← This Is Woman's Work with Nicole Kalil
This Is Woman's Work with Nicole Kalil
Women In Sports with Jamie Mittelman | 320
00:37:57
This episode highlights the untold stories of women in sports—especially Olympians and Paralympians—who are breaking barriers and redefining success on their own terms. Nicole Kalil and Flame Bearers host Jamie Mittelman explore why representation in elite women's athletics matters more than ever.
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- [00:00]
Nicole Khalil
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- [00:52]
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- [01:31]
Nicole Khalil
I am Nicole Khalil and I'm going to kick off this episode of this Is Woman's Work with a confession. Obviously one I'm not proud of or I would have called it an announcement or like an opinion. But my confession is that I'm embarrassingly late to the game, which when it comes to supporting women's sports friend, not only am I late to support, I can even think of a conversation just a few years back where I told someone that I had a hard time watching women's basketball. And this was to a woman who had grown up playing basketball. I don't even know what that means, and I still cringe to this day every time I think about it. And yes, part of my defense could be that I'm just not that into sports in general. I mean, I love the team dynamics, the coaching strategies, the commitment that it takes to be at the top of anything. And I'm obsessed with a good sports documentary, movie or book. But watching games at home on TV or going to a game where there's so many people yelling and doing people y things. Yeah, that's just not my favorite thing. Most of what I know about sports today comes through Jay. And embarrassingly, that includes what I know about women's sports, too. Did I believe that US Women's soccer should get the equal pay that they fought for? You bet your ass I did. Did I cheer? When Simone Biles prioritized her mental health over the expectations of the entire world, I cheered the loudest. But it wasn't until JJ got into basketball herself that I actually invested my own time and energy into following women athletes. And let me tell you, just like so many of the things that are worth doing, my biggest regret is that I didn't start sooner. Because here's the truth. Women athletes are every bit as inspiring, tough, committed, and game changing as their male counterparts. Honestly, for me, even more so. They're putting in the work, they're shattering records, they're challenging the status quo, often without the recognition or resources they deserve. So today we're going to talk about women in sports and what will be the first, but definitely not the last, episode on this topic. And we're going to focus on the athletes. You may not be hearing much about the women who are trailblazing in their sports and in their countries who are excelling, succeeding, and changing the game, but you might not yet know their names. To help us shine a light on these incredible athletes, I've invited someone who's made it her mission to share their stories with the world. Let me introduce you to Jamie Mittleman. Jamie believes deeply in the power of stories to transform lives, and she's determined to elevate as many diverse voices as possible within elite women's sports. With a background in media, international nonprofit work, and managing a $30 million portfolio with a conglomerate of Yahoo. She holds a Master's in Public Administration from the Harvard Kennedy School and is the host of of Flame Bearers, the first global media production company and podcast for women Olympians and Paralympians. So, Jamie, thank you for being our guest and I'd love to hear your perspective. As somebody who's been paying attention to women's sports for far longer than most, do you think my admittedly embarrassing journey from apathy to interest is part of a larger, let's call it, global trend? Are more people finally starting to wake up and pay attention to women's sports? Or do we still have a very long way to go?
- [05:06]
Jamie Mittleman
Hi, Nicole. Thank you for having me. I am so excited to be here and talk about my Favorite thing in the entire world, women's sports. I love it. I think what you said is spot on for many, many people. And I think we are making progress and simultaneously I think we have a long way to go. And I think both can be true. I think that we saw with the Paris Olympics. This was the first year that we reached gender parity in terms of equal numbers of men and women athletes competing. Huge win. What people don't know is that the Paralympics did not reach gender parity. So we can celebrate that win on one hand. We can celebrate people like yourself coming into the fold and supporting their fellow women. We could also continue to call out, name and improve in the areas where we still have growth to work towards.
