Growing up as a queer woman, I’m not unfamiliar with seeing different stereotypes about myself in the media. While certain ones may repeat more than others, one that I see almost on the daily is the stereotype that women only find certain media, whether that is sports, music, movies, or anything in between, interesting because they find someone attractive, because society doesn’t want to support the fact that women can have interests for the same reasons as men (genuine interest). It exists in dialogue between characters in tv shows and movies, a sentiment echoed across social media and even in day-to-day conversations I’ve had. 

This stereotype positions women’s engagement with sports, media, film, and other forms of media as inherently superficial. Always driven by an attraction to a performer or an athlete, or by being performative for someone else they attend to, rather than by a genuine interest. This narrative is consistently constructed across media. Girls are portrayed as ditzy and pretend to understand sports to attract a crush. Women are mocked across social media and by presenters for watching football because they might see Taylor Swift, rather than the possibility that they genuinely like the sport. Women’s fandom time and time again is seen as decoration around male achievements, rather than genuine audience participation. 

This construction is largely inaccurate. While yes, some women might have an interest in some media because of their attraction to a certain player, performer, or actor, etc., it’s completely inaccurate to discard every woman and their interests under the umbrella of attraction. Men consistently engage with media because of some kind of parasocial attraction, idolizing athletes they find charismatic or that they want to mimic. Rarely are men’s interests as scrutinized as a woman’s; a sudden new interest is welcomed, versus being immediately looked at with skepticism. Even with evidence that Women make up large portions of serious fan communities. Roughly half of NHL viewership, even before Taylor Swift began showing up to games, mass parts of music fanbases, and other serious communities are rooted in women audiences. This data isn’t new, but the stereotype persists because it’s useful to exclude women from spaces that are historically pandered towards men, even if women have always been there. 

The most glaringly obvious perspective missing from this conversation is women. The stereotype is constructed almost entirely from an outside perspective. By male fans, male commentators, and media outlets shaped by a male-dominated leadership. This narrative is being built about a group while actively discounting what the group has to say about itself. What is missing from the conversation is any engagement with the history of women and fandom. The Beatles’ success was built largely on a female fan base. Ignoring this history allows the stereotype to present itself as responding to a recent or fringe phenomenon, when it’s actually a recurring structure applied to women across generations. The stereotype treats the origin of interest as permanently tainting its legitimacy, which is a standard applied nowhere else.

One example of this is women being referred to as “puck bunnies” for attending NHL games, assumed to be under the pretense of trying to attract the attention of a player. While these people might exist, it is a term and a sentiment that has stretched across the NHL, with women fans consistently being looked down upon by male fans and players alike. Stanley Cup winner Matthew Tkachuk recently went on a podcast and singled out female fans, saying that it’s annoying when they call male players by their nicknames. A British outlet claimed that women are going to hockey games because of the popularity of hockey romance books. These two instances aren’t unique, and both single women out as an “other” part of the fanbase. Instead of respecting their interest and passion for a historically male-dominated sport, these women are looked down upon, and language like this perpetuates the stereotype time and time again. 

Another example of this is the cultural label of being “basic” applied heavily to female fans of artists like One Direction, Justin Bieber, and, later, Harry Styles. Male-dominated music criticism outlets like Pitchfork historically gave lower scores and less serious coverage to music with predominantly female fanbases or to female artists. Fanaticism of male-led groups that have strong male fanbases is consistently well respected, whereas female fans are consistently taunted. Even if these artists consistently prove their worth as serious artists, it does little to stop larger parts of society from looking down on these artists and their female fans.

This stereotype can be incredibly harmful. It can lead to women getting pushed out of fan spaces or pushed away from their interests if they are in male-dominated spaces. Even if these women are in a fan space with other women, outside opinion can lead to one feeling guilty or bad for having certain interests, even if those interests are completely normal. Misogyny seeps into a large aspect of day-to-day life for women, and this is just one more unfortunate example.