Unfortunately, the answer is NO! It would be easy to believe that progress is being made: the Paris 2024 Olympics were gender-balanced, Montreal is launching its women’s soccer team in spring 2025, and women now close out the X Games. Yet glaring inequalities persist, and men’s sports are still perceived as superior to women’s sports.
We were surprised too! As event organizers for over 10 years, we’ve witnessed progress firsthand and are proud to have introduced equal prize money since 2017. But that’s just the beginning. This issue is much larger than it seems, and we came to understand its depth while working on a documentary for Télé-Québec. This experience was a true wake-up call, and we believe that by sharing key information, everyone can contribute to changing deeply ingrained dynamics in our society.
The documentary Sportives sur l’Adrénaline will air in March 2025 and aims to spark a dialogue about gender inequality in sports. The goal is to raise awareness among the public and industry stakeholders—including event producers like us—about the importance of building a more inclusive sports landscape. In this series of articles, we’ll explore key insights, improvements, and potential solutions.
Women Were Once Banned from Sports
To understand the roots of inequality in sports, we need to look back. Historically, sports were outright prohibited for women. In the 1800s, physical activity was deemed dangerous for women by male doctors (women weren’t allowed to practice medicine at the time). They argued that women were too physically weak, that sports could harm their all-important reproductive health, and that muscles simply weren’t “feminine.”
Back then, even a light jog was out of the question—forget about marathons, which were banned for women until 1972! So yes, women are playing catch-up when it comes to performance, as they’ve historically had far less access to sports. Worse still, women internalized the belief that they weren’t good at sports, perpetuating this idea across generations. But this is changing, and we’re determined to keep pushing that change forward!
By the Numbers: Eye-Opening Stats
When it comes to traditional media, women in sports receive only 4–6% of airtime in Canada. As highlighted by voices in the documentary: “That’s nothing! Alarming! Insufficient!” Worse still, this figure has remained unchanged since 1989, even though women’s participation in sports has grown significantly over the past 35 years. As Annie Guglia, one of the four athletes featured in the documentary, points out: “The level I’ve reached in skateboarding is far from my true potential. I’m sure I would have been much better if there had been other girls pushing higher during my time.” This shows how important it is to have role models to look up to.
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An article published by La Presse last August acknowledged public demand for more coverage of women’s sports. François Cardinal, Vice President of Information at La Presse, wrote: “For years, many of you criticized us for focusing too much on male athletes—and you were right. By tradition, habit, and lack of professional women’s teams, we primarily covered men’s sports.” This underscores the importance of investing in the professionalization of women’s sports—something we’ll discuss in a future article. (source)
The gender pay gap in sports is shocking. According to Forbes, the list of the 50 highest-paid athletes for 2023–2024 includes no women. In 2021, only two women—both tennis players—made the list. Additionally, the top 20 highest-paid female athletes collectively earn about eight times less than their male counterparts. For context, tennis star Iga Świątek earned $23.9 million in 2023, while Cristiano Ronaldo made $260 million the same year. That’s a staggering difference!
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Prize money also highlights this disparity. In 2022, the total prize pool for men’s teams in the FIFA World Cup was $440 million. For the women’s teams in the 2023 World Cup, it was $60 million—just 14% of the men’s total. We are far from achieving equality. It’s more like a harsh reality check! In fact, the vast majority of female athletes are unable to make a living from their sport and must work other jobs, preventing them from dedicating themselves 100% to their athletic careers. And then people wonder why women perform less than me! It’s not that women are less talented; it’s that they lack the basic resources needed to reach their full potential. (source)
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In the realm of action sports, we were extremely surprised to learn that even today, according to the study Women and Sport: Findings and Challenges (Conseil du statut de la femme, January 2023), gender stereotypes are still very much present. Sports that emphasize strength, risk-taking, speed, and power are considered “masculine” and deemed unsuitable for women, who are instead encouraged to pursue sports that focus on grace, aesthetics, and expressiveness.
Lysanne Richard, one of the four athletes featured in the documentary, responds to this by saying, “I don’t agree! Come on!” Like her, we believe that sports are for everyone! Whether you’re a guy, a girl, or whatever, everyone has the potential to skateboard, climb, or race down a mountain on a snowboard. All it takes is practice and perseverance.
Fortunately (good news here!), women are reportedly the fastest-growing demographic in action sports! Over the last 5–6 years, female skateboarders in competition have reached technical levels that took male athletes 15–20 years to achieve!
A Cause Close to Our Hearts
At Tribu, we believe that the sports industry, in its broadest sense, has an incredible impact on society and mindsets. More importantly, it holds both the power and responsibility to drive the change we wish to see—namely, a more inclusive sports world for a more equal society.
Although we were among the first producers to introduce equal prize money in all our competitions, considering ourselves inclusive and forward-thinking on the subject, working on this documentary made us realize that, like many event producers, we still have a long way to go as an organization. That’s why we’ll keep you updated in future articles, sharing both our insights and the progress being made—because yes, things have been moving at lightning speed since the documentary was filmed!