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Why Is There a War on Cheerleaders?
Townhall.com ^ | January 29, 2019 | Dennis Prager

Posted on 01/29/2019 5:12:06 AM PST by Kaslin

If I were to tell you that a growing group of killjoys wants to ban NFL cheerleading, would you guess that this group is on the political left or right?

Must be the right, right? They're the religious ones with all the sexual hang-ups.

Wrong.

They're on the left.

And what's their problem with cheerleading?

I'll let them speak for themselves.

In The Boston Globe, Margery Eagan, Globe columnist and co-host of NPR's "Boston Public Radio," wrote a column titled "It's time to say goodbye to the NFL cheerleaders." She described NFL cheerleading as "creepy and demeaning."

USA Today sports columnist Nancy Armour came to the same conclusion: "The underlying premise of NFL cheerleaders is degrading. ... NFL cheerleaders need to go."

Chicago Tribune sports reporter Shannon Ryan wrote, "The league has shown only that it regards cheerleaders as pieces of sideline eye candy." To make her point, she asked, "why aren't there scantily dressed male cheerleaders and dance teams?"

Only the well-educated could ask such a stupid question -- because only the highly educated deny that, with few exceptions, the only people who would like to see scantily dressed male cheerleaders are gay men.

In USA Today, Yale Divinity School Director of Communications Tom Krattenmaker added a theological voice to the anti-cheerleader chorus. "It's time," he intoned, "to call this out for what it is: demeaning to women and an anachronism that ought to be beneath the male fans to whom this titillating eye candy is served." This sentence, and his whole piece, is what goes for deep thought on the left today. He doesn't explain how being an NFL cheerleader is "demeaning." He simply declares it so. Did he bother to interview any cheerleaders? I did, and the consensus among cheerleaders is that it is one of their greatest life experiences.

Jacie Scott, a black woman who retired from being a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader in 2016, wrote in response to Nancy Armour: "I spent four years as a cheerleader in the NFL, and the experiences that each year brought helped shape me into the woman I am today. ... I saw countries I never imagined seeing. I made a positive impact in lives, young and old, and I did it all with 30-something incredible women. I wouldn't trade my time as a cheerleader for anything."

What is demeaning to cheerleaders is not cheerleading but people like Tom Krattenmaker, Shannon Ryan, Margery Eagan and Nancy Armour who have the conceit -- and meanness -- to label these women demeaned.

I interviewed a former Atlanta Falcons cheerleader, Nina Ahlin (now Noa Hami), on my radio show. When she entered my studio, I was struck by how attractive she was 20 years after retiring from cheerleading, and by her modest dress. Regarding her dress, she explained that soon after retiring as a cheerleader, she met an Orthodox Jewish man, fell in love, converted to Orthodox Judaism and married.

Apparently, her religious husband, a successful businessman, didn't find this woman's cheerleading background "demeaning." On the contrary, like the vast majority of men -- religious or secular -- he was delighted to be dating and ultimately marrying an NFL cheerleader. Good thing he didn't go to Yale Divinity School.

It was clear that even now, as an Orthodox Jew who dresses in the long skirts and long sleeves, she doesn't find cheerleading demeaning: She sent me a photo of herself from her cheerleader days.

As she wrote to me: "I can't imagine my life without having the experience I did as an NFL cheerleader. It was literally life changing for me. The friendships I made, the places we were able to go and the people we were able to meet can't be duplicated. ... The thought of that being taken away from young girls who dream of one day becoming a pro cheerleader scares me!"

Why do leftists have contempt for cheerleading and cheerleaders (who, after all, choose to be cheerleaders -- and for virtually no pay)?

A Vanity Fair piece on cheerleaders gave the game away: "The league profits from selling a retrograde notion of masculinity -- big, strong men, unafraid to take a hit, surrounded by enthusiastic, scantily clad women."

Or as a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation article titled "Pro cheerleading 'should be abolished'" reported, former professional basketball player Mariah Burton Nelson said, "Cheerleading implies that women's proper role is to support men, smile at men and fulfill the sexual fantasies of males."

The left has contempt for masculinity and the male sexual nature that is part of it. The new emasculated man will not look at sexy women. And the new defeminized woman will not want to "support men," let alone appear sexy for them.

The left claims to be pro-choice. But it demands the abolition of NFL (and NBA) cheerleading without giving women a choice to be cheerleaders -- just as it never gave Miss America participants a choice when it abolished the Miss America swimsuit competition. Leftists believe they are morally superior people and, therefore, have the right to deprive anyone -- man or woman -- from choosing what the left disdains. The only woman's choice the left cares about is the choice to extinguish nascent human life.

Even if you have no interest in football or cheerleading, this should be your issue. We have to tell the left here, as in virtually every other area of life, and in the most forceful terms possible: Just leave us alone. Let us live our lives with our small joys. And grow up -- men like looking at women, and women like being looked at.

A world with NFL cheerleaders is far preferable to the world the left wants to create: a dystopia in which men and women are interchangeable.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial
KEYWORDS: cheerleader; nfl; sports
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To: Lurker

So now you’re not a real conservative unless you’re in favor of paying half-naked women to shake it for strange men on the Lord’s day. Also, Oceania has never been at war with Eurasia.

Did I get that right?


141 posted on 01/29/2019 8:14:59 AM PST by Romulus
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To: Kaslin; the OlLine Rebel; freedumb2003
Actually Kaslin argues as if something is wrong with you, like liberals do.

You meant the author, Dennis Prager argued, I didn't write the op-ed Sheesch *rme*

Oh sorry. I myself have posted articles from someone else and have been responded to by posters here thinking I wrote it it. But if you disagreed with any of it, you should left a comment at the top.