- [05:59]
Nicole Khalil
I mean, I think that that's probably true across the board. Right. When we think of so many things related to women and equity, it is that paradox of we've come a long way, there's stuff to be proud of and we have a long way to go and there's still some big frustration. So I guess let me ask you, why do you believe that it's so important to, to tell the stories and to be paying attention to some of these lesser known women in sports like Olympians and Paralympians?
- [06:30]
Jamie Mittleman
Sure. So I grew up playing every sport I could get into and I was born in 1988. So I was fortunate enough to have female soccer role models to look up to. We had the 99ers. This is the iconic team with Mia Hamm and Brandi Chastain. And that was so important to me because I could see people who looked like me and sounded like me competing at the highest levels of sport. When I take a step back, I like to realize and name that I was very lucky to have those role models. Most women and girls globally do not have women who look and sound like them at the highest levels of sport. So if you look at the sports media landscape as a whole, 85% of sports coverage goes to men. So I like to just call out the fact that I think sports media is a misnomer. I think that's male sports media coverage if 85% goes to men. Of the 15% of women who are covered, the vast majority of them are white, able bodied women from the global north who normally play soccer or basketball. Now, hey, I'm not going to knock on that. I played soccer in college for a little bit. I am a Boston girl. I am able bodied. But I think the point here is that it's a yes and opportunity. The aperture is so Much bigger. There's so many incredible athletes who fall into those categories and there's so many other athletes with vastly different experiences who we can learn from. So it's, it is broadening the aperture of whose stories are being told. So girls and boys from all corners of the world have role models that they can look up to who look and sound like them. So that's the quantity issue. There's also a serious quality issue in sports media coverage with women having their, their stories taken from them, their narratives co, opted, their words being twisted. This is something that frequently happens with Paralympians, para athletes. So these are athletes with physical disabilities and Paralympians are the best of the best. These are elite, world class athletes. Yet. Yet most of the media paints them with the pitty brush, talking about their disability in a way that doesn't always necessarily resonate with the athlete themselves. We see this with tropes coming around all the time with brown and black individuals. We see made up feuds being made up between women who have no feuds going on. So we're trying to address the quantity issue, but also the quality issue of telling her story in her own words.
- [09:10]
Nicole Khalil
Okay, I love everything about what you just said and I'm on board for all of it. And so it triggered a lot of different questions. And I'm going to go in no particular order. What part do you think we as the consumer of media play in helping to revert the attention to the actual story or the athlete story? But the thing that popped into my head is we do play a part in these made up feuds or what makeup they're wearing or, you know, if these women are being too aggressive, though this exact same behavior is celebrated, you know, so we as women, as consumers, contribute. If nobody was paying attention or listening or responding, these stories would change. So how do we, how help contribute to what's being shared?
- [10:03]
Jamie Mittleman
I absolutely love this question you mentioned. I got a master's in policy and one of my main takeaways from that degree was that yes, there are absolutely systemic barriers and structural things that happen. There's also individual things that each of us can do as aspiring contributing members of society. And I think the parallel here is, yes, there are systemic issues that are holding back women in sports. We can all blame the media, people outside that are not ourselves. There's also things that I myself, Jamie Middleman, who lives in Boston, can do every single day to help make a difference for a woman in sports. So the first thing is if you see a narrative that isn't jiving with you if you see someone miscovering and an athlete if you see someone not being covered while their male counterparts are being covered, if you see a commentator using language like girl or lady, or addressing the female athlete differently than they address their male counterparts, for example, just by their first name, not their first and their last name. Assuming a colloquial informal relationship, do something about it. Charlie Guest is an Olympian. She is a. An incredible skier. She does not have any ties to the media world. She was watching the FIS World cup last year and she noticed there was a serious inequity in terms of the time that the male got on, the men got on screen and the woman got on screen. Now, again, this is, this is an athlete. She has no ties to the media world. She wrote a letter into FIS calling out this inequity. They apologized and they said this year it will be better. So that's just one small concrete thing that everyone can do. You can literally just be a fan, a consumer. You don't have to have any political clout, power, media connections, but that's something you can do. If you're watching, if you're consuming this content and you say, hey, this doesn't sit right with me, you can actually do something about it. And you may feel like you are voiceless, but there's a lot of people out there who want to elevate that. So what I would say is Flame Bears is a perfect place to start. The next time you see something like that, let us know. We would love to amplify what you're seeing.
