Snooker

In the Times:
www.thetimes.co.uk/article/6c08649c-29ea-11ed-a830-74a6c8fbb722?shareToken=b2681e0f7d22080b861d2c95efe09848

Sorry wasn't sure if you were saying snooker needs to be mixed. Apart from the women's game, it is mixed. If women qualify they are as welcome to win say the Masters as Ronnie O Sullivan.

But they don't, women don't tend to rise up in the big tournaments hence the need for a women's league. And Jamie coming out top suggests there might be male advantage. They need more research.

Exactly - deal with the world as it is now, not as we would like it to be or hope it will become. Otherwise nothing will improve for women.

@Wanderingowl
Great comment.

You may be interested in Dr Emma Hilton's take on women's dominance in ultra events. There are no obvious physiological advantages for women in these events, so she thinks it could come down to this -
1 There are more elite women athletes competing in these sports compared to men so it's elite women versus sub-elite men and
2 These events have a larger psychological component - after a while it just becomes about the athlete's willingness to get up in the morning and run another marathon or swim another 10k (or however long the courses are). Elite athletes are likely to have greater mental strength than sub-elite, regardless of sex.

Yeah, I mean, the absolute strongest case for retaining a pure female class is where there's an obvious safety imperative [combat and collision sports, e.g. rugby, boxing, MMA, wrestling, etc].

Next strongest is in sports where there's no obvious safety angle but where body size really obviously confers an intolerable advantage [e.g. weightlifting, basketball, swimming, rowing, throwing athletics events, tennis, etc etc].

We're not in that territory here, but, as already pointed out earlier in this thread:

(a) Being male does confer at least some physical advantages; and
(b) There's a clear, very significant, difference in M/F participation rates in the sport, such that, for participation to be improve, women and girls need all the incentives and opportunities they can get.

The physical differences might not be as apparent as with rugby or boxing, for example, though I don't think that's evidence that they don't exist. Perhaps mixed sex competitions will be fair and the way forward in future. But right now they are not and money that has been ring fenced for female players, to try and reduce the sex pay gap, is being made available to male players. That's what we're seeing here. That's what happens when you split the world into 'men' and 'not men' and don't allow women to exist as a category in their own right. There are men, and then there is everyone else, and everyone else includes everyone female bodied and some males who have decided they are not like other males and therefore must go into the 'other' category and are therefore entitled to access to all resources earmarked for the 'not men' group.

This might prove that there is a difference in playing snooker between males and females. From reading the article it seems like not much science has been done. But if the players don't like it, they need to say something, personally I think Jamie ought to just compete through the 'men's' channels which are 'open' anyway (the women can't seem to break in which is interesting, especially in light of this) - there seems to be at least a sliver of doubt on male advantage and they are biologically male.

Looks like our girl Jamie is going from strength to strength 👎.

www.sports365.info/2022/08/29/snooker/snooker-chief-hails-first-transgender-winner-and-says-issues-with-other-sports-dont-apply/

You would be surprised how little the pros practice, my late dp only practiced 3-4 hours a day when he had a tournament to play, other than that he played for pleasure Mark Williams doesn't practice at all.

And also Ng On Yee, who is the top Asian women's player, she can participate in the World Snooker Tour with all the male pros, just like Reanne Evans. Asia, particularly China has sooo much money and commitment to the game, it's a different world over there, they play it in school. Maybe a really competitive woman competing in the WST might be nurtured over there.

It's worth saying that players like Reanne Evans who have children (and I think she's a single parent as she split with partner) just have less time to put into the game, which might be the major stumbling block.

With snooker the big boys practice 8 hours a day most if not every day of the week which might not be practical for as many women. Hugely talented players like Evans will be hindered by their responsibilities, unlike the men.

Not sure how Women's snooker feel about having a biological male compete and I feel it's their call. If it is an issue to them we may never find out as perhaps the money may be too flimsy to risk and the coverage is so small. Guess wait and see how well Jamie performs.

