Wrestler forfeits so he doesn't have to wrestle a girl.

[Coito ergo sum]

Male high school wrestler forfeits rather than face a girl --

http://www.suntimes.com/news/nation/387 ... -girl.html

I don't exactly blame the kid. It should be that if a girl wants to compete against the boys, then they compete like any of the boys would. However, I think the reality is that if a boy competes against a girl as roughly or unmercifully as they might against another boy, there may be problems.

I've seen it in other sports. Take a not so much contact sport like soccer or football as most of the rest of the world calls it. Some leagues in the US have young teens and middle schoolers competing coed. There are major issues when a boy runs a girl off the ball, or in indoor soccer, runs her into the wall. Boys will inevitably play tentatively when in the vicinity of a girl, and they are in a catch-22 situation - play gentlemanly and you get beaten, play hard and you're pushing a girl around.

I can imagine what a boy wrestler would think competing against a girl. Appropriate places to touch - allegations that a touch was intended in a sexual or molest-ish way, rather than a sporting way. Hurting a girl, and having to endure taunts about being a guy who beat up on a girl....all that sort of thing.

I am all for people competing regardless of sex, but it seems to me that this is at least an issue that needs addressing. And, I don't think that "it's the boy's problem he needs to treat her like an equal" is realistic - because he is still faced with the issues that I described.

I think the whole "faith" reference in the kid's statement, though, is a bit weird. I didn't know it was anti-Christian for boys and girls to compete in sports. Maybe becaause of the physicality of it?

Which raises another issue - what if the guy has an erection? Seriously - boys that age get erections whether they want to or not, sometimes. Just the contact of a penis on or near a female can do it.

[Cunt]

I think I would decline. Even if it were my sweetheart.

Oh, and I have seen a young wrestler joke with his (male) opponent that he was indeed gay and would be enjoying the contact (after said opponent tried to 'psych him out' by calling him a gay). Would this kind of banter be acceptable to a mixed competition?

[Coito ergo sum]

I think I would decline. Even if it were my sweetheart.

Oh, and I have seen a young wrestler joke with his (male) opponent that he was indeed gay and would be enjoying the contact (after said opponent tried to 'psych him out' by calling him a gay). Would this kind of banter be acceptable to a mixed competition?

Nope. Not at all. In mixed competition that would be Title IX sexual harassment, and would probably warrant the student being disciplined.

[Warren Dew]

I guess he didn't have what it took to win.

[charlou]

Others may differ, but he's made a decision that he thinks is right for him. I think that's about as good as this kind of situation gets.

[Azathoth]

I think I would decline. Even if it were my sweetheart.

Oh, and I have seen a young wrestler joke with his (male) opponent that he was indeed gay and would be enjoying the contact (after said opponent tried to 'psych him out' by calling him a gay). Would this kind of banter be acceptable to a mixed competition?

Nope. Not at all. In mixed competition that would be Title IX sexual harassment, and would probably warrant the student being disciplined.

Surely if it is classed as sexual harassment it wouldn't matter if it was mixed competition or not

[Robert_S]

I think I would decline. Even if it were my sweetheart.

Oh, and I have seen a young wrestler joke with his (male) opponent that he was indeed gay and would be enjoying the contact (after said opponent tried to 'psych him out' by calling him a gay). Would this kind of banter be acceptable to a mixed competition?

Nope. Not at all. In mixed competition that would be Title IX sexual harassment, and would probably warrant the student being disciplined.

Surely if it is classed as sexual harassment it wouldn't matter if it was mixed competition or not

Not necessarily, sometimes the double standard works against males.

[JimC]

I haven't wrestled a girl for simply ages...



However, as to the OP, there are undoubtedly many sports than can be unisex without any problems. I seriously doubt that wrestling is one of them...

Even fake wrestling...

[Rum]

I had a couple of 'best friends' (not girl friends) who were girls when I was on the point of puberty and we used to mess around and wrestle and stuff. I can distinctly remember some 'odd' feelings, not appropriate for one's best friend. not to mention stirrings in the nether regions!

Such innocent days..

[Coito ergo sum]

I think I would decline. Even if it were my sweetheart.

Oh, and I have seen a young wrestler joke with his (male) opponent that he was indeed gay and would be enjoying the contact (after said opponent tried to 'psych him out' by calling him a gay). Would this kind of banter be acceptable to a mixed competition?

Nope. Not at all. In mixed competition that would be Title IX sexual harassment, and would probably warrant the student being disciplined.

Surely if it is classed as sexual harassment it wouldn't matter if it was mixed competition or not

Yes, it would. It wouldn't be "sexual" harassment if it was a boy trash talking another boy. Sexual harassment in this context has to be harassment on account of the harassee being a male or a female.

