On Grid Girls…

Here and now, in a global racing village and the 21st century, is no place for grid girls. This is no place for brolly dollies. This is no place for stilettos & PVC knickers as billboards. Not at the track. Not on a race course. Not when there are fast machines burning fuel and rubber. Not when we’re supposed to be enjoying the technological advancement of our supposedly most enlightened age.

Don’t tell me “sex sells.” Of course it does. But aren’t the cars and bikes and machines and circuits sexy? They undulate and thrust, moan and purr, vibrate and test the endurance of participant and fan alike. That sounds pretty sexy. Bonus points for the cars and bikes and machines and circuits as actual objects able to be objectified, not humans.

Don’t tell me “but its our history.” We have lots of things in our collective global history we have eliminated or are eliminating. Segregation. Smallpox. Open face helmets. No run off areas. No catch fences. No SAFER barriers. Times change. So does racing.

Don’t tell me “boys will be boys.” Men aren’t a monolith. There are men who love women. There are men who love men. There are men who love both, all of this romantically and sexually. Yet, there are plenty of men who do, in fact, find women aesthetically pleasing who still aren’t at the race track to ogle scantily clad women. {side note: it is impossibly easy to access images of fully nude women. they are found online, a place you also currently happen to be.} You see, these boys working at the track or watching the coverage of racing are there because of the aforementioned speed and fuel and rubber and technology and heart of competition.

The women already at the track, working and watching, they are here for the same reasons. Except the grid girls, who really aren’t allowed to do anything but smile, sweat in inexplicable clothing, and fend off bad apples. When they are around, doing the work they are paid to do, the women there for the enjoyment of or participation in racing are just as easily dismissed. Women are only at the track to be hit upon or to find a husband or to dutifully trudge behind and nag the man race fan in their life, seems to be the message encouraged by grid girls. A woman couldn’t possibly be a race fan because she, too, has an abiding affection for the sport. A woman couldn’t possibly work in racing because she, too, has the dedication and skill set to do so.

Audiences are generally shrinking for sporting events the world over, give or take. There are only so many 18-35 year old men, and only so much cash to go around. A demographic with actual growth potential: women.

Attempting to grow interest amongst women worldwide in whatever form of racing you’re selling becomes much more difficult when the very sanctioning body or title sponsor of the sport uses women’s bodies as billboards. No, I take that back. These women don’t have enough coverage to adequately advertise anything. They exist only to be objectified by a dwindling number of men.

The race track is no place for grid girls. Not now, not in the future. If your product, racing or sponsor, can’t sell without them, you need to make the show better. Make a better product. This isn’t the 1970s. This is 2017. Women are people, and racing deserves better than to treat them otherwise.