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6/19/2013

Sexist Comments on Top Shot All Stars

By Gabby Marcuus

Gabby Franco of Top Shot Season 4, Gabby Marcuus of ArmedCandy and William Bethards at SHOTShow 2013While watching this last week's episode* of Top Shot on the History Channel, I was happily tweeting with fellow gunners. Then Gabby Franco decided to send us all on an emotional roller coaster, thinking that we might have to watch the rest of the season without her. She kept us guessing right up to the last row of steel targets but in the end, fellow "All Star", Kyle Sumpter put it best, when he called it,
...classic Gabby shooting...
precision, consistancy.
She sent home one of her closest friends, Chee Kwan. This  seemed to be a sweet flip, considering he was the shooter to end Gabby's run on Top Shot season 4. I'm sure the friendship between Chee and Gabby will withstand this victory. However, it was the the comments of another competitor, that made me pause as the credits rolled on Wednesday night.

William Bethards, the Top Shot competitor with snappy quotes such as, "Hey, diddle diddle, right down the middle!", stated that Gabby's win, "...really validated her as a female shooter." If twitter could capture a scream, it might look something like this,
"No William it validated her as a shooter**! That was damn good shooting for a man, woman, ANYBODY Why don't u hey diddle that!" 
After this past week's intense discussion about the treatment of women in the firearms industry I may have an especially low threshold for this kind of thing, but in my opinion this was blatant and sexist!***

One of the things I love about the shooting sports is that there is not reason why men and women can not compete head to head, just as Gabby and Chee did. Gabby shot faster, kept her cool, missed less, and won the event. It was Gabby Franco at her finest, but it was also clean professional shooting by a skilled marks-person. William's comment was the equivalent of him saying to Gabby, "That was pretty good... For a girl." But her win had nothing to do with her being a female shooter, it had to do with her being a great shooter.

Do you think William Bethards' comment
was sexist toward Gabby Franco?
[Tweet your thoughts]
©2013 ArmedCandy,LLC


* Top Shot All Stars Season 5 Episode 3 "Pick Your Poison" Original Air Date 6/13/2013

**(In hindsight, I believe I miss-tweeted. I think it's reasonable to assume that being an Olympic
shooter and representing her country at the Sydney summer games, validated Gabby, as a shooter, far more, than saving herself from elimination on a reality TV show.)

*** I am referring to a group of articles on Gun Nuts Media where Shelley Rae, Editor of Gun Up Magazine and myself, Gabby Marcuus, posted and discussed the treatment of women in the firearms industry. Here is a link to Shelley's post. Please note specifically, the fourth paragraph from the top.

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