- [12:24]
Nicole Khalil
Okay, So I love that. My takeaways are point out something when you see it right, something that doesn't sit right or that feels inequitable, and also just don't participate in it. You think of social media and all the commentary about, I mean, just people in general and their decisions and their personal lives and blah, blah, blah. I think one of the most responsible and mature things that we can do is just not contribute.
- [12:48]
Jamie Mittleman
Absolutely. Coco Gauff, who is now the face of tennis in the United States, said she reads every single social media comment. Now, that hurts my heart. A lot of them are negative. Instead of piling on to things that you don't agree with, don't participate or contribute in a positive way. So you can, you can be an inactive person, you can say, I'm not going to participate, or you can actually counter what you're seeing. And I think, I think both are better than contributing or piling onto a dynamic that you don't support.
- [13:23]
Nicole Khalil
Yes, well said. We've talked about, we've made a lot of progress and there's still a lot of progress to be made. And one of the areas and you already said this is, you know, there were just some athletes that, that have women athletes that have become as popular or as well known that we've not seen very much in history. You know, you think of the Caitlyn Clarks or Simone Biles, Serena Williams, Megan Rapinoe, I mean the list goes on. And those are just American athletes. Is there an element of supporting these women and getting to know some of the lesser names? I mean you talked about 85% is of media coverage is on the men. 15% then is on women. And I have to imagine 14 of the 15% are on like 10 women.
- [14:09]
Jamie Mittleman
Totally.
- [14:09]
Nicole Khalil
So long winded way of getting to my question, which is why is it so important to branch out and just get more women on our, the tips of our tongues and knowing their stories.
- [14:22]
Jamie Mittleman
Sure. I absolutely love this question. And this gets to our entire ethos as a company of every household name that we feature. Like a Becky Sauerbun who's the former retired captain of the US US Women's National Team or Caster Semenya who's a three time world champion. We, we intentionally feature five to six different athletes who people probably haven't heard of, who don't have the same level of household notoriety, for example. And that is so important. Back to this idea of role modelship where if nobody is supporting them, if no one's telling their story, if no one's shining a light on them, girls and boys from their community don't know that they can do that too. We very much believe in that. If you can see it, you can be it model. And we're trying to show that yes, there's those 10 women who everyone knows and we are huge number one fans. There's also thousands of other individuals who we can all learn from and their stories are vastly different and their stories are going to appeal to different people. For example, Rita Assemwe from Uganda has an absolutely incredible story of defending her grandmother against thieves who broke into her house. She lost her right arm. She had to relearn how to do everything with her left arm and is now the number one parabadmin player on the continent. The people who Rita can speak to are vastly different than the people who Megan Rapinoe can speak to. And they are both imported. But I think that Rita can form a connection with girls and boys in a way that Megan can't just in the same way that Megan can speak to different people. So we're trying to show role models from all walks of life who can connect and inspire different generations and communities.
- [16:11]
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- [16:40]
Jamie Mittleman
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- [16:48]
Nicole Khalil
Notes of your burger.
- [16:49]
Jamie Mittleman
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- [16:57]
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- [17:27]
Nicole Khalil
I also think, and this is an uneducated opinion, so tell me if I'm wrong, that the way we interact with world athletes inside the US Is different than a lot of other countries do. So, for example, outside the US you are more likely to know the names of athletes in all sorts of different sports or whatever, not from your own country. Whereas here I feel like we are a little bit more insular. Like we know of some names. But does that matter? Is there something to be said for learning about the different cultures and languages and experiences and stories of athletes all over the globe versus staying so insular?
