The selling of Ivanovic--here we go again

La Gazzetta dello Sport has a new interview with Ana Ivanovic, and parts of it represent the deeply unfortunate marriage between the patriarchal view of young women athletes, and how those athletes buy into that view. The interviewer, Lorenzo Cazzaniga, cannot be blamed for the interview's title--"The New Lolita"--that was most likely created by a copy editor. However, the title was obviously inspired by Cazzaniga's opening line, " At first sight, Ana Ivanovic looks to be of the same ilk as those 'Made in Kournikova' Lolita types...." One way or the other, it is disgusting.

First, Ivanovic is not a girl; she is a young woman. More important, however, is the title's reference to a siren-like quality that makes grown men become fools and even criminals. This attribution of sexual "power" to women and girls (a man recently told me that "women have all the power," and he was shocked that I did not agree) in order to prevent females from having real power is the same trick that has been used for hundreds of years. And it still works.

For her part, Ivanovic posed for at least one Lolita-type (the interviewer's context, not mine--I actually know something about Lolita) photo for the story. And her very first interview answer is sure to set off some "cat fight" glee among readers:

Your future seems certain. You’re pretty, sought after by sponsors. People are talking about you as the new Sharapova…

It’s strange, Sharapova doesn’t say a word to anyone, whereas I talk, smile, laugh!

Perhaps Sharapova isn't talking so much because she is busy winning Grand Slam tournaments (to his credit, the editor implies such in his next question).

The interview on the Ivanovic site was done in English, translated into Italian, and then translated back into English, so a few nuances may have been lost, but we get the message: Ivanovic is the next big sex product of the Sony Ericsson WTA tour. She will make a ton of money, her photographs will become a kind of "acceptable" pornography, men will post on forums what they would like to do to her body, and little girls will be assured that--if they just stay away from French fries and wear the right skirts--they, too, can have this kind of "success."

A few years ago, someone asked Sharapova whether the tour was selling sex. "I don't care what they're selling," she answered. (I like to think she may have cared a few months later, when a Japanese company began selling a large pillow with a likeness of her breasts on it.) Now that girls are once again being told that it is their sex appeal that they must and should promote, sports organizations, managers and parents are complicit in the international marketing of young sportswomen with long legs, and with faces so unformed that anything one wishes can be projected onto them.

Ana Ivanovic is a talented tennis player, but that ultimately will not matter to anyone who does not closely follow women's professional tennis. She will instead go the way of Kournikova and Sharapova and become an icon of sex, and a most unfortunate teacher of little girls--and little boys. Sharapova, with her wit and intelligence, appears ready to transcend the world of cheap sex thrills, but there is always another "girl" waiting to take a big swig of the patriarchal Kool-Aid.