It was during the Sydney Olympics in 2000 when women's weightlifting was first introduced. Seven years ago in Athens, women's wrestling officially became an Olympic event. Next summer in London, women boxers will gain take the ring.

It has been a long time since various limitations were placed on female athletes and long-held prejudices which today seem like a combination of ignorance and chauvinism (in the 1930s, Olympic committee members believed that women were unable to run distances greater than 800 meters ) were widely popular. Today, the number of female participants is nearly equal to that of the men in international competitions, including the Olympics and world championships. Moreover, the television ratings and market value of women's sports are rising at a faster rate than that of the men in recent years.

Nowadays, boys and girls take to the soccer pitch and play together. At no time in recent history have more women watched, attended, and took part in sporting events.

In Western countries, this state of affairs is plain for all to see, but it is also starting to be felt in other parts of the world. Media coverage of women's sports has also improved - though it still remains inadequate. Perhaps most importantly, money is distributed based on one's ability.

The prize money offered to men and women in major tennis tournaments have been equaled (despite the fact that women play less total sets in Grand Slam events ). In Israel, budget allocations are determined by individual and team results as well as the number of participants.

Women's equality did not come easily. In 1972, the United States enacted Title IX reforms, which required colleges and universities to allocate the same amount of resources for women's sports as it did for men's.

Here in Israel, the Ramat Hasharon basketball team petitioned the High Court of Justice demanding more equitable treatment from television broadcasting entities and municipalities which subsidized their activities. Government programs have been put in place encouraging greater female representation in sports management positions.

Despite the dramatic improvement in female athletic achievement and the greater attention that it has garnered, why does one still get the sense that women's sports suffer from discrimination? Why is it that certain sports continue to be identified with women, while most others are automatically associated with men? Why does the average sports fan prefer men's sports to women's? And would a sports fan tune into a women's game in, say, beach volleyball, for the right reasons?

The answer boils down to education. Despite all the breakthroughs that have been made in female sports, particularly in recent decades; despite the high level of competition and achievement; despite the efforts to attain full equality, a large chunk of the public (men, of course ) do not view women in sports equally.

"There are still men who think that a women's place is in the kitchen or in taking care of the children and the husband," said Ramat Hasharon basketball chairperson Rachel Ostrowitz. Unfortunately, she is right.

"We need to get to a point where people will look at women in sports, any sport, and this would be accepted as if it were a natural thing," said Dr. Alina Bernstein of the College of Management. "There are things that can be inculcated from a very early age through education and awareness."

"I have twins," Bernstein, a media studies expert, said. "A daughter and a son in first grade. The boy plays soccer with his friends, and my daughter is often met with, 'Why are you wasting your time playing soccer?' This starts at an early age."

Despite the importance of the media, Bernstein said she did not "think that there needs to be total equality, 50-50, in media coverage."

"Not all women have to take part in sports," she said. "But we need to break through this concept which says that in certain sports a woman needs to be beautiful and look good, like in tennis, for example. When a woman succeeds in other sports or is not good-looking, then she really isn't a woman. That's when all the talk begins about her being a lesbian."

Bernstein says the situation will be difficult to change.

"But education from a young age and ad campaigns are the answer," she said. "The media can help, but the media does not change reality. Legislation, including affirmative action, and budgets will also help. But there needs to be action taken from the most basic level. There needs to be education from a young age. As a mother, I take my son to his basketball team, and there are many boys' teams who are divided according to age and level of play. At the end of the list, without any variance in age groups or ability, there's simply 'girls' basketball.' In an ideal world, we would have a campaign that on the one hand would education children from a very young age while on the other hand there would be affirmative action programs that would elevate women's sports."

Dr. Moran Barak, a sportscaster and a former director of the Athena program - an initiative launched by Culture and Sports Minister Limor Livnat encouraging greater female participation in athletics - said that despite the improvement in budget allocations for female sports, there is still a long way to go.

"Money isn't everything," Barak said. "Shortcuts, like High Court rulings, are good when it comes to financial aspects, but a law will not change people or educate them."It will likely take generations for a real cultural change to take effect, according to Barak.

"We need to educate the younger generation toward social and cultural legitimization of women in sports equal to that of women in medicine or in business," she said. "If you take medicine 150 years ago, there were no women doctors. Today, you can see that over half of all medical students are women. There is legitimization for women to be doctors. It's a process. Women's sports now are where women doctors were 100 years ago."

"Obviously, these things happen much faster today," she said. "But it's a matter of two generations, maybe even one generation if we do it right. It's a matter of persistence, and the media needs to get on board."