammates were wearing. However, Ms. Willis was singled out because of the way it fit her body specifically. As a young woman endowed with curves, the suit simply hung differently on her frame. Instead of being evaluated and praised for her athletic merit after the win, her body was unfairly judged as transforming an ordinary swimsuit into something obscene.

While this story elicited justifiable outrage, many of us curvier women received it with empathy and a complete lack of surprise. When you have a curvier body type, you quickly become accustomed to being judged and oversexualized based solely on your appearance and the way things fit. It doesn’t matter if you are 10 years old and blooming early, 40 years old and wearing something that appears “inappropriate for your age,” or 17 years old and filling out your swimsuit in a way that’s being seen as a threat to modesty — you will carry the burden of anxiety when it comes to your body and the way it is perceived by others. The added responsibility of trying to moderate those perceptions becomes your cross to bear.

My own puberty struck early, bringing with it the crippling awareness of the way those emergent curves shaped the way I was perceived. Although our society holds a standard that romanticizes the hourglass figure, the truth is less romantic than it is salacious. You learn quickly that you will receive attention that you don’t want, haven’t invited and are little equipped to handle emotionally. Assumptions will be made about your character — and when you’re young, the truth has very little merit when it comes to schoolyard gossip. The worst part is that the other kids are not the only ones who make these judgments. Adults will also burden you with their gaze and all of the unspoken judgment it contains. I began to hate my body from an early age, and would desperately wish away those pieces of me that were “too much.”

Developing into adulthood under these circumstances, it was easy to learn a paranoia about the male gaze, and the threats that could come along with “inviting” attention. Similarly, I became keenly aware that this same attention could attract the ire of women. As my curves grew, I became uncomfortably familiar with the look in people’s eyes as they mentally stripped me down and deemed me a sexual object. I recognize that look from being a 12-year-old getting leered at by grown men, and I’m familiar with it from being given the cold shoulder by other women, deemed a lurid distraction to their boyfriends or their sons.

In my youth and still somewhat to this date, I learned to view my body as a threat, both to myself and to others. Taking care to cover those bits that act as a sexual signal felt like a necessary step to de-weaponize my body.

Although the issue of clothing may seem like a mundane one, in reality it can become a daily anxiety. You are free to dress as you like, sure, but never distant in your mind is the fact that how those clothes hug your body can be tantamount to a scarlet letter. Just as heavier women are assumed to be “unhealthy,” and skinny women are evaluated as “needing a sandwich,” you are cast as a harlot; a man-eater. A simple T-shirt over an ample bosom is rendered obscene, and you mustn’t be too tempting. Dressing becomes an exercise in people pleasing, and trying to attract the least amount of attention. Clothing simply doesn’t look the same on you.

Although I am now 36, this caution never left me, and it is as much a part of my daily routine as brushing my teeth or tying my shoes. It is with me when I go shopping and lean over in front of the fitting room mirror to ensure my chest won’t be exposed. It is with me when I wear a dress, and put shorts on underneath. It is with me when I wear loose cardigans in the summer because I feel as if there is an extra layer between my body and the eyes of those who may decide to hypersexualize me based only on my hip to waist ratio.

Ultimately, the virality of Breckyn Willis’s story led to a reversal of the decision to disqualify her. Even so, she is a teenager who was discriminated against for her shape. Her body, and whether it fit “acceptably” into a sports uniform, has made national headlines. The damage has been done. This wasn’t the first time she was objectified by adults on the basis of her figure. The sad reality is that it probably won’t be the last.

One can only hope that the attention this story is getting is serving the purpose of amplifying just how pervasive the stigma toward the female body can be. At the very least, the institutions that are set up to serve young women should be a safe space that protects their dignity and self-esteem. This means that schools and sports teams should be mindful that they aren’t ostracizing girls based on arbitrary modesty codes that have the effect of penalizing certain body types. When they do this, they are not only participating in the oversexualization of these girls, but they give power to the negative attitudes toward curvier body types by turning them into policy.