- [18:16]
Jamie Mittleman
Sure. I think this kind of makes me think of American exceptionalism in general. The idea that, you know, the world revolves around us. I think that is a very common and hey, this is. I don't want to get political, but I do think in general, Americans have had a sense of cultural imperialism throughout the world, where American pop, American music is the music that is listened abroad. People know American United States. Every single person knows who the US President is. Best of luck asking an American who the president of any country in Europe is. No one's going to know and the same is true of female athletes. I think it's a much broader trend that in general, people around the world know what's going on in the US People in the US do not really know. Good luck asking most Americans to point out where China is on a map. Not going to happen. Because I think there are massive opportunities and I think that it's important because women's sports experience are vastly different around the world. Again, this is not a comparison. This is not saying, oh, it's better to be an athlete in the US Than it is in Europe or Asia or Africa. That's not what we're saying. We're saying that the experiences are very different and we can learn from all of them. So, for example, Massimo Alizada is the chef de maison of the Olympic refugee team. So she grew up in Kabul, Afghanistan, having to dress up as a man to get on her bike because women were not able to bike ride. And anytime she went out and rode her bike, she would have to have a man go in front of her and behind her.
- [20:00]
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- [20:01]
Jamie Mittleman
And when cars passed, if they ever realized that, oh, this is actually a woman dressing up as a man, people would verbally and physically assault her. I like to juxtaposition that to a lot of the US Athletes we've worked with. And again, this is not a comparison. This is just to show that women's experiences around the world are so totally different. Yes. And there's underlying threads of lack of support, pay inequity, as we have seen in the US Discrimination. How that manifests is completely different around the world. So there are common threads, and that's what we like to show. We also like to say, hey, yeah, these are things that I think make all of us stronger. And we can realize that we're not alone when we realize that there's women around the world who are feeling this anger, who are struggling in the same way, but they're. They're up against different barriers. The through lines are similar, but how they manifest in cultures around the world and religions around the world are different. So I think it's cool to realize that we're all a part of something bigger.
- [21:08]
Nicole Khalil
Absolutely. And historically, I mean, I can remember we've seen young girls admire and celebrate male athletes, and we're starting to see young boys admire and celebrate women athletes. It kind of, maybe I'm just making this up because I want to, but it kind of feels like the younger generation. Yes, we want to see somebody who looks like us achieving. And there's also an element of like we're just enamored with good stories. And we, when we're younger, have a higher capability of learning from anyone or celebrating anyone that's doing something that we think is cool. Right. Is there something to this idea that we can all learn from women athletes? We can all be motivated by and celebrate women athletes. We can all enjoy women athletes. Yes. As women. I think it's a responsibility, one that I came late to the game to. Yeah, but it's not just a woman's thing.
- [22:10]
Jamie Mittleman
No, I totally agree. And that's why when I was talking about role modelship, to your point, they're role models for girls and boys. It's not just for girls who are spying to be professional athletes. It's anyone who likes a good story, anyone who wants to learn from role models of goal setting, of resilience, of overcoming trials. We don't tell stories, sports stories. We're not talking about the buzzer beating shot. We're talking about who they are and what makes them tick and what makes them such strong individuals. And that's something that anyone can relate to, whether or not you're into sports. I think that's the best part is these are just stories of incredible individuals who. That anyone would want to learn from.
- [23:01]
Nicole Khalil
Absolutely. And as I said, for me, I started paying more attention when my daughter got interested.
- [23:09]
Jamie Mittleman
Yeah.
- [23:10]
Nicole Khalil
And I'm not sure if this comes up a lot in your conversations, but as we think, you know, obviously not every young kid is going to be a professional athlete. In fact, most of them won't be. But what are the things that we can be doing to encourage our young girls as athletes? And what might be some of the things that we might be doing to discourage them or. Or make it harder for them than it even needs to be?
