Parents taking issue with forfeits when boys don't join girls on mat

The Seattle Times ^ | May 8, 2005 | Linda Shaw

[beaversmom]

Girls who wrestled for several Puget Sound-area middle schools this year easily won their matches against boys from two private schools.

The girls stepped onto the mat. Their opponents from Tacoma Baptist and Cascade Christian stayed in their seats. The referee then raised the girls' hands to signal they'd won by forfeit.

[Feiny]

Markets don't matter with public schools. This also involves funding. Our schools are already cutting popular programs....why should they be forced to fund an unpopular one? Now...if someone started a female wrestling league outside of school...fine. Future mud wrestlers in training.

[Feiny]

I did a bit of googling & fond that there is a female wrestling championship. If these girls want to wrestle each other...fine. If they don't have enough girls in their area to wrestle...they need to recruit or travel.

http://www.tech-fall.com/2004seniornat3.html

[Feiny]

http://www.tech-fall.com/girlsregion1.html

[Feiny]

http://www.tech-fall.com/girlsregion2.html

[papertyger]

So far as I'm concerned, the traditional taboo against boys hitting girls is defunct. Any male children I might have will be taught everyone is to be treated the same. Female children will be taught presuming on the old taboo is inviting disaster.

[VermiciousKnid]

You misunderstand me. I in no way advocate the funding of an unpopular program. Hell...I'm not even a fan of the public funding of the schools themselves!

I guess my point was, that if they WERE to start a girls' wrestling team, they MIGHT find that it IS popular.

And of course, an independent team outside of the school would be A-OK, too.

Regards,

[grellis]

I'll admit up front--I know very little about wrestling and even less about martial arts. All I really know about martial arts is that they are primarily defensive and Kurosawa was a damn fine director. I think girls--women, for that matter--are much better off learning martial arts from men for precisely the reason you cite: If their goal is self-defense, they have to be able to defend themselves against their most likely opponent/attacker--a man.

Wrestling is different, though. The goal of wrestling is to pin your opponent, which I suppose is kind of self defense in a way, but there is just something...wrong about girls wrestling boys. The only time I ever see wrestling is during the Olympics, and I always think the same thing: soft-core homoerotocism. Opposite-sex high schoolers wrestling each other would, in all likelihood, remind me of that awful Meatloaf song. You know the one. Take away the mat, add a dashboard.

No way I'd let my boys wrestle girls.

[grellis]

Lib womyn practice feminism. We conservative women succeed at femininism.

[dervish]

A tremendous amount of wrestling moves involve a hand in your opponents crotch.

While I have no problem with co-ed sports in general, provided the women meet the existing standards, wrestling is different.