this post was submitted on 10 Mar 2024
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A 6th grade girls team from Kentucky was set to go for the year-end championship tournament, but was told they were banned due to fears boys teams might 'retaliate' if they lost to the girls team.

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[–] DoctorSpocktopus@lemmy.ca 185 points 8 months ago (9 children)

Once again, girls are somehow responsible for boys’ inability to behave 🤦

[–] BananaTrifleViolin@lemmy.world 19 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Once again there appears to be more to this story than the poor quality article linked suggests.

[–] Pips@lemmy.sdf.org 58 points 8 months ago

Here's the quotes:

SWOB President Tom Sunderman expressed concern in a statement:

"Doing this for 28 years, what we have worried about is a boys team losing to a girls team (especially in the year end tourney), they may get frustrated and retaliate against a girl." "Then we have liability issues.” Prez, a social media user on X (Formerly Twitter), didn't buy it.

"What he meant to say was they can’t have their boys being emasculated by a better girls team… it would be a blow to their developing manhood to get beat by girls."

What context am I missing?

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[–] BreakDecks@lemmy.ml 121 points 8 months ago (6 children)

"...what we have worried about is a boys team is losing to a girls team (especially in a year end tourney) they may get frustrated and retaliate against a girl," a text allegedly sent by the tournament directors reads.

"Throughout the season we had a few teams come to us about this and raise concerns about it. Because of this we decided to keep them out of the tournament," another text reads.

Oh, so the teams were threatening to commit violence against the girls. Why not just kick those teams out?

[–] thorcik@lemmy.world 26 points 8 months ago

"For their safety" :vomits:

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[–] SuddenDownpour@sh.itjust.works 112 points 8 months ago (2 children)

How about policing the boys' damned behavior for one fucking time in their lives, then?

[–] winterayars@sh.itjust.works 15 points 8 months ago

They'd have to not agree with the behavior in the first place.

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[–] Steve@communick.news 105 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (23 children)

That's not why they were kicked out. The coach lied, to get them playing in the boys league, since they were so good.
So of course they got kicked out. What you expect the league to do?

He explained:
"In November of 2023, Next Level and Larry McGraw deceptively registered a girls team into the 6th grade boys league and under the gender listed as MALE."
"We entered them into the league assuming they were a boys’ team as conveniently no roster was ever provided."
"Subsequently, their first game was filled in by a boys 6th grade Next Level team because they played the 6th grade boys Cincinnati Royals team - coached by myself, so there was no reason to suspect anything different."

He continued:
"It wasn’t until late January/early February that several teams from the 6th-grade division started traveling down to Kentucky to play their scheduled games, that it became apparent that the Next Level team was, in fact, a girls team."
"Several complaints from coaches and teams were filed because of this deception."

Social media users, however, saw SWOB's statement as deflecting from another issue, one that accused the league of trying to keep their feelings from getting hurt in the event the boys were defeated by girls.

[–] asteriskeverything@lemmy.world 89 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (4 children)

that is some selective bullshit

Seriously. What this tells me is that 70+ people either didn't read the article or they just really have a thing about mixed gender sports. You quoted only the pathetic backpedalling lies he said to try to further justify his actions. BUT FIRST AND FOREMOST he said this (the man you are quoting, Sunderland, is the president)

The city-wide basketball league, Southwestern Ohio Basketball (SWOB), made the call because they believed that 11 to 12-year-old girls and boys competing against each other on the court could pose a liability risk leading to violence, even though the girls team had been winning 7-1 all season without incident.

IT IS WHY THEY WERE KICKED OUT.

It wasn’t until late January/early February that several teams from the 6th-grade division started traveling down to Kentucky to play their scheduled games, that it became apparent that the Next Level team was, in fact, a girls team.

You're telling me it took multiple games AND teams for them to become "apparent that it was a girls team " ??? And become a problem. But only until they got far enough because maybe they wouldn't and then SWOB could avoid PR problem all together.

this is a reminder to read the fucking article people

You might come up with a similar conclusion as me, or completely opposite. But OP is patently false and deceptive with their quote and definitive ruling on it, claiming the headline is deceptive! Fuck that.

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[–] RunawayFixer@lemmy.world 34 points 8 months ago (2 children)

So if I understand it correctly, it's a boys only competition, not an open competition. And since these girls were so good, they wanted to be able to compete against the top teams, so they pulled of a superb ruse to be able to do just that, in the process upsetting some men who don't want to compete against girls for reasons, especially if they end up losing. That's going to make a good sport movie one day.

Many (most?) sports have a top "open" competition that anyone can enter and then several restricted competitions (age, sex, handicaps, ...), but even if you qualify for one of the restricted competitions, if you're good enough, you can still play in the open competition. Except in bible belt country apparently, no girls allowed in the top competition.

[–] MagicShel@programming.dev 25 points 8 months ago

He also said it wasn't unheard of for a girl to play on a boys' team or for a girls' team to compete against boys.

It sounds like it's not a boys only competition. It's not entirely clear whether this quote is just referring to in general or this specific league, but based on the context the latter appears to be the intended reading.

[–] prime_number_314159@lemmy.world 22 points 8 months ago (2 children)

These are 6th graders. There's no "top" competition for 6th graders at all, which is why this is a region specific league, and most of the sports are divided into boys and girls divisions at those ages.

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[–] olympicyes@lemmy.world 14 points 8 months ago

In the statement on their website, Sunderman literally quotes himself telling McGraw that the girls couldn’t play because if they beat a boys team in the playoffs then the boys might get frustrated and physically retaliate, causing a liability issue.