- [23:38]
Jamie Mittleman
Yeah, I love this question. The first would be to just be active and to give it a shot. I am not a parent yet. It is something that I am hoping to be in the next couple of years. So I can't talk about this from my, my own lived experience, but what we have seen is that at least at the highest levels, the people who tend to succeed are people who had parents who said, let's give this a shot, who are willing to drive them to practice, who are willing to put their child in a sport or multiple activities because they thought it would be something that would be enriching to their life. So the first one would be encourage your child to be active. And then number two, what I would say is there's studies have shown that there's a significant drop off around. Around puberty for women in sport. And that's usually around when women's bodies are changing and usually is coming from feeling uncomfortable in their body, amongst many other reasons. But I think if they have a community of friends who are participating in the sport and they feel like their friends are all doing and it's supportive that their odds of dropping off in sport are significantly reduced. So I would say think really thoughtfully around how you build that sense of community for your daughter or your son in sport so they're less likely to probably drop out when. When that time comes.
- [25:12]
Nicole Khalil
Great advice. And you know, it's hard to answer a question like that without personal experience, but I know you've interviewed so many athletes that I thought maybe you answered it beautifully. Okay, we've talked about a little bit of athletes internationally. What are some women's sports that we should be paying attention to that aren't getting a ton of media and that could include specific athletes, Special Olympics. But you know, outside of soccer and basketball, what are the other in tennis, what are the other sports that you're seeing? Some real magical things happen with women.
- [25:50]
Jamie Mittleman
Yes. Oh my gosh. There's so many. Too many to count. One thing that I would say, even within the worlds of soccer and basketball, we are actively working on projects with previous generations of those teams who are often overlooked. Even within the superstar sports who are receiving attention, previous generations have not received the coverage that they deserve, nor the pay, nor the accolades that they deserve. So there is still, at least from my perspective, a sense of wanting to pay homage to that generation. I would say within the context of the United States, women's hockey is coming up fast and furious and it makes me so excited, which I think is starting to take over the US and the world by storm. I think we are starting pickleball. It's not considered a Olympic or Paralympic sport, but it is one of the fastest growing sports. Wrestling. Women's wrestling was just declared a D1 NCAA sport. That's something we are extremely excited about. So those would probably be my top three sports to watch that are not on most people's radars.
- [27:00]
Nicole Khalil
Yep. And where does Special Olympics fit into all of this?
- [27:04]
Jamie Mittleman
It's such a good question. And this is a source of common confusion. So Special Olympics is a totally separate organization, not affiliated with the Olympics or the Paralympics. So the Olympics are for able bodied, elite, world class athletes. The Paralympics are for elite, world class athletes with physical disabilities. The Special Olympics works with individuals with intellectual disabilities. So we have not worked with the Special Olympics to date. That's something that we are thinking about doing in the future. But historically, we've just worked with Paralympians. So physically, athletes with physical disabilities and.
- [27:43]
Nicole Khalil
Olympians, you mentioned athletes that didn't get the recognition that they deserve. And I'm also just outside of Boston, and I know they're bringing a new soccer team to our area. And I know at least part of the strategy is working with some of these former World cup soccer players, like Lauren Holiday is obviously in our area. You know, things like that. So, Christine Lilly, how important is it that our sports are listening to, asking the questions to getting involved some of these former athletes to make sure that our future experience is always better than our previous?
- [28:25]
Jamie Mittleman
I think it is smart business. I also think it's just the right thing to do anytime, Regardless of what industry you're in, when you are working on something, you want to learn what has worked in the past and what has not worked in the past. And I think the individuals who have played before in Boston and from this area are a perfect place to start gathering data from. And I think it would be a massively missed opportunity, honestly, to forego that data collection if we want to put it in analytical terms. I also think that just from a, like, a moral perspective, it is the right thing to do to show how far we've come. I think the opportunities today are vastly different than what they were 10, 15, 20 years ago. And oftentimes it's the people who go first who get the short end of the stick. And I think there's a real opportunity right now for all boats to rise together. And I would love to see more companies doing that. As an example, when Kansas City launched their Kansas City current last year, I had the opportunity to work with the very first U.S. women's National Soccer team. So this team was founded in 1985. Their stories had never once been told. I tracked down every individual on that first 1985 team. And on Kansas City's opening day, they honored all those players and brought them out into the center of the stadium. One of them gave a speech and they had their photos mounted on the stadium wall. I thought that was a beautiful way to celebrate the present while also honoring the past.
