The Sexism Within Barstool

Barstool Sports is a famous and well known sports and pop culture blog founded by David Portnoy in 2003. Within Barstool Sports is also Barstool Smokeshows, a page and blog dedicated to posting, praising, and sexualizing skinny and pretty college aged women. Around many college campuses, it is not hard to find a barstool “Saturday’s are for the boys” flag proudly billowing or an embarrassing drunken video taken from a party being shared on platforms such as these. Although the company began as a way to discuss college life and sports, it has snowballed into a sexist and unfunny company which promotes and pokes fun at sexual harassment, racism, cyber bullying, drunkenness, and idiocy. Barstool creates a culture of toxic masculinity by sharing and praising men taking advantage of woman, making sexual comments, becoming physical with others, or drinking and doing drugs.

https://www.wcvb.com/article/barstool-sports/7800558#

A large reason for why Barstool is both unfunny and cruel towards women and minority groups is the lack of female representation on the writing and creating teams. Very few women work or write for Barstool and those that do are often harassed sexually or verbally. Little action is taken against the assaulted and those in positions of power, creating a sense of fear to discuss such attacks and disregard for those that are reported or occur. For example….

Because the writers and creators of Barstool’s content are one dimensional, often white, hyper masculine men, the content that is created is geared towards the same audience. There is little respect or room for non offensive, racist, or sexist humor and commentary. The woman that do work for this company often serve as visual props or objects to lure more men into viewing this content, rather than working alongside their male counterparts to rebrand the companies culture and image (even the merchandise Barstool creates is sexist, as seen by their misogynistic tops and tapestry’s). If women however were given a voice within this company, it would be extremely beneficial to barstool. Being more inclusive of different genders, races, sexualities, and cultures would increase Barstool’s views and fanbase. Jokes would be funny and relatable without being sexist or offensive. Barstool has a large influence on the young men who consume it, and thus should make sure to post content that does not reinforce rape culture and toxic masculinity.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/inside-barstool-sports-culture-of-online-hate-they-treat-sexual-harassment-and-cyberbullying-as-a-game

8 Replies to “The Sexism Within Barstool”

  1. Very interesting and not cool, I didn’t know really anything about barstool but I’m glad I understand now it’s something to really think about.

  2. This was super eye opening to read! I do not really watch barstool or follow any of their accounts but have heard of their content through other people. However, I did not realize how bad this actually was! I also was surprised to find out that it has been a company since 2003, I thought it was started more recently. It is really sad that companies like this still exist and continue to perpetuate sexism and harassment. I’m shocked it has gone so unnoticed and that people still take in this content. It is a great example of how the audiences are the same type of people making the content, which is most of the time straight privileged white men.

  3. Great post! I’ve only skimmed across their instagram a couple times and I was really lacking an appreciation or interest in their content. They do seem very immature as a company and don’t really share anything useful or revolutionary. Honestly it just seems like an Alcoholic Awareness club but without any of the awareness or effort to get better. Pretty strange to see them normalizing and encourage heavy drinking to students who are very young and shouldn’t be consuming large amount of alcohol. I don’t even want to get into the sexualized and sexist side. Thanks for sharing!

  4. I am not sure that a site as toxic as Barstool could ever reach a point in which it moves away from the behavior that seems to be at its core. Nowhere, should the behavior of harassment and bullying be promoted, and Barstool thrives on that behavior. Barstool simply needs to end, for it, and the toxic culture it promotes, have no place.

  5. This was a really interesting read, I do not follow any Barstool accounts but sometimes my friends will send me some of the content from there sometimes. I definitely agree that I think that they need to change the way that they do things, also I wonder if the university specific Barstool accounts are associated with the main one? I know for a fact that some of the photos posted on our university’s barstool are posted without consent from those in the photos, even if those in the photos aren’t recognizable. Sometimes the caption will be entirely fake and unrelated to the photo as well. Great article and great work!

  6. Ah Barstool… I always love a good meme but I can understand how Barstool can cross the line. I agree that Barstool can be highly problematic, BUT I don’t think they would ever consider branching out and being more inclusive BECAUSE they’re purpose is rooted in all the racist and sexist content they post. They’re essentially a voice for people who think like them… if that makes sense. BUT I do think something should be done about the hyper masculinity and rape culture messages that they promote

  7. I totally can see how Barstool can be offensive and overtly sexist. While I do admire the idea of having a social media site for the college community to interact and share, Barstool does not seem like the most healthy and inclusive choice for doing so. They typically cater to the frat community and focus on the partying aspect of college, while there are other communities within college that are fun and are more deserving of recognition.

  8. I barely know about Barstool, but I’m not sure if they will fix their problematic traits… I’m glad I got to know more about Barstool because now I know what to avoid in the future!

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