Billie Jean King Is Back on the Court—And Still Fighting for Women in Sports

Billie Jean King Is Back on the Court—And Still Fighting for Women in Sports

Still, King has never been just a tennis player, though she has enough personal accomplishments on the court to make her one of the sport’s all-time greats: With 39 major titles to her name (including one Australian Open, one French Open, six Wimbledon, and four US Open singles titles), she has the third most wins of any female tennis player in history. But King’s impact extends beyond her own life and career. Named one of Life magazine’s “100 Most Important Americans of the 20th Century,” she had a heavy hand in transforming women’s tennis into the sport we know and love today. Not only did she help found the Women’s Tennis Association, she also successfully campaigned for equal prize money for men and women and defeated Bobby Riggs in the infamous “Battle of the Sexes” in 1973. In her eyes, though, more progress needs to be made. “Girls are behind. We haven’t had as much attention given to us, in this area particularly,” she says. “And I know it because I’ve lived it forever.”

That continuing crusade is one reason why King has partnered with personal care brand Dove to raise awareness of the body confidence issues that affect a significant percentage of girls in sports. Based on research conducted by Dove and Nike, nearly half of teen girls who quit sports do so because they were told their body isn’t right for it. In a 2022 review published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, researchers wrote that most female athletes reported facing coach pressure to modify their body shape to better align with the purported ideal for their sport. “I’m so glad I’ve lived long enough to see changes, but we still have so much work to do,” King says. “We”—women and girls—“really are socialized not to trust our bodies.” And, she adds, “body image, body talk, how you think and feel about yourself, is so important in life, not just in sports.”

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