The Art of Being a Female Hockey Fan

I am a passionate and dedicated hockey fan--I love hockey first, and my team second. When I watch a game, I don't care as much about who wins as I do about seeing a well-played game that is officiated fairly. I know the rules of the game, can differentiate between a "pretty" goal and a "gritty" goal, and I have tremendous respect for the history of hockey and all of the players who came before the players that I love so dearly. It's one of my greatest ambitions to learn to play, to further my understanding of the game to include a player's perspective. When I watch a game, there is no consideration for who is the hottest [read: cutest] player on the ice. My knowledge of the game has impressed many lifelong male fans, in spite of the fact that I've only been a fan of the game for about 5 years.

Respect for my devotion to hockey has been hard to come by, not because I'm a relatively "new" fan, but because of my gender. Yes, male fans see a woman wearing a hockey jersey and assume that she is interested in making one player or another a sexual conquest. I've had to pass oral hockey exams, administered by men, to prove that I am actually a fan, and not a puck bunny (hockey groupie).

It's an unfortunate fact that female sports fans are widely regarded by men as groupies, no matter what the sport is. If it's played by men, any woman who claims to be a fan is considered a groupie until she proves otherwise. I remember reading a list of "guy rules" years ago that included the rule: Any woman who claims to be a sports fan must be held suspect until she demonstrates knowledge of the game and the ability to pick a buffalo wing clean.

This stigma is perpetuated by the appalling number of women who cannot discuss the sport of their choice without saying things like, "So-and-so is soooo cute!" I understand that attraction is a part of human nature. Men are just as attracted to female athletes as women are to male athletes. The difference is that a man lusting after Anna Kournikova is just being a man. A woman lusting after Peter Forsberg is a groupie or a wanna-be groupie. This double standard is a way of life, and female sports fans need to learn to work around it and stop encouraging this image.

In any discussion about hockey, I can hold my own with any hockey fan. I will concede that I succumb to human nature and have found myself attracted to a player or two, but I keep it to myself. There's no need to broadcast to the world any attraction that I feel toward a hockey player. That, ladies, is the art of being regarded as a hockey fan who happens to be female, and not a puck bunny. Hold you tongue, keep your lust to yourself, do the rest of us a favor--we're tired of being quizzed about the rules and history of hockey.