He didn’t say they couldn’t play because they registered as a boys team. That was more of a supporting anecdote presented because of social media blowback.

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[–] AbouBenAdhem@lemmy.world 102 points 8 months ago

So the league decided to preemptively retaliate on behalf of the hypothetical violent boys?

[–] merthyr1831@lemmy.world 63 points 8 months ago (3 children)

This is how most sex segregated sports came about

  1. women beats men
  2. women banned
  3. segregated division created because of "biological differences"
[–] Balinares@pawb.social 60 points 8 months ago (17 children)

I wonder why people are downvoting your comment. It's literally what happened. See for instance this paper on the history of gender segregation in the Olympics: https://theworld.org/stories/2016-08-17/see-120-years-struggle-gender-equality-olympics.

Quote: "Margaret Murdock from the US won a silver in a tie in the 1976 Riffle Event, one of the events in the shooting categories. The rifle event was split into men's and women's events in 1984."

[–] Th3D3k0y@lemmy.world 25 points 8 months ago (5 children)

Sports without contact mechanics I've always wondered why the split. Like men's and women's chess... what?

But men's and women's football? That kind of makes sense, not saying women's should be banned from the men's leagues, but let them make that choice themselves

[–] SuddenDownpour@sh.itjust.works 17 points 8 months ago

Women's chess leagues exist for women who want to compete without facing misogynistic behavior. They can also compete against men, however, unlike in other sports, and many do. If you ask me, what should have been done from the start would have been tackling the misoginy.

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[–] asteriskeverything@lemmy.world 60 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (11 children)

One of top posts here is selective as fuxk quoting only the president's backpedalling after their official initi statement being the fear of retaliation. I'm getting way too annoyed watching the upvotes (aka misinformation) grow just because this asshat added a quote.

Oh by the way, sunderman.- the president - coached one of the boy teams that played against the girls team. And they are trying to say it took time to realize, to justify why they were allowed to play up until the championships. FFS this is garbage sportmanship

(Edited to correct autocorrect)

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[–] Nurse_Robot@lemmy.world 51 points 8 months ago (18 children)

Sexist, ignorant and disappointing. 3/3 for Kentucky

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[–] RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 50 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Y’all Qaeda strikes again.

[–] KredeSeraf@lemmy.world 21 points 8 months ago (1 children)

God damn Talibangelicals and their Shakira law.

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[–] girlfreddy@lemmy.ca 38 points 8 months ago (3 children)

More sources that go into depth on what happened and the fallout ...

https://www.rawstory.com/next-level-basketball/

https://www.wvxu.org/sports/2024-03-04/kentucky-girls-basketball-team-banned-southwestern-ohio

And maybe this is why the girls were shut down ... On Feb 28 in an event in Alabama the girl's team, who were forced to play in the boy's league, won the championship but the trophy went to the losers instead.

https://www.cbssports.com/general/news/why-an-alabama-girls-youth-basketball-team-wasnt-awarded-a-championship-trophy-after-beating-a-boys-team/

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[–] ParsnipWitch@feddit.de 37 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Can relate. I was beat up by another kid of my age after practice because I beat him in a really small and unimportant Judo tournament. We were both 12 and his parents, my parents and the trainers all agreed that he just overreacted because he was scared the other boys would bully him. I switched to ballet afterwards.

[–] Omgpwnies@lemmy.world 18 points 8 months ago

That's a shit dojo 100%. Everywhere I've trained if someone pulled that shit, they'd at the very least get sat the fuck down for a good long chat with the sensei, if not kicked out entirely... not to mention pushups, so, so, so many pushups.

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[–] anon_8675309@lemmy.world 37 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Whats that say about how the boys have been raised? And this just reinforces that.

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[–] Maggoty@lemmy.world 36 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (7 children)

That's 11 years old.

Okay let's hear all the excuses for 11 year olds needing to be super competitive and separated by gender.

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[–] Vrijgezelopkamers@lemmy.world 34 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Better to prepare those boys for all of the ass-whoopings women will serve them in their future professional careers, no?

[–] theneverfox@pawb.social 34 points 8 months ago (10 children)

My favorite sport to watch is girls volleyball...I don't like to watch sports in general

Most people treat me like a creep when I bring it up, but it's way more dynamic and interesting than men's volleyball. I used to scorekeep the sport, women's volleyball is just more entertaining

IDGAF about basketball to start with, but if the boys can't compete we should throw them by the wayside. I don't get why this is even a question

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[–] Fedizen@lemmy.world 34 points 8 months ago

cue counterstrike audio: "Terrorists Win"

[–] Seraph@kbin.social 28 points 8 months ago

Of course you can play with the boys!

No not like that - you have to let them beat you!

[–] CosmicCleric@lemmy.world 25 points 8 months ago (6 children)

Regardless of the prejudice angle in this story, I feel bad for the girls for being excluded from possibly winning the championship, especially when they were performing well.

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[–] OpenStars@startrek.website 19 points 8 months ago

That makes perfect sense - only ~~grown-ass adults~~ whittle gurls could ever be afraid that someone might lose a game!

[–] inclementimmigrant@lemmy.world 18 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Nice.

So it basically boils down to this.

We as Kentuckians realized we failed as parents at a state wide level therefore we will continue to be shit parents and ban the girls for having better parents to appease the shitty parents and their shittily raised boys so they don't get a bruised ego for failing as parents and humans.

Again, very nice.

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