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Townhall...
Not Wrestling Girls
By Brent Bozell
It’s so easy to look at teenagers in general today and sigh. They’re
more than a bit lazy, a bit spoiled and more than a bit morally
compromised. Two teenagers made national news. One showed common
decency and sportsmanship, two virtues seemingly uncommon in that
generation. Hope is restored.
Sixteen-year-old wrestler Joel Northrup faced a dilemma when he was
scheduled to wrestle Cassy Herkelman, one of only two girls to make it
to the state tournament. Even though he entered with a 35-4 record,
Northrup forfeited rather than violate his religious principles.
Cassy’s father, Bill Herkelman, praised the Northrup family: “That’s
their belief, and I praise them for sticking to it. This is the biggest
stage in wrestling in the state, I would say, and they stuck to their
beliefs when it probably tested it the most,” he said. “It was probably
a tough pill for him to swallow.”
That’s putting it mildly. High-school wrestling is very popular in Iowa
and other Midwestern states, where the state tournament is televised.
Northrup then made the rounds of national TV talk shows to address the
decision. “There’s no specific scripture or verse in the Bible that
condemns wrestling girls,” Joel told the “Fox & Friends” show.
“It’s more of a Biblical principle of treating the opposite gender with
respect ... I don’t think wrestling should be a coed sport because of
all the compromising holds and everything.”
Northrup didn’t say anything about discomfort over wrestling a girl
because it was personally embarrassing or sexual in any way. It wasn’t
about the bad publicity that would result if he gave her a broken
forearm or a concussion. It was about elevating the woman. Shoving a
woman’s face into the mat is undignified. He told CBS it gets “violent
at times ... I just don’t feel it’s right that a boy should engage a
girl ... like this.”
Only in our stupid popular culture is such a position considered
controversial. CBS put this question on screen: “Chivalry or
Chauvinism?” But these aren’t really opposites. For many years, the
feminists have waged war on the idea that men would “stoop” to
chivalry, like opening doors for women or giving up a seat on a subway
train for them. Being a “gentleman” was another word for being a
patronizer -- a chauvinist.
Sadly, you knew some ink-stained wretch would think Northrup’s decision
was sexist, demeaning and religiously obtuse. Enter ESPN.com columnist
Rick Reilly, who slammed anyone and everyone who respected this moral
decision, including Cassy Herkelman and her father: “Does any
wrong-headed decision suddenly become right when defended with
religious conviction? In this age, don’t we know better? If my God told
me to poke the elderly with sharp sticks, would that make it morally
acceptable to others?”
In Reilly’s moral universe, “Body slams and takedowns and gouges in the
eye and elbows in the ribs are exactly how to respect Cassy Herkelman.
This is what she lives for ... She relishes the violence.”
Herkelman’s dad boasts: “She’s my son ... She’s always been my son.”
Reilly then bizarrely claimed that it wasn’t cruel to gouge her in the
eye; it was cruel to send her into a “national media hurricane” --
identified as about 20 sports reporters and columnists -- to be asked
not how she wrestled, but how she advanced without wrestling.
The ESPN columnist ended this sneering diatribe by suggesting this
16-year-old boy “wasted” his dream of a championship and was just
uncomfortable with girls being on Earth. After Northrup was eliminated
in an overtime match, Reilly wrote, “He was reportedly on his way back
home to Marion, Iowa, where his mom was about to deliver her eighth
child. For the kid’s sake, I hope it’s a boy.”
Northrup didn’t deserve the wave of national abuse he received from
so-called defenders of women. It was additionally unnecessary when his
female opponent wasn’t offended. But it won’t be the first or the last
time that sports writers from New York City come to Iowa to lecture the
hayseeds.
No one, of course, seems willing to ask the other question: What was
the Herkelman family doing encouraging their teenage daughter for years
to wrestle competitively with males -- with every implication, physical
and sexual?
Read it at Townhall
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