Speaking Their Voices - Goals for Girls

“Please Donate to Spread the Word: Girls Can Play Soccer, Too”

What would you do if everyone around you – even your own family – stood in the way of your ambitions simply because you are a girl? That’s exactly the question Argentine filmmakers Ginger Gentile and Gabriel Balanovsky are pursuing in their upcoming documentary film Goals for Girls: The Movie. Currently in production, the film chronicles the challenges of a girls’ soccer team from the slums of Buenos Aires struggling to play soccer, a sport that is off-limits to women in Argentina.

Despite the fact that soccer is a national obsession in Argentina, women have largely been kept on the sidelines of the sport. Unlike in the United States, there are no professional women’s soccer teams in Argentina and no laws equivalent to Title IX that would guarantee equal government funding for women’s soccer programs. On top of these institutional barriers to women’s soccer there are societal ones as well. It is less culturally accepted for women to play soccer and the sport is primarily followed by male fans.

In defiance of these obstacles, a group of girls from a shantytown in Buenos Aires have formed their own soccer team. Even though their parents would prefer for them to stay home and clean house and the neighborhood boys mock their practices, these girls refuse to hang up their cleats. Instead, they hope to continue playing and use the sport to climb out of the cycle of poverty. A few girls are even participating in this year’s Homeless World Cup being held this September in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

The slum girls’ soccer players portrayed in Goals for Girls: The Movie are sending the message to girls around the world that they don’t have to live inside the confines of the stereotypes that society often forces upon them. By proving that progress can be made when a group of girls come together to achieve a common goal, this story will motivate other females around the globe to fight for an equal opportunity to accomplish their own goals, whether on or off the soccer field.

The more girls who view Goals for Girls: The Movie, the stronger our communities will be. That is why your donation to the movie is so critical. By making a donation to support the production of Goals for Girls: The Movie you will help ensure that the film can reach the widest audience possible when it is released next summer during the Women’s World Cup in Germany. Your donation will also help fund an educational video workshop for the girls so that they can take part in the filming process and gain a valuable and marketable skill.

Please go to www.goalsforgirlsthemovie.org to donate today and help bolster the voices of this important girls’ soccer team and visit their facebook page.



Article written by guest contributor Emily Robbins, United States contact for “Goals for Girls: The Movie.” For more information please contact Emily at emily@goalsforgirlsthemovie.org.

Photo credit - Maciej Okraszewski