The Neanderthal Football League

Ines Sainz is a sports reporter for Azteca TV, a Mexican television network with several affiliates in the US, including Austin, Texas where I would occasionally watch. This weekend she was the center of controversy because she was the subject of catcalls and other unwanted behavior in the New York Jets locker room.

Some have said that Ms. Sainz dresses provocatively. I would be one of the first to agree. She's a former Miss Spain and Miss Universe contestant who dresses like someone who knows how to accent what she hopes to accent. And if you have ever seen Azteca TV you would know that this is the style of the network. In fact I have never seen a Mexican or Hispanic TV broadcast that did not include an overabundance of cleavage, and that includes the news! She was dressed in her normal workplace attire, just like the men were in the locker room after the game.

The sideline shenanigans are another story.

This has caused a new storm of sexual harassment in the workplace/NFL Locker room talk. Let's begin here: Nobody deserves to receive cat calls or leering glares or sneering remarks about their appearance in the workplace. Nobody deserves that, regardless of whether they are a woman who dresses to accent her appearance (which Ms. Sainz does) or naked in the locker room (which the players in varying stages are).

But I want to make one thing clear too. Professional athletics in America are the last bastion of the great adolescent male. The great majority of these guys have been made to feel special, they have been catered to all their lives. They have gifts that are the product of testosterone and the training that only fuels primary urges and hormonal drives.

Can they help it? Of course they can. Are they expected to? Often no.

Folks, the genie is in and out of the bottle. They are expected to act like Neanderthals one moment and gentlemen the next. I'm not saying to cut them slack when they cross the line, just don't be shocked when they do.