Wednesday, February 13, 2002

Ice skating is just for women

By BILLY MURPHEY
Laugh Lines

Another quarter decade has passed and it's time for me to tell you yet again why ice skating is not a sport.

First of all, we don't use the word "figure" in any other game, nor should we. Using the term "figure skating" is never going to add credence to the winter Olympic contest. The word "figure" only makes men slide mindlessly into debates over Pamela Anderson or Jenny McCarthy. Any competition that includes fashion and the need to actually prepare your hair is not a sport. Imagine Terry Bradshaw discussing the pros and cons of waterproof mascara with Howie Long.

I know there are going to be some of those types who go to the bathroom with a support group who are gonna call me sexist, but ice skating is for women. It is not a sport. Ice skating is like dancing. Sure, there is heavy breathing and movement, but men only show interest in it to please the woman. I once went to one of the ice skating "competitions" with my wife. You should have seen the men there. Like me, their interest hardly went past looking for the roving venders to buy peanuts or $7 nachos. None of us were turning to our wives and saying, "Gee, I wonder where Brian Boitano shops?"

I am not disputing the fact that ice skaters are athletic. I just don't know what is so competitive about it. It all comes down to who falls and who doesn't. In a man's world, that might just as well be a drinking contest. I don't speak from experience, as I have never been drunk, but neither have I ever cried just because I left a shoelace untied. Maybe I'm being macho because I can open my own jars or my last name never has to change. But, even that withstanding, ice skating is no sport.

My wife loves ice skating. She says the artistry is inspiring. The movements are compelling. The music is beautiful. Yet real sports don't include lace. Real sports don't have the tenderness for boas, frills, plumes and sometimes tears at the end, and I'm just talking about the men.

I am not trying to debase the popularity of ice skating, nor am I trying even to say that other winter Olympic competitions should overshadow it. Where else can you see a triple-toe, triple-toe combination, followed by a Salchow and then a Toe Loop? Throw in a Triple Lutz, a Double Axel and a Single Flip and you have more systematic virtuosity than an Enron bookkeeping session.

In the scheme of things, I don't propose anything change. I am not for getting rid of ice skating. Let's just all quit calling it a sport. There are lots of chillier notions out there, like the thought of "Alias" being canceled or anything to do with Rosie O'Donnell. It's just in times of coerced honesty and mock integrity, I thought I should expose the hypocrisy and lay my soul bare. And I don't have to do it in stretch Spandex.

[Visit Billy Murphy on the Internet at http://www.ebilly.net.]

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