Donald Trump’s joke about women’s hockey team follows an old sexist script

The US women’s hockey team dominated every match they played at the recent Winter Olympics in Italy, clinching the gold in a hard-fought final — only to be reduced to a sexist punchline by their President. “I must tell you, we’re gonna have to bring the women’s team, you do know that… I do believe I would probably be impeached,” Donald Trump could be heard saying in a viral video to the American men’s team, which had also won a gold medal, right after he invited them to the State of the Union Address. The callousness of the framing —that the invitation to the women was a burden to be borne —underlines sports’ persisting gender problem.

Trump’s words would perhaps have been easy to dismiss, if not for the raucous laughter from his listeners. It suggests that for all the edifying words spoken about gender equality in sports, women athletes continue to be afterthoughts, the plus-ones invited to stand on the podium, instead of being celebrated for claiming their space on it. The limits of merely speaking the language of equity and inclusion are evident to anyone paying attention, from the massive pay gaps and unequal investment in infrastructure and equipment to sexualised coverage of women athletes and the persistence of the “locker-room” culture.

The Milano Cortina Games are being celebrated as the most gender-balanced Winter Olympics in history. Women athletes, who represented roughly 47 per cent of the total participants, competed in events that were as challenging as any attempted by their male counterparts. Crude words cannot dim the shine of their triumphs — but they do show what more needs to be done to rewrite an old sexist script.