REFLECTIONS ON FEMALE SPORTS PARTICIPATION
During the Great Depression mothers stayed at home and children played on the sidewalks and streets of their neighborhoods. With little money available for toys and games, boys and girls had to determine how to entertain themselves while under the watchful eye of their mothers or neighborhood women
Boys and girls naturally gravitated towards activities for which they had a physical and mental inclinations. Even at the pre-school age girls had relatively broader hips and narrower shoulders than boys, which gave them an advantage at activities requiring balance such as hop-scotch and jump rope. They also had the ability to do cartwheels easily, which they tended do instinctively. Girls also sang songs and usually accompanied them with some sort of rhythmic physical activity.
Boys tended to competitive activities that required strength, endurance, and courage; however, these traits did not manifest strongly until their sixth year. Boys and girls usually played together through the age of six, but by the age of seven if a boy was caught playing with the girls he was labeled a sissy. At that age boys began exhibiting their competitive natures and began playing marbles, card games, running races, and cops and robbers. They started to have team activities, such as stoop ball, sandlot baseball, touch football, or basketball in the park playground.
Boys become involved in sports instinctively as part of their preparation to fulfill their role in propagating and preserving the species. Sporting events in most indigenous societies were less a function of entertainment than an opportunity for the elders of the tribe to evaluate young men concerning their ability to eventually contribute to the larger societal order. It also gave young women the opportunity to review which men they would consider good marriage prospects. We will come back for another look at the gender activities of indigenous societies later.
Men’s sports were designed to develop the manly attributes necessary for the propagation and preservation of the species. There isn’t any functional purpose for women to engage in men’s sports: it is an aberration of human behavior that causes mutations to their bodies, inhibits their fertility, creates difficulty in having natural child births, and limits their ability to breast feed their children. As girls they become prone to physical injuries − especially damage to their knees − as a result of engaging in activities designed for men’s bodies.
Another aspect of male sporting activities unnatural for women consists of the ability to create and maintain teams. Males of all species have a natural ability and inclination to create structure. Men created every organizational structure that exists. Women not only do not create structure, they need structures in which to function. Secondly, at the age when boys begin forming teams, clubs, and gangs, girls begin establishing cliques. They have cliques in kindergarten, grade school, college, at work, and every institution that they belong to. Scientific research indicates that boys tend to associate in groups of 8 to 12 whereas girls tend to associate in groups of 3 or 4. There are few teams that can be made of groups of 3 or 4, but many teams can be made of groups of 8 to 12.
The physical participation of women in men’s sports is an aberration of human activity and the association of women into large groups is an anomaly. These unnatural activities exact negative mental, physical, and emotional tolls on women.
Returning to an examination of most indigenous societies we find women do not engage in male type sports activities. On the contrary, as they approach the age of maturation every effort is made to treat a woman’s physical and emotional well-being in a manner that will enable her to become fertile and have a successful pregnancy. Marriage, birth, and the rearing of children are sacred occurrences and activities in most primitive societies, and tribal activities focus around those events. Men provide the environment and means for women to bring forth life and nurture it; that is the gender partnership of human existence.
E.G.
