Actually, only a few years ago, women at sporting events was unusual almost everywhere, even in the most socially advanced societies. No English lady would be seen at a Premier League football match. Try counting the number of females visible in this photograph of a crowd at a world series baseball game at Yankee Stadium in 1928.
Now, of course, women make up a significant portion of the spectators at most sports events. Is this evidence of social progress? Maybe not.
Sports management, the people that figure out how to make sports as profitable as possible, came to realize that there was a big pool of potential spectators home darning socks and filling coloring books while their adult male relatives were at the stadium. Why not make baseball, football, etc. a "family experience"? This they did, with special family sections, family ticket offers and ancillary entertainment geared to women and children not completely mesmerized by the game on the field itself. The children enjoy the opportunity to play grab ass with other kids and stuff their faces with expensive bratwurst and ice cream. Mommy orders new lingerie on her smart phone, confident that she can keep Daddy from stopping off at the saloon on the way home and make it to work on time the next day. Family attendance at sporting extravaganzas has nothing to do with social progress. It's strictly business.
For most women and kids, and even many males, who don't know an RBI from a sacrifice fly, attendance at a game isn't an opportunity to observe a contest between exceptional athletes. It's instead a chance to be in group of people with a similar desire, that the home team vanquish the foreign rivals. The details are unimportant.
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