- [30:09]
Nicole Khalil
Couldn't agree more. What an important thing to recognize, acknowledge, and also express gratitude for the fact that it's their shoulders that we're standing on. Right? Totally. Yeah. Okay. My last question is kind of a deviation, but when we think of sports, we often think of competitiveness, sportsmanship, Aggressiveness. I mean, there is a lot of terminology that we expect and use, but we mostly have used it in the context of men's sports. And my observation is often there seems to be some unspoken difference between, like, sportsmanship is questioned or called out differently in women's basketball than. Than I see it in men's basketball. Competitiveness, aggressiveness, things like that. How important is it that we think about these words and their definitions and apply them across the board or question ourselves when we're not? This feels important, but I don't know how to put it into words.
- [31:18]
Jamie Mittleman
I think I know what you're getting at. Men and women's sports are different. And we're constantly using the measuring stick from men's sports and the words that we're using in men's sports to compare and frame women's sports. And I don't think that that's the right measuring stick. I think the idea of framing women's sports discussion with the language, with the same framing that we have for generations about men's sports does leave some of the beauty and the strength of women's sports on the table. I think a perfect example of this in a slightly different way. I had the opportunity to work with Becky Sauerbudd. Becky is the former Captain of the U.S. women's National Soccer Team. She's a quiet leader by more masculine standards of leadership. Perhaps is not the most outspoken, is not the person you see in front of the cameras, but she had. She was called almost like the mother of the team. She had a presence that brought people together. People felt comfortable going to her. That is a form of leadership in my perspective, that is just as valuable, should be celebrated. But within sports, we don't talk. There's not a form of jargon that people refer to yet as that is a celebrated form of leadership in the same way that people talk about. About more outspoken captains. And they're great. But I think there's multiple different models here that can be celebrated and can help more women be more who they actually are and who they want to be, as opposed to trying to fit themselves into the. I'm an athlete. This is how I should portray myself. These are the expectations put upon me. As opposed to Becky, who's like, who am I inherently as an individual and I'm not going to try and fit into that box.
- [33:18]
Nicole Khalil
Yeah, great, great, great example. Jamie, thank you so much has come from this conversation for me. But probably the best part is wanting to have more of them. And I just think that there's so much going on in the world of women's sports that we can all learn from and benefit from. And I appreciate you doing your great work to highlight them, so thank you.
- [33:42]
Jamie Mittleman
Well, thanks for having me. I like to say the athletes are doing the hard work. We're just trying to give them the credit that they deserve.
- [33:49]
Nicole Khalil
Yes, let's do that. Okay. And if you're listening and you are looking for more stories of women in sports, listen to the Flame Bearers podcast. Or you can watch it on YouTube and follow Flame Bearers on all of the social medias. We'll put links to everything in show notes. Again, Jamie, thank you.
- [34:05]
Jamie Mittleman
Thank you for having me.
- [34:06]
Nicole Khalil
All right, as we wrap up this episode, I invite us all to reflect on the power of the stories we tell and just as importantly, the ones that we don't. When we hear about the grit, sacrifice, and epic wins of athletes, it's impossible not to feel inspired. There's our stories of resilience, of breaking barriers, of redefining what's possible. And here's the thing. Those qualities aren't defined by gender. We can and should all be just as inspired by women. As Jamie says, it's stories that ignite movements. Every time we celebrate a woman athlete, every time we share her name, her triumph, and her journey, we. We create something that's even more important than the game. We challenge outdated norms, elevate representation, and open doors for our next generation. And for me, it's a powerful reminder that paying attention, sharing, and supporting isn't just a nice thing to do. It's a responsibility, one that I was far too late to. And as the saying goes, everyone watches women's sports, and everyone should, because that is woman's work.