Jessica Bennett, Montville High School’s 103-pound wrestler, waited until Rich Wood went down to try to grab her leg, then launched herself onto his back, and got him down to his knees. After a brief stalemate later in the match, Jessica, 15, lifted him off the ground and took him back to the mat, for more points.
At that, several of Rich’s teammates, from St. Bernard High School here, looked down at their feet. There is still some pain in watching a teammate being beaten by a girl — even a girl like Jessica, who has won 23 of her 35 matches this season.
Well, yeah. As Roger Shaw, who heads a women's wrestling program, told the Times: “A boy who goes out on the mat against a girl doesn’t win. If he beats her, he was supposed to, and if he doesn’t, he’s dead meat.” Poor Rich Wood, humiliated like that in front of other boys. How damaging that could be to his psyche. But if he had beaten her, that would be damaging in its own way. For one thing, there's no honor in beating a girl at wrestling. For another, in order to muster the psychological wherewithal to compete on equal footing with a female wrestler, Rich Wood has to overcome deep cultural conditioning that will have taught him to think of women as persons men should exert physical labor to protect, not to conquer. The powerful and invaluable taboo that says men must never hit women will need to be eroded somewhat so Rich Wood can compete. Ten, twenty years from now, when Rich Wood is having a terrible argument with his wife or girlfriend, one wonders if it will be that much easier for him to give in to the temptation to strike her.
More stupidity, from the story:
One thing that coaches, parents and wrestlers — both boys and girls — agree on is that sex is the last thing on wrestlers’ minds as they pull and push and turn their partners, same sex or opposite.
“They’re so pumped up with adrenaline when they’re out there on the mat, they’re not thinking of anything but wrestling and winning,” said Gary Wilcox, Jessica Bennett’s coach.
I find that impossible to believe, and wish that Camille Paglia would descend upon these nincompoops and explain to them the intertwining and subliminal relationship between sex and violence. Having been a teenage boy, I can say without fear of contradiction that sex is never the last thing on a teenage boy's mind. In fact, it's at best No. 2 or 3, but never below that. I'm just an armchair psychologist here, but it strikes me as really dumb and dangerous to have teenage boys working out their competitive aggression groping and grappling with teenage girls. Boys at that age are in the grip of something natural that's more powerful than they can understand, and they live in a culture that gives them virtually no help in restraining and channeling those impulses into something constructive. Strenuous athletic endeavor is one traditional way of working out those tensions, of sublimating them. And now feminist egalitarians are putting males in the position of being aggressive and physically intimate with their female peers, in a situation of dominance ... or, in Rich Wood's case, humiliation.
Not good. Not good. Camille, help!
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Aaron is notorious for being strong, even when getting his ass kicked.
Nothing like laughing while being thrown through the air.
That I have no qualms throwing one or being thrown by one in training and competition has no bearing on my psychosocial conditioning to "protect" women. Sure it does. The very fact you are justifying it here by playing down sex differences is the proof needed. Men and women are the same in The Brave New Feminist World.
Sure it does. The very fact you are justifying it here by playing down sex differences is the proof needed. Men and women are the same in The Brave New Feminist World. Huh? Where did I down play sex differences, all I said is that my fragile masculine ego is/was not shattered by getting beat by a woman in a fair competition nor did it water down my "psychosocial" conditioning to protect the female sex. Try sticking with what people say rather than your misread insta-gut reaction.
Aarons post reminded me, and how I had forgotten escapes me, that judo was developed to give a smaller, less physically robust person equal footing (ha!, terrible pun) with a larger attacker. And that judo players have been playing co-ed well before Victor and Max were ever irritated by the less palatable aspects of feminist idealogy. Or that white crane kung fu, (one of Bruce Lee's early styles) was developed by a teenaged Buddhist Nun.
I still say I and my cohorts are better people for our co-ed contact sports, than we would have been without such experiences. And abusers by and large are born and bred in abusive homes with abusive behavior modeled daily by the folks who should know and do better. My 2 cents. If we want a more civil society that shows respect to its members then we got to lead the way by our example.
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