Women and sport

Photo: Aref Karimi/AFP/Getty Images

“It’s not necessary for women to play cricket.”

Up to a point, I have to say I agree with this statement. It’s not necessary for women to play cricket. It’s not necessary for men to play cricket. It’s not necessary for children to play cricket.

And yet, inexplicable though it may seem, there are many women, men and children in various parts of the world who want to play cricket. They enjoy playing cricket. They get a kick out of it. And it does no harm at all to anyone else. Well, perhaps just occasionally a ball slams into an innocent spectator or passer-by (a potentially fatal accident, given the rather hard nature of cricket balls), but fortunately this isn’t an everyday occurrence.

So although I might question the necessity of cricket, and would protest quite vigorously if anyone tried to make me watch a game, it would never occur to me to ban it. Nor would I ban model aeroplane building, cross-stitch, Monopoly or darts. None of these activities serves any useful purpose, but they give people pleasure and do no harm. Each to his own.

This is not an attitude shared by the Taliban, who have recently decreed that women in Afghanistan will no longer be permitted to play cricket, or indeed participate in any other sport. In an interview with the Australian broadcaster SBS, the deputy head of the Taliban's cultural commission, Ahmadullah Wasiq, offered the spurious explanation that women’s faces and bodies might be exposed while engaging in sport – not just to the people present but to the media. The crux of the matter, however, is that “sport is not seen as something that is important for women”.

This is a statement I strongly disagree with. Most of my female friends and relatives engage in some form of sport, or have done so in the past. My mother was a keen skier and tramper (hillwalker or hiker, for those of you who don’t speak New Zild) as a young woman, and has continued to enjoy walking all her life. My aunt was a world champion triathlete in her seventies, and is still a hardy cyclist and swimmer in her eighties. My cousin, always sporty, fought back after cancer and major surgery and now cycles, runs, and swims impressive distances. My partner plays hockey and takes part in increasingly adventurous cycling events. One of my sisters-in-law competes in triathlons, another played football for several years and now runs across London to get to work. My mother-in-law tracks her step count and cycles around the countryside on her e-bike.

Sport means different things to different women. It’s important for physical health: a way to keep fit, prevent weight gain, and stave off the decline brought by menopause and ageing. It’s important for mental health: an opportunity to spend time outdoors in the natural world, to set goals and achieve them, or perhaps just to let off steam. It’s hugely important as a social activity, connecting us with others and fostering a sense of community. For a small minority – the most talented, the most dedicated – it’s a source of public recognition and in some cases financial security.

Take a look at this photo series of women in Afghanistan engaging in various sporting pursuits. The one that affects me most is the last one, showing a woman on a bicycle; it gets to me because I can’t imagine being forbidden from riding my bike. Cycling is my vitamin pill and antidepressant rolled into one: it gets me outdoors, feeling the sun and the wind on my skin, seeing the changing seasons in the fields and hedgerows and woods. It gets my muscles working and my heart pumping. Cycling makes me feel like a kid, not a middle-aged woman.

The other thing that saddens me when contemplating these photos is that all these women are doing their best to cover up as much skin as they can. It’s impossible to tell whether this stems from personal piety or from a fear of punishment, but in either case, it’s not enough to satisfy the Taliban. Imagine how much you would have to love your sport to jump through those hoops. Imagine compromising your comfort, your enjoyment and your performance with all those hot, constricting extra layers, only to be told “Sorry, no sport for you – it’s just not necessary”.  

I know that this is far from the worst thing the Taliban have done or are likely to do. They’ve also been quoted in the last few days as saying that women can’t be government ministers, because their job is to have children. Keeping women out of government, preventing them from working or even leaving their home unaccompanied, and excluding girls from education: all these things are more significant in the big scheme of things. And women are certainly not the Taliban’s only victims; their persecution of religious minorities and their brutal suppression of dissidents is well known.

But there’s something particularly chilling in this prohibition and its almost offhand justification. It highlights the breathtaking arrogance of a regime which seeks to suppress – or indeed deny – the diversity of human personalities, desires and interests, and to impose the same narrow and rigid patterns on every single life.  Or rather, to impose one pattern with a certain amount of variation on every male life (since men are permitted a range of different jobs and some freedom of movement) and another far more restrictive one on every female life.

I don’t have a conclusion or a solution – invading and occupying Afghanistan doesn’t seem to have helped much. All I can say is that I’m extremely grateful to live in a place and time when women have equal rights to education, self-determination and mobility. Where women can decide for themselves what occupation to pursue, who to sleep with and/or live with, and whether or not to have children. And where women can swim, run, climb mountains, ride bicycles and even – if they really feel so inclined – play cricket.