[Coito ergo sum]

I guess he didn't have what it took to win.

That is certainly one way to look at it.

I expect, though, that a girl will some time soon, if it hasn't happened already, file formal complaints about where she was touched during the fight.

[Coito ergo sum]

NY Times Article on the topic from a few years ago: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/17/nyreg ... estle.html

[Warren Dew]

That is certainly one way to look at it.

I expect, though, that a girl will some time soon, if it hasn't happened already, file formal complaints about where she was touched during the fight.

Possibly some outlier will. Or possibly a boy will. Either way, the solution is not to prevent women from competing against the best competition, but to fix sexual harassmen rules if they don't work the way they should.

The rest of the issues are, indeed, things that the men should just get over. Take this one for example:

Which raises another issue - what if the guy has an erection? Seriously - boys that age get erections whether they want to or not, sometimes. Just the contact of a penis on or near a female can do it.

What if the boy has an erection when wrestling another boy? I don't see any difference in the situation - it comes with the territory for the sport. Given the disparity in participaton between boys and girls, there are probably more gay boys in wrestling than there are girls, so if this were a "problem" of some sort, it would be more of a problem with other boys.

[Coito ergo sum]

That is certainly one way to look at it.

I expect, though, that a girl will some time soon, if it hasn't happened already, file formal complaints about where she was touched during the fight.

Possibly some outlier will. Or possibly a boy will. Either way, the solution is not to prevent women from competing against the best competition, but to fix sexual harassmen rules if they don't work the way they should.

The rest of the issues are, indeed, things that the men should just get over. Take this one for example:

Which raises another issue - what if the guy has an erection? Seriously - boys that age get erections whether they want to or not, sometimes. Just the contact of a penis on or near a female can do it.

What if the boy has an erection when wrestling another boy? I don't see any difference in the situation - it comes with the territory for the sport. Given the disparity in participaton between boys and girls, there are probably more gay boys in wrestling than there are girls, so if this were a "problem" of some sort, it would be more of a problem with other boys.

All valid points.

Maybe it is something boys need to just get over. I can only say, though, that from my experience it's very difficult to "compete" against women in a co-ed sports. When I've participated in them over the years, men always play easier against women than men. In coed soccer, for example, special rules are created when women play with men, and you just don't attack the ball as hard as you would if a guy were there. It's sort of a lose if you do, lose if you don't scenario - if you don't go after her, you're patronizing her, and if you do and beat her then you're picking on a girl.. Maybe it's generational, and we just have to push through and get to the point where knocking a woman into the boards or smashing her to the mat unmercifully is not seen culturally as something that ought not to be done.

I suppose society is changing, and I'm viewing things through the lens of the 1980s. In my high school sports if boys played the girls of my high school as hard as they played against men, the girls would get pounded.

It also seems to me to be sort of building in a fundamental unfairness to high school sports to allow girls to compete with boys when they have their own leagues. Sure, it's great for women to want to compete against better competition, but they have their own league. So, if women start competing in the men's league, then every woman that competes there is a boy who can't compete at all (because the boy who can't make the cut in the boy's league is not allowed to compete in the girls league).

Maybe none of the concerns I mention is worth anything, but it's an interesting topic for me. It seems to crystallize for me the changing nature of our culture. A girl on a boy's wrestling team in my high school would have been unheard of. She'd also very likely get defeated handlily by the worst wrestler on the team. In the last 25 years there must have been a sea change in women's sports, with strength and conditioning really improving for girls. Very interesting.

[Warren Dew]

It's sort of a lose if you do, lose if you don't scenario - if you don't go after her, you're patronizing her, and if you do and beat her then you're picking on a girl.. Maybe it's generational, and we just have to push through and get to the point where knocking a woman into the boards or smashing her to the mat unmercifully is not seen culturally as something that ought not to be done.

I don't deny the attitude exists - I just think it's irrational and we should get over it. Personally, I'd prefer to get to the point where fighting is seen as something that ought not to be done whether the opponent is a boy or a girl - outside of sports like wrestling, which we can then recognize as a situation where those rules don't apply.

I do also think it's less of a problem in nonadversarial sports, like track.

It also seems to me to be sort of building in a fundamental unfairness to high school sports to allow girls to compete with boys when they have their own leagues. Sure, it's great for women to want to compete against better competition, but they have their own league. So, if women start competing in the men's league, then every woman that competes there is a boy who can't compete at all (because the boy who can't make the cut in the boy's league is not allowed to compete in the girls league).

I'm in favor of eliminating the girls leagues. I've never thought it a favor to girls to pressure them to abandon female dominated activities - like dance, for example - and participate in male dominated activities instead. It's pretty chauvinistic to be pushing girls' soccer but not boys' ballet.