Motor Speedways make my head hurt

Next came the day which I loved to hate.

NASCAR has always been a secret point of tension for me ever since I attended a race with my family a few hours away from home in Atlanta only to develop the worst ear infection possible right before the event. Earplugs and chewable Tylenol were no match for the roaring engines of misery in my head for those few hours. Thus, today’s visit to Indianapolis Motor Speedway did not excite me to say the least.

Entering the museum for a quick tour the only item that caught my eye was the highest placing woman, Danica Patrick, racer in 2005. Our driving tour began next. This is when I felt a little angered to the point of committing an act of civil disobedience.

Our older tour guide hopped on and was a nice old man until some of his comments he made struck a nerve. Among several other facts, he told the group how in the old days women used to not be allowed to attend because they would just be a distraction. The idea that women are merely for looks hit me hard when thinking of history’s emphasis on females only fulfilling roles of beautiful seductress or nurturer. What if you are not “attractive” in the eyes of pop culture and you don’t like children? What does that mean? You are not female or a woman?

Later the guide made a remark about the lady with him helping him with the tour. He said that she tried to be a tour guide and wasn’t able to. The whole time all the woman did was open doors for us, the tourists, and there seemed this understood superiority between them. He treated her like she was just a woman who could not possibly lead a tour group like he did. I wanted to stand up and yell at him or assert my own intelligence in some way.

When he finally acknowledged Danica Patrick as coming in 4th place in 2005, his patronizing tone was almost all I needed to say something. It sounded like he might as well have said, “Awe, that pretty young thing put up quite a fight. Maybe the only female able to drive,” and I half-expected a woman-driver joke.

I thought back to the previous museums we have seen over the course of the trip as well as how far the women’s rights movement has come. How we gained our voting rights last, but how we still get paid less compared to men and have never had a woman president.

Maybe I should have said something or stood up to defend women as being more than aesthetically appealing. I did not. Why? Because the tour guide does not realize the language he uses offends people or is patriarchal. And, in the end, he is not a bad man. Next time, hopefully there won’t be one; I may commit some act of civil disobedience like Rosa Parks who stood up for where she belongs.