Some.
Do all women lose their feminine reserve in playing sports? Hauling a huge load of laundry up the stairs?
I don’t see the physicality element as a “key distinction.”
It’s the striving for mastery or winning over a competitor that contains the potential abuse of releasing the darker side, in men as well.
Yes, thank you for seeking distinctions.
I don't see competition as necessarily bad, for males or for females. When I was in school, there was a lot of competition to get the best GPA in my class at High School. Competition can be good spirited and can help PUSH a person to perform better than he might have without it. I might otherwise be complacent with doing "my personal best" (as the new PC term would have it) ... which complacency would lead to my not ACTUALLY doing my best. Competition can push me to find my REAL best.
Now, the feminine nature IS in fact more inclined to turn competition to its "darker side". Why? Because they make everything so personal. It's much easier for a man NOT to resent another man, but rather actually respect him. Men could have their butts kicked in some area, and they can shake the guy's hand sincerely and respect him for his accomplishment. And this loss in turn can motivate him to work harder to come back and beat him ... but, again, with no hard feelings. With females, resentment and jealousy VERY QUICKLY creeps in, and it's very difficult for them to shake it. Of course, I speak only in terms of natural tendencies (due to our fallen natures). Some men are very bad sports and bad losers and get jealous, whereas some women take it very well.
But, even then, this is the case whether it's sports or beauty or academic accomplishment, or anything else.
As you very articulately point out, competition is not the key distinctive, however, when it comes to sport.
I also agree that a certain degree of "physical aggression" is not in keeping with feminine nature. Certainly, girls should not be playing a sport like football, where have the time you're trying to demolish your opponent physically. Other sports can have a certain amount of physical aggression in them, but it's not essential to the game, but just happens incidentally ... whereas in football it's almost essential to the sport. You're SUPPOSED to tackle someone. In these other sports, actions like that are considered fouls. Should two ladies be allowed to "wrestle" on another? I think not. I agree that something like that is also contrary to feminine nature, the attempt to physically dominate your opponent.
But take a sport like volleyball or tennis. There's no direct physical contact there at all. Or softball (although for some unknown reason a disproportionate of female softball players are lesbians). Sports like basketball or soccer are somewhere in between, where the intent of the game is to achieve some objective (score a goal or a basket), but there's contact along the way. It's incidental to your objective however. You're not directly attacking the person but are competing do something with the ball. You're trying to get the ball and not attack the player.
So perhaps the distinction Sean is looking for is "contact sports" ... even though he's been unable to articulate it. And perhaps another thing he's grasping for is the rise of adrenaline that happens during sports ... vs. intellectual competitions. But then, there can be a rise of adrenaline associated even with solitary sports ... like running. And also, as Mark79 points out, in a high-tense chess game.
Topic: Holy Family Academy - ANOTHER SCANDAL IN PHOENIX (Read 21968 times)