Hoop dreams aren’t just for boys.
Coming off of hosting his first-annual basketball camp for girls, Golden State Warrior Stephen Curry has penned a moving op-ed for the Players Tribune on the importance of gender equality, and closing the opportunity gap as well as the pay gap.
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“I think it’s important that we all come together to figure out how we can make that possible, as soon as possible,” wrote Curry in his essay. “Not just as ‘fathers of daughters,’ or for those sorts of reasons. And not just on Women’s Equality Day. Every day — that’s when we need to be working to close the pay gap in this country. Because every day is when the pay gap is affecting women. And every day is when the pay gap is sending the wrong message to women about who they are, and how they’re valued, and what they can or cannot become.”
The basketball star went on to describe how seeing the world through his daughters’ eyes has expanded his awareness of the challenges they both will face under current social structures, and shared his desire for a country that promotes inclusion.
This is personal. https://t.co/PbJlSk95R3
— Stephen Curry (@StephenCurry30) August 26, 2018
“So that when someone sees an NBA player is hosting a camp, now, you know — maybe they won’t automatically assume it’s for boys,” continued Curry, whose camp coordinated 200 hoop-loving young girls. “And so eventually we can get to a place where the women’s game, it isn’t ‘women’s basketball.’ It’s just basketball. Played by women, and celebrated by everyone.”
The girls who attended his camp were not only devoted to enhancing their game on the court, he noted, but also inquisitive when it came to navigating life in the business world.
In a Q&A coordinated between the camp and Ariel Johnson Lin, a VP at JPMorgan Chase , one 14-year-old camper asked how to present ideas in the workplace or boardroom where significant gender imbalances exist.
“Questions like hers — those really are the questions that young women continue to have to ask about the workplace in 2018,” wrote Curry. “And that’s because it’s still so deeply ingrained in them, even in 2018, that inequality is just a thing you have to come to expect.”
But Curry doesn’t believe that should be the norm moving forward and is calling upon his peers and fans to take steps toward change.
“I’m feeling more driven than ever — to help out women who are working toward progress, in any way that I can,” he said. “Let’s work to close the opportunity gap. Let’s work to close the pay gap. And let’s work together on this. I mean, ‘women deserve equality’ — that’s not politics, right? That’s not something that people are actually disagreeing on, is it? It can’t be.”