142 posted on 01/29/2019 8:22:41 AM PST by daniel1212 (Trust the risen Lord Jesus to save you as a damned and destitute sinner + be baptized + follow Him)
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To: Romulus
So now you’re not a real conservative unless you’re in favor of paying half-naked women to shake it for strange men on the Lord’s day. Also, Oceania has never been at war with Eurasia. Did I get that right?

Evidently that is what Prager and comrades argue. And division is actually requires in Scripture:

Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil (Exodus 23:2 KJV)

Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty. (2 Corinthians 6:17-18 KJV)

143 posted on 01/29/2019 8:25:10 AM PST by daniel1212 (Trust the risen Lord Jesus to save you as a damned and destitute sinner + be baptized + follow Him)
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To: Elsie

That is SO cute!

Love it. Like our original BALTIMORE Colts.

Cute, classy.

Might have to support it, even if it is in IRSAY’S Indy.


144 posted on 01/29/2019 8:32:26 AM PST by the OlLine Rebel (Common sense is an uncommon virtue./Federal-run medical care is as good as state-run DMVs.)
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To: Kaslin

Leave it to some of the miserable prudes on this thread, and we’ll eventually end up with this but with burqas:

https://youtu.be/5CaMUfxVJVQ


145 posted on 01/29/2019 8:35:13 AM PST by 2CAVTrooper (Democrats... BETRAYING America since 1828.)
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To: trebb
I’m waiting for Rubio to weigh in...

My guess is he would have the cheerleaders covered in foam...

146 posted on 01/29/2019 8:35:35 AM PST by kosciusko51
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To: Kaslin

NFL cheerleading as “creepy and demeaning.”

____________________________________________________

Do these same people want to ban pornography?


147 posted on 01/29/2019 8:40:06 AM PST by Bishop_Malachi (Liberal Socialism - A philosophy which advocates spreading a low standard of living equally.)
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To: 2CAVTrooper

Back when the country had a sense of humor.

148 posted on 01/29/2019 8:40:15 AM PST by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn)
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To: BenLurkin

149 posted on 01/29/2019 8:43:03 AM PST by dfwgator (Endut! Hoch Hech!)
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To: the OlLine Rebel

Excuse me but the cheerleaders are just as easy to see as the players. If you can’t see cheerleaders from the stands, I don’t know what magic let’s you see the game any better. They perform on the field during breaks in the game, and they move around to be seen from different locations. If you object to the need for a jumbotron or binoculars, why attend the game?


150 posted on 01/29/2019 8:45:23 AM PST by Williams (Stop Tolerating The Intolerant.)
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To: the OlLine Rebel

Good god, what year is this — 1922?

Cheerleaders are conservatively dressed by today;s standards. There are girls at the mall dressed more skimpily than NFL cheerleaders.

The cheerleaders today dress just like the ones at my very Christian college — in the 1970s.

I am sure we can supply burkas if that will satisfy your standards for modesty.


151 posted on 01/29/2019 8:46:07 AM PST by freedumb2003 (As always IMHO)
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To: daniel1212; the OlLine Rebel

I disagree with the poster, the OlLine Rebel, and have already recommended he/she begin with the burkas he wants cheerleaders to wear.

How I got looped into another discussion I have NO idea.


152 posted on 01/29/2019 8:48:23 AM PST by freedumb2003 (As always IMHO)
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To: Bishop_Malachi

>>Do these same people want to ban pornography?<<

The western taliban — apparently not limited to the left.


153 posted on 01/29/2019 8:49:24 AM PST by freedumb2003 (As always IMHO)
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To: crusty old prospector
At our school though, the real babes were on the drill team.

No pun intended?

154 posted on 01/29/2019 8:50:21 AM PST by freedumb2003 (As always IMHO)
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To: freedumb2003

It’s not just ugly women, the left is very much a radical homosexual movement.


155 posted on 01/29/2019 8:50:50 AM PST by Williams (Stop Tolerating The Intolerant.)
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To: Williams

>>It’s not just ugly women, the left is very much a radical homosexual movement.<<

I was speaking about feminazis — but yeah, perverts are the tent pole that maintains the left movement.

The pedophiles are making their move to be normalized and the left is embracing them.


156 posted on 01/29/2019 8:52:17 AM PST by freedumb2003 (As always IMHO)
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To: 2CAVTrooper
Leave it to some of the miserable prudes on this thread, and we’ll eventually end up with this but with burqas: https://youtu.be/5CaMUfxVJVQ

A false dichotomy, and your denigration of those who hold to Christian morals as miserable prudes means you are one with the liberal sexual revolution, and (perhaps) only a conservative in the libertarian or fiscal sense?

157 posted on 01/29/2019 9:04:44 AM PST by daniel1212 (Trust the risen Lord Jesus to save you as a damned and destitute sinner + be baptized + follow Him)
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To: Reily

That’s a good analogy. Maoist China. Hillary’s would fit right in. She can just bring her current wardrobe.


158 posted on 01/29/2019 9:40:16 AM PST by SamAdams76
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To: Romulus

I made no comment about what you are, only what you allowed to happen to you.

Best,

L


159 posted on 01/29/2019 9:53:31 AM PST by Lurker (President Trump isn't our last chance. President Trump is THEIR last chance)
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To: OttawaFreeper

Just EEEEWW!


160 posted on 01/29/2019 10:07:02 AM PST by Don W (When blacks riot, neighbourhoods and cities burn. When whites riot, nations and continents burn.)
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