The "sexism" claims are heavily relying upon comparisons what McEnroe and Conners et al, did 30 years ago. The comparisons and claims are invalid for multiple reasons.
First of all, claims that these male players got away with it are completely false. The very first video I just searched for "McEnroe Outburst" and the first youtube video that came up
youtube showed him getting a point penalty for calling the Ump a "jerk" then a game penalty for hitting his own water cup with his racket. The second video showed him getting a point penalty simply for cursing in reaction to an objectively incorrect call that cost him a match point. Then the third
video was his disqualification from the Australian Open again for merely cursing after being given a point penalty for racket abuse. These are just the penalties that happened to come up randomly in the first 3 youtube videos I watch of "McEnroe Outburts", which means there are tons more. He was regularly penalized and often more harshly and for doing less than Serena did on Saturday.
Second, Serenas verbal abuse was notably worse than most of what these men did, and I cannot find a single instance where a man engaged in comparable abuse and was not penalized. As seen in the above videos, mostly what McEnroe did was use curse words while telling the Ump they were wrong (e.g., "Bullshit, that ball was fucking out!"). That isn't even abuse toward the Umpire or an insult, it is merely crude language. Telling an Umpire that they are a liar and a thief is to insult their honesty and integrity at the very heart of their job. It is about the worst thing you can imply about a referee or umpire in the context of sports. That is why the
Official Grand Slam Rule Book lists accusations of dishonesty and is the only specific type of insult listed in it's definition of "verbal abuse":
[P]" verbal abuse is defined as a statement about an
official, opponent, sponsor, spectator or other person that implies dishonesty or is
derogatory, insulting or otherwise abusive."[/P]
Not to mention, Serena directly threatened Ramos's job and livelihood by saying "
You will never ever ever be on another court of mine as long as you live." Beyond any violation of abuse rules, that is obviously going to get a strong reaction from an Umpire.
So, those claiming sexism need to show a male not getting penalized after directly accusing an umpire of deliberate dishonesty and threatening their job. I doubt there is such an instance or anything comparable without any penalty given.
A third factor that makes comparisons to McEnroe, Conners, etc. is that tennis generally is less tolerant today of abuse towards officials. In fact, it began to change at the end of McEnroes career. Most of his penalties seem to have come in the second half of his career and his first Grand Slam disqualification was at the end in 1990, even though his actions were not any worse than earlier.
Plus, Ramos in particular is well known for being more strict, touchy, and inconsistent with penalties against male players too, including Nadal, Murray, and Djokovic who accused Ramos of "double standards" in giving him but not his opponent a racket abuse violation.
A fourth factor that makes the comparisons invalid is that Serenas attack on the Umpire was unlike most of McEnroe's or other players outbursts who were reacting to either objectively wrong calls or calls they sincerely thought were wrong. Serena attacked Ramos for noticing the objective fact that her coach was giving her coaching signals, which she clearly saw (she described her coaches hand gestures during her tirade) and then falsely accusing Ramos of calling her a cheater which he never did nor implied (as the announcers accurately noted, the rule is about the coach coaching and not whether the player is trying to get coaching). Umpires know that they sometimes miss a call and thus are going to allow some venting over it. But when a player goes on a repeated tirade like that for getting warned for such an objectively clear code violation, it is going to shorten their fuse on subsequent violations. Plus, whether the ump got a call wrong is going to impact how fans react to the player outburst.
Most of these factors not only make comparisons to McEnroe but even to other more recent player outbursts invalid. What Serena said to get a game penalty was worse, more abusive and insulting, and less triggered in understandable anger a line-call than what other players (male and female) have said that did not get a similar penalty, and even worse than some that got worse penalties like disqualification.
