Women have never been treated like equals in the world of sports. Statistics show that male athletes get $179 million more in athletic scholarships each year than females do. Additionally, in North America, collegiate institutions spend just 24 percent of their athletic operating budgets on female sports.

This financial discrepancy reflects the unfortunate long-held cultural perception that female sports are not as important, or as relevant, as sports played by men.

A USC study conducted in 2015 noted that network coverage of female sports in North America only account for 3.2% of air time which is actually down from 5% in 1989.

Further, when female professional sports are covered it’s all too often filled with sexist commentary, inappropriate interview questions, and articles commenting on physical appearance. This coverage not only trivializes a woman’s accomplishments, but also sends a message that a woman’s value is based on her looks, not her athletic ability.

#CoverTheAthlete shows what it would look like if professional male athletes were asked some of the same, real questions, female athletes have been asked recently by the media.

Viewers were then directed to CoverTheAthlete.com where they were given the ability to tweet directly at their local sports stations to demand better coverage using #CoverTheAthlete.

Over 1.5 million views in its first week.

Over 10,000,000 media impressions with $0 spent on media.

Over 10,000 tweets to journalists around the world demanding better coverage using #CoverTheAthlete in just 3 days.

#CoverTheAthlete was named the most controversial video on reddit as the film was hotly debated and extremely polarizing. The comment section was littered with hateful sentiments like “Female sports shouldn't exist.” and “Oh fuck off with this shit, not a real problem…” which only spurred on the supporters even more.

To highlight this divide between male and female sports coverage, we showed people what it would be like if the media asked men the same absurd questions that females have been asked by the media before. By illustrating how ridiculous it would sound if this ever happened, we hoped to remind people that this behaviour is unacceptable.

And then instead of just raising awareness, we gave viewers an outlet to do actually do something about it.

The film led to a website that encouraged people to tweet directly at their local sports networks to demand better using #CoverTheAthlete which sparked a global debate around sexist sports coverage.

In January 2015, Canadian tennis star Eugenie Bouchard was stepping off the court from an Australian Open victory when Channel 7 reporter Ian Cohen asked her “Could you give us a twirl and tell us about your outfit?”.

At the time, there was no major public outcry. But there should have been.

Professional female athletes are asked these kinds of demeaning and sexist questions all the time, but men are not. It’s hard to imagine someone asking Roger Federer to talk about his outfit, or to show us his six-pack right after winning a match.

This wasn’t the first time a professional female athlete was asked an inappropriate question that had nothing to do with her athletic accomplishments and it certainly wasn’t going to be the last unless something was done about it.

And for a young, female, creative team that grew up playing competitive sports their whole lives enough was enough.