What if a female gymnast wants to do the horizontal bar or other "male" events? And even when they do have the same event in name, like the floor, they're still different for unnecessary reasons. For example, women have music, men don't. Why?
Obviously there are biological reasons why women aren't as strong, maybe it's unreasonable to expect women to do a heavy event like the rings, but most events could be equally accessible to everybody. But the sport itself forces athletes into very gender-specific roles. I can't help but wonder if unifying the sport may help to reduce this kind of abuse as well.
There certainly is sexist baggage involving women being considered more "ornamental" though.
My point is, where one falls short, play to your strengths. Doubly so in a competitive environment. Nothing stopping female athletes from doing rings. Absolutely nothing. Just like there was nothing stopping women from joining the mens junior or senior VB teams.
The rule differences between ice hockey for men and women are such that I've heard it said that they might as well be different sports.
Let's talk about Beachvolleyball too.
The same thing that happens if I want to be a movie star or heiress.
Something is sexist when you create sex criteria. So the whole sport is sexist since you have distinguish between men and women categories in most of the disciplines.
Women on the other hand like it, "biologicaly" as you say.
Why is it wrong to have different events for men and women?
Yeah, that is why male dancers and male dancing is non-existend worldwide.
Or otherwise said, can you prove it is "biological" rather then cultural?
Delaying puberty will still be a thing because people that end up competing at the top levels start training intensely long before they are eligible to compete.
Its not like someone wakes up one day and says "I think I'd like to be an Olympic gymnast", trains for a few months, and competes at the Olympics.
Anyways, just because some participants may cheat doesn’t inherently mean a rule isn’t worth making.
Athlete's do doping checks all the time. Might as well do a single-time age check as well.
HN discussion on that one:
Pro sports have age minimums but kids start prepping at age 8.
This problem with women's gymnastics is the rules of the sport favor children's and childlike bodies.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/31/well/live/pelvic-massage-...
Sometimes the kids hide the abuse from their parents.
> “He grabs me by the throat with both hands and lifts me into the air by my neck ... I hear him clearing his throat, followed by the sound of spitting, and feel a thick glob splat into my face.”
You should read the article.
"He's yelling at me because he cares" is the same internal logic that keeps many women in abusive romantic relationships.
(I have a kid of each gender in local gymnastics programs and I have to carefully keep this stuff in mind. It's great that the kids are strong, and gymnastics makes people absurdly strong, but I don't think I would ever let my daughter anywhere near a high-level competitive program.)
My children always liked sport but I told them that this is for their fun and not a medal for the organization (they were never interested in the competition part).
They switched sports either when it was getting boring or they felt that the competition part was over the fun one.
This does not mean that they abondonned early, but for instance both stopped karate after their black belt, to do rock climbing or ping pong. Because the fun was gone.
Let's not confuse the issues and terms, please.
