Minister: Women should be offered 'feminine' sports

After sport and equality minister Helen Grant suggested that feminine sports like Zumba and cheerleading should be offered to more women in a bid to narrow the gender gap in sport, we asked ITV News Facebook page users if that was the best way to get women into sport:

• Teresa Quintela: I think they should be getting girls into more male dominated sports. I play ice hockey and with all the discrimination and loopholes girls have to jump through to be able to play it's no wonder they don't re-education is needed from grass roots. No sport should be gender specific!

• Wayne Baker: Creating 'feminine' sports will only widen the gap. If a woman wants to enter a sport...she should just enter it!
• Lauren Ireta Mundy: Like what extreme nail painting? Do me a favour! Girls are just as good as boys at everything if not better!

• Sarah Jane Roots: No. the best way to get women into sport is to support more women's teams. The British women's football, rugby and crickets teams always come higher than the men's.

You can join the conversation in the ITV News Facebook page.

Read more: Minister: Women should be offered 'feminine' sports

Sports minister Helen Grant has said her comments about getting women into sport have been 'taken out of context'.

Comments made by sports and equalities minister Helen Grant have been criticised by anti-sexism campaigners as "discouraging" at a time when female Olympians are leading the glory for Britain at the Sochi games.

Founder of the Everyday Sexism Project, Laura Bates, said: "It's really the wrong approach to suggest that the only way for women to get involved in sports is to be girlie and feminine."It's actually discouraging for a minister to say this.

"With our great athletes performing fantastically at the Olympics, we still see media outlets focusing on the looks and femininity, which the comments seem to do too."

Lizzy Yarnold, 25, won the country's first gold medal at the Winter Olympics in the skeleton while Jenny Jones took a bronze in snowboard slopestyle and so did the female curling team.

Speaking of a recent YMCA rollerblading event for girls aged between seven and 17 Helen Grant said:

Ms Grant added that the media needs to increase its coverage of female sport and businesses also need to offer support through sponsorship.

The sports and equalities minister has said feminine sports like Zumba and cheerleading should be offered in a bid to narrow the gender gap in sport.

Helen Grant said women should be given "what they want" when it comes to sport and not forced to take part in football or swimming, adding that they can still look "absolutely radiant".

She made the comments to The Daily Telegraph in an interview about how to increase the number of women taking part in sport, highlighting that 1.8 million more men than women play sport regularly.

"[Women] don't have to feel unfeminine," she said."There are some wonderful sports which you can do and perform to a very high level and I think those participating look absolutely radiant and very feminine such as ballet, gymnastics, cheerleading and even roller-skating.

"We really need to take a step back and actually ask women what they want and give it to them."Whether it's a Zumba class or a game of rounders after they've dropped the kids off. That's the approach we need to take - what works for them."