Women Wrestling .:. grubbykid.com

Women Wrestling

If you can, check out Girl Wrestler a short from Diane Zander which follows Tara Neal, a 13 year-old girl wrestler from Texas, on your local PBS station. The film touches, of course, on the impact of Title IX on girls' and boys' sports but also on how Tara works through a system which is both, brutal and adverse to change.

My policy on girls and women in such sports as wrestling, football, or rugby is similar to my stance on women in the military: if the girls can pin, wrestle, or chuck with the boys - let them. Same thing with women in the military: if women can kill people the same as men, they deserve to work in a forward position. However, we need to step back from these issues and look at what sport is. Sport itself, is the battle between two entities with the aim to win. Sport is the most beneficial when both sides have parity in ability, and most gripping when both sides are evenly matched.

With that being said, how do we allow girls to participate in contact sports, especially in high school, where there is a chance that girls will be overpowered by boys in many contact sports? I don't believe there is a "bright-line rule" which can be drawn. Where possible, there should be girl's contact sports available and as a last resort, allow girls to play on a case-by-case basis with boys. Seems easy enough, huh? If the girl can hit or pin she's in. Right...nothing is that easy.

It never is that easy because men, boys, and coaches probably won't allow girls to play, citing a need to "protect" the girl. How long did women fight to get into the Army, or into military academies? I don't have a solution to this, and in Tara's case, when she went to high school there were no other girls in her division, much less her weight class. She ended the season by sitting on the bench, and then later quit wrestling. To me, this is a shame: sport itself is not glorious - our exertion during sport is what is both exceptional and glorious and Tara was denied this. I am all for chivalrous protection of women, but they aren't fragile creatures for us big burly men (ha!) to protect. Again, if women want to kill (joining the military) or hit (by playing football) who are we to stop them? I have known many women who could (and have) kicked my butt - should we deny their chance at sport because we adhere to a faulty notion of gender? The answer is no.

An aside:
By the way, in the course of writing this post, I became more and more supportive of girls in contact sports. I just think that if people can play, they can compete. Maybe I am putting too much faith in people as being decent, fair, and adult about this issue.

Comments

bsqwared says:

i agree, grubby, that girls should be allowed if they can compete. we had a girl on our high school wrestling team at Eastlake North during my junior year, and she was a friend of mine. Though she was smaller than any of the weight classes allowed for, and had never wrestled before, i gave her a lot of respect for even showing up to practice every day and getting beat time and again. at the end of the season, she had not won a match, but i believe this to be caused by inexperience rather than gender. had she wrestled for years like most of us on the team had, she would have done much better. However, she did break the hand of one of the guys on the team, which showed that she wasn't there just for show... she meant business.

Posted by: bsqwared at December 20, 2004 1:57 PM #

mary says:

i agree with you...i grew up with three brothers and i can do anything that they can do. i was raised just like a boy...no special treatment. so now when i go to school and they say that i can't play football or wrestle, that ticks me off. If i can play just as good as any of those guys or better why not let me play. if anyone has a reason why girls should not play "guy" sports then please let me know.

Posted by: mary at October 25, 2005 4:03 PM #

Travis Gano says:

i agree, if women can do the same things as us, such as wrestling, let em' do it!

Posted by: Travis Gano at October 26, 2005 12:32 PM #

Emily Moser says:

I totally agree! Women should be allowed to play any contact sport that they want if they have the desire to play. It doesn't matter how tough the sport is or even if its a "guy" sport. I was denied the chance to ride rough stock at my rodeo camp because the one girl that rode rough stock was seriuosly injoured. Well the guys can get hurt just as easily.

I grew up with mostly girls so now i get treated as if i can't do any tough sports as anything like that. Well I also grew up an a farm and I'm a damn tough girl and just because I'm little doesn't mean that I can't participate in tough sport.

I'm doing a report on this because I get descrininated against because I'm a small girl. Well us women are a lot tougher than most like to think. We don't always need the men to protect us or anyone to protect us.

If a girl has the confidence and determination to play a tough spot than she should be alowed to play. The size and sex doesn't and shouldn't matter!!

Posted by: Emily Moser at December 5, 2005 12:49 PM #

MMtall says:

I been wrestling for years and my hardest fought match was against a woman! She basically destroyed me in the ring and it was an embarrasment to friends and family that watched the match.

I think the toughest part of mixed wrestling is to loose to a female .... I tried a rematch and that is the last time I will ever do that!

Posted by: MMtall at May 21, 2006 7:56 PM #

Cassandra Jarvis says:

I myself think that women or girls should be allowed to wrestle even though some people don't think so. It should be based upon their own oppinion and not anyone else's. And that if you want to then it's you and not someone else. If it was me then i would go for it and not back down from what i want to do.

Posted by: Cassandra Jarvis at October 24, 2006 8:58 AM #

Jodie Lee Hall says:

I happened to be dating a 4 time all american wrestler last year. It ended because his head was larger than his muscles. Now I can't tell you how much I would have loved to have seen someone beat his ass at wrestling. As many matches as I went to it never happened unfortunately. I admire the girls who go out there and wrestle. If one girl can defeat a male wrestler, than there sure as hell are others! I am all for female wrestling as a sport. I would do it!

Posted by: Jodie Lee Hall at October 26, 2006 10:17 PM #

Jessica says:

I my self love to play football and wrestal i helped my brother train when he was in both sports. and i was vary disapointed when i hit high school and found out the did not have a team with girls for eather. I helped some one 10 years older the me with wresteling and i pined himvary ofte. he was 57 pounds heaver then me. I'm vary happy I am not th eonlyone that is not happy about girls not being able to play contactsports.

Jessica

Posted by: Jessica at February 7, 2007 11:22 AM #

Toad says:

I agree 100% because a girl should beable to play football. I played football in 7th grade it was so cool. So yes a girl should have the same rights a boy!!!!!!

Posted by: Toad at February 16, 2007 2:21 PM #

Mary Kurt says:

Your totally right abot every thing.
I a girl wrestler would know this too.
theres not alot of uys that are wiling enough to face a girl because there scared. scared of what they know will happen to them if they losse to the girl.
and if there even is a boy in your divison some guys just say no I forfet the match.
i dont want to wrestle her.
no thats absaloutly ridiculous.
If a girl can wrestle...
why just limmit them self to that?
they should be able to do any thing they set there minds to.