Last week it was announced that the Professional Darts Corporation (PDC) would be stopping the use of “walk-on girls” during matches.
For those who aren’t familiar with what a walk-on girl is, it’s basically a beautiful woman, usually scantily clad who escorts the male players to the stage.
It’s not unlike the ring girls of boxing or the grid girls of Formula One. Some people find it distasteful, some consider it demeaning and others dislike the idea of male spectators objectifying women on the sidelines of a sporting match.
Me? I’m completely baffled by why this was even an issue in the first place.
Throughout the globe vulnerable people are being forced into situations they would not choose to be in. According to the UK’s Anti-Slavery Commission: “There are more slaves today than ever before in human history. There are now an estimated 45 million slaves worldwide, with approximately 13,000 enslaved in the UK.”
So, with the knowledge that 13,000 people (likely mainly women) are being coerced into doing something they don’t want to do, such as the sex trade, I cannot fathom why anyone would want to campaign or even care what the models and promo girls are doing at a darts match.
We’re talking about adult women who have chosen a particular career path, who have chosen to escort the darts players or walk around the boxing ring. Women who probably take great pride in their work and how they look doing it. Women who are likely making more money than I am per hour.
One woman Charlotte Wood, who is very proud of her career, revealed that being a walk-on girl accounted for 60% of her income and quite rightly she’s asking who is protecting her right to work in her chosen career field.
According to the PDC they banned the use of the girls following “talks with broadcasters” with immediate effect.
Over the years I’ve ended up in hot water with the feminist community in Belfast because of my defence of women who choose to enter the pornography industry, I’ve been called varying degrees of a misogynist and more. But I’m very clear on my fundamental belief that it is a woman’s right to choose what to do with her body. Whether that is abortion, pornography or becoming a walk-on girl we, as a society, have no right to tell her what is right or wrong.
The idea that as humans we cannot objectify one another is absolutely laughable, how on earth would we procreate if we weren’t attracted to a person’s body in some way, shape or form?
It’s got to the point where I think we are now taking a backward step in the fight for women’s rights. Have we really got to the point where the people who are fighting for the rights of women are fighting to take away the right for a woman to work in her chosen field because they find that distasteful? Come on…stop being such snowflakes…