So, this morning, I get up, and because I am a good internet zombie, I unlock my phone and see alerts.
Notifications all over Facebook.
The damn icon is covered with flags.
Festooned, as it were, with bunting and banners, begging me to pay attention to it.
So, because it was 5:30 in the morning and I wasn't in a rush, I did.
The first thing I see is this article on Reason.com about that amazing girl competing in American Ninja Warrior, Kacy Catanzaro.
Now, that woman is very, very impressive. She's 5 feet tall - that's five feet, no inches - and weighs 100 pounds.
She's also farther along in the competition than any female has ever gone, and farther than most men ever get also.
If you're not familiar, ANW is, basically, a really huge, angry, and extremely disinterested obstacle course designed by sadists. There's no teams; no coaches, or help; no competitors trying to bring you down. It's just you versus the course; either you complete the obstacle in front of you, or you don't.
Kacy is 24.
She's the first woman to reach the finals; only one obstacle course stands between her and a win.
Let me show you just how amazing an athletic achievement this really has been, from her, for those of you who don't watch the show.
So, yeah. At this point, even if she doesn't win, even if she doesn't complete the final obstacle course, she's made history. And she's fucking awesome.
Unfortunately, the article author at Reason.com doesn't understand some fundamental things about ANW, and it's led him to make some really, really wrong conclusions. Mainly, he tries to use Kacy as an example to prove that women can - and therefore should - compete directly against men in sports.
Let's examine that concept, because even if you looked at that and said "Um, what? That's crazy," you may not realize how crazy - and wrong - it really is, and why.
In American Ninja Warrior, the only factor in which Kacy is "competing" against men is time.
The whole way, she's not trying to carry as much weight as a man, she's not trying to run as fast as a man, she's not trying to throw or kick something as far, none of that. Her main obstacle, boiled down, is her own body weight, and it's competing against her agility, strength, speed, and spatial sense.
Just the same as each man, going through the same obstacles, is facing the exact same calculation.
ANW is, in that sense, a unique way for a woman to "compete against" a man athletically, because it doesn't require a direct physical comparison.
Why is that relevant?
Sports are gender-segregated for a very good reason. Let me break down some facts for you.
For example, powerlifting. The Olympics keeps records for two weightlifting events - the snatch, and the clean and jerk.
For men and women both, the events are segregated by weight class; although this comparison won't be perfect, because the weight classes don't align perfectly, I will give the edge on weight to the women, and let's see what happens.
Let me remind you that these are Olympians; these are the most finely trained men and women in the world, not your average Joes and Janes. These people are competing at the very tip-top of their craft, in the peak of their physical condition.
Women's second highest weight class is 75 Kg / 165#. The comparable men's class is 69 Kg / 152#. (There's a men's 77 Kg / 169# class, but I want the girls to have the advantage.)
Snatch: Men, 165 Kg / 363#; Women, 131 Kg / 288#.
Clean and Jerk: Men, 196 Kg / 432#; Women, 161 Kg / 354#.
Now, there's a weight advantage to the women, and they got schooled. Now you may be asking why I chose the second-highest women's weight class; it's because the highest is "over 75 Kg / 165#."
There are several more men's weight classes; 77 Kg / 169#, 85Kg / 187#, 94Kg / 207#, 105Kg / 231#, and "over 105 Kg / 231#."
So, what's the current women's world record?
The current world record holder for women's powerlifting is a Chinese lifter named Zhou Lulu. She weighs 133Kg / 293#, and her record currently stands at 187Kg / 412# for the Clean and Jerk. That's a tremendous lift, and well to be admired.
The reason she shouldn't be competing directly against the men is that the men's world record holder is a beast named Hossein Rezazadeh, from Iran, who weighs 335#, almost 50 pounds more than Zhou Lulu, and Clean and Jerked 263Kg / 580# for the record.
To put that in perspective, Zhou Lulu may bear the distinction of being the strongest woman on planet earth, and she was outlifted by Galabin Boevski from Bulgaria, who weighs 152#.
That's a lot of numbers.
Galabin Boevski weighs a little more than half as much as the strongest woman in the world, and he's stronger than she is, in a provable, demonstrable sense.
The fastest female runner on earth is Florence Griffith-Joyner, who ran the 200m in 21.34 seconds. The men's record holder is Usain Bolt, who ran it in 19.19.
That doesn't seem like that big a difference to non-track and field people, but to put it in perspective, Ms. Griffith-Joyner's performance wouldn't have put her in the running (ha!) at the 2012 Olympics; the slowest of the competitors who placed - Anaso Jobodwana, eighth in the field - beat her by almost a full second.
The teenager who won this year's 200m high school men's race in Minnesota, Tyler Beehler, ran the race only 1/10th of a second slower than the fastest woman in recorded history. (21.45.)
To put this in further perspective...
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| This is me. |
My lovely wife has a good friend, who is about 5'10" and weighs about 159#. She does yoga, and is in pretty good shape.
A few weeks back, we went bowling.
After some back and forth smack-talking between myself, and my wife's friend, a bet was formed: I bet I could bowl while carrying her. Obviously she bet I couldn't.
So after some discussion, I wrapped my arm around her waist, picked her up, and got a spare.
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| Aaaaaand, there you go. |
With one hand, I was able to lift and carry about 37% of the weight the strongest woman in the world was able to lift overhead and hold for a second and a half, or so. I am out of shape if you're being extremely charitable, but I'm able to lift roughly 80% of the weight the most over-developed, heavily trained, professional female powerlifter in the world can manage.
It's not fair to suggest that women can, or should, compete against men in "sports."
A fit, tough, highly trained and athletic 165-pound woman, playing Wide Receiver in the NFL, would suffer a career-ending injury the first time a 350-pound-plus defender tackled her.
That's not judgment. It's inertia.
The salient and relevant point, however, is that that fact, on its own, doesn't mean she isn't a good football player.
The devastating beatdown that would be inflicted on the WNBA if they integrated their players with the NBA would be inevitable and embarrassing.
And you know what? It would be completely, devastatingly unfair, because it gives the totally inaccurate impression that those women, and their athletic achievements, are somehow less than the men.
And yet, those women are solid, professional b-ball players. They're professional athletes. They're in far better condition than I am.
Saying women should compete against men directly is foolish, and it's terrible, because the inevitable crushing defeat devalues women's real, solid, demonstrable achievements.
It's the same reason they don't put 145-pound boxers in the ring with superheavyweights.
And it's why if they integrated MMA fighting, there would be exactly one fight in the Octagon that men would "win," and thereafter the women would win every single fight.
Why? Because the first fight, the male would hit the female once, and she would have to be hospitalized.
And after that, the men would refuse to hit back. (Well, most of them. I can think of a couple of those dudes who look like they would love to bruise up the ladies just because.)
Despite the stylings of the gentleman writing for Reason.com, there's nothing reasonable about making the claim that - because Kacy Catanzaro is awesome at ANW - she should be placed in a direct physical match against male competition. Doing so makes it seem that Kacy's accomplishments aren't as important.
And she's a fucking rock star.
