Having worked in a predominantly male environment the majority of my adult life, I am pretty inured to the way guys sometimes behave, especially when it comes to chatter about the opposite sex. Still, I was a little surprised by Friday morning’s “sports” discussion on KFAN.

Hoping to hear the pundits offer up some consoling words of wisdom about the loss to Houston the night before, I tuned into 1320 on my way to work. Instead of meaningful insight about the game, however, I learned that Google is a wonderful thing. It allows you to block and cut a name-like Alessandra-paste it into the search box, and find out all there is to know. Turns out she is a Brazilian supermodel, but the ensuing discussion included the statement that they should just forgo names (not sure if he meant only models or all women) and instead go with numbers 1, 2, 3 etc. Maybe wear them on a jersey. The guy followed up that little gem with the fact that he enjoyed browsing through Victoria Secret catalogs in his free time, though it wasn’t clear if he was shopping for himself or someone else.

Flipping off the station (literally not figuratively), all I could do was shake my head at the moronic quality of those comments and hope the guy’s poor mom wasn’t listening at the time. I know I would be hugely disappointed in my son were he ever to talk like that about women-publicly or privately. So I decided I would write a bit today about that radio conversation, if only to make a point with him. While supportive of my thoughts, I have to say my husband thinks this is probably a waste of time, has almost nothing to do with the Jazz or the NBA (not that I am trying to infer there is), and will just be dismissed as yet another example of male bashing-the other side of the sexism coin.

But while attending the Golden State game with a girlfriend Saturday night, I took the opportunity to really scope out who was in attendance. More men than women for sure, but still a huge number of women were there with their husband or boyfriend. And there were more than a few female sans male groups enjoying the game, like myself and my friend. Quite a few Grandmas as well. Even more pertinent, there were a ton of kids, five sitting in my row alone.

While I no longer feel that the world of professional sports is some bastion of virtue like I did in my youth, I still think it has the ability to positively influence our children. They need to see and hear adults treating each other with a decent level of respect, both on and off the court. That includes those in the media that surround the game. Women are sports fans too, and it would probably behoove those radio guys to remember that females could be listening in, at least if they care about expanding their audience. But more importantly, they should remember that kids may also hear them and give some thought to what message they are sending.

Off the soapbox now. BTW, the GSW game was a blast, loved the fact that Memo got hot and Deron was on fire. Nothing like watching a blowout in the Delta, I mean Energy Solutions Arena.