How come girl dropout rates in sports are so high and how can we fix it?

Girls in youth sports are very important when we consider the countless benefits
that sports offer, such as leadership skills, healthy habits, and confident
personalities. Unfortunately, girls drop out of sports at a significantly higher rate
than boys. When asked, many girls express that they don’t feel accepted in
athletic environments, personally, I’d blame gender stereotypes. Growing up,
society already sets them at a disadvantage by encouraging them to be crafty or
artsy instead of sporty. To fix this issue we can stop the stereotype that girls do
crafts and boys do sports. Encourage girls to step out of their comfort zone to try
something new like rock climbing or shooting guns.
How come the numbers for female coaches in youth sports are so low and what
are the effects on our youth?
Female coaches in youth sports is unacceptably low, it’s even rarer to find a
female coaching boys over the age of 16. This could be for many reasons,
maybe women don’t feel secure enough to take over a high position or is it that
others don’t hire them to be coaches simply because they are women. Either
way, this issue is causing more damage than you’d think, not only are
opportunities for women decreasing but also womens’ perspective and influence
on the lives of our youth is being crippled.

How come women are treated lesser than in sports most evidently in the 2021
NCAA basketball tournament?
Footage from the NCAA 2021 women's basketball tournament went viral after the
participating teams recorded the HUGE differences between how the men and
women were treated. The men were offered a state of the art gym with tons of
weights and racks while the women were only offered a single weight pyramid
along with a few yoga mats. This is one example of many where females are put
at a disadvantage simply because it’s not stereotypical for them to be playing
 sports at a high level. How come the NCAA felt that it would be acceptable to
write off the women? I personally don’t know that answer but it’d be interesting to
see how the class responds.

Why aren’t more movies passing the Bechdel test?

To pass the Bechdel test a movie must contain, 2 female characters who talk to
each other at least one time during the movie and their conversation concerns
something other than a man. Surprisingly less than 60% of all movies pass and
some of the most notable movies are listed below. This test specifically targets
the idea that women are not fairly represented in the media. What’s interesting is
that according to studies, movies that pass the test tend to outperform others.

Movies that don’t pass this test:

-The Lord of the Rings Trilogy
-Ratatouille
-Avatar
-The Avengers

In regard to the article talking about gender-neutral toys, does it actually matter?
Do you guys feel like you’ve been affected personally by this?
The more thought I put into this the more conflicted I feel, as a child I bought
whatever toy I wanted no matter if it was labeled for boys or for girls. However
when going to another kid’s birthday party I wouldn’t dare buy my male friend a
“girl” toy or vice versa. I honestly don’t think it matters whether the toy is
marketed as a girl or boys toy, the only problem is the stigma of the kids who
don’t buy the toy of their gender. It would help if every toy was gender neutral but
I feel like we could more efficiently solve this problem without attacking the entire
toy industry.