There is a woman on the World Snooker main tour, Reanne Evans is a 12 times Women's World Champion, she is competing against the men. In darts Fallon Sherrock & Lisa Ashton play on the main tour competing against men.

🚀😂🤗🚀

'In space, nobody can hear you laugh like a drain'

Given the username it has been hard not to shout at fishy

But I don't want to be banned for laughing like a drain at a psoter, so I haven't.

Interesting we always look at morphological differences but not neurological differences. I'm not sure how the feminist mumsnetters will appreciate being told that men have the edge mentally as well as physically.

Not quite. We are only too aware of the socialisation effect that comes into play once kids are old enough for self awareness. And there is growing evidence, alongside a growing willingness and ability to research, hard wired sex based differences from birth - this is the Man = hunter; Woman = nurturing reality of sex based differences. Nobody in their right mind would throw away half of the nature/nurture input because they didn't like it. Oh! No, wait... maybe some would. But not me! Nor many women that I know.

Many animal studies and a wide variety of studies of very young children have always shown sex based cognitive differences. For example spatial-visualisation in 2- and 3-month-olds. Girls respond more readily to faces and begin talking earlier. Boys react earlier in infancy to 'unexpected items in the playing area'. In adulthood, women remain more oriented to faces, men to things. Not enormous differences, but statistically important ones. Why? Simplistically: Hormones. Science is still working on it.

Men have more spatial awareness, women have faster reflexes. Wonder why? Catch a running antelope; catch a falling child? Maybe?

But don't presume to know how women will respond to being informed of various sex based differences. We aren't ill educated children, prone to throwing a sulk when things don't go our way!

Fishwishy

Again Fishy your own prejudice shows in your post. Neurological differences such as reaction time between eye and action have been discussed often. I think I have mentioned it on this thread.

I have yet to see informed feminists deny there are some processes in the brain that are different for females. Of course there is. Does it mean they should be discriminated against in an employment capacity.? No.

This is not the gotcha you think it is.

My hunch is that Fishy has womb-envy.

And one of the reasons women appear to be so very significantly better in ultra endurance field is psychological. We are theorised to be better able to both anticipate our requirement to pace ourselves and theorised to cope better with the mental requirements of being alone and just going and going through exhaustion. There are also numerous physiological reasons for us likely being so much better in these fields, twitch muscle fibres, faster recovery times our higher natural levels of body fat, etc. So I'm honestly not sure what the fuck your point is. Men and women are better suited, physically and mentally, for different sports. What's the next thing you think is controversial to us, that water is wet, fire is hot?

Interesting we always look at morphological differences but not neurological differences. I'm not sure how the feminist mumsnetters will appreciate being told that men have the edge mentally as well as physically.

Note the use of better in the above quoted statement too not my words although I do agree, the open category is better sport.

I've played competitive cuesports for 15 years and have discussed this issue at length with my team mates.

Men absolutley have an advantage over women in cue sports. The main issue does not seem to be physical differences (although it does make a difference, especially when you reach the top tiers of sport) but mental\brain differences. Men have better spatial awareness and hand eye coordination.
I know a women who is one of the top female players, she is currently going through the menopause and it affects her game massively! A man would not have this problem. See also pregnancy!

If Jamie had won the women's title he would have qualified for the main tour thus taking the place from a woman

@Fishwishy you seem to be persistent in ignoring the fact that sport has categories, even elite sport. Rowing has heavyweight and lightweight categories. Which is "best"? Is the men's eight the best or the men's coxless pairs? What about the coxed pairs?

Judo has weight categories - is the heavyweight 100kg+ category the "best"? What about swimming? Is the 50m freestyle winner the "best" at swimming, rather than the butterfly or backstroke? Is Sarah Sjostrom a "better" swimmer than Adam Peaty because her freestyle 50m is quicker than his 50m breaststroke?

And so on and so on.

Women's sport is a category of sport, like all these other categories. The fact that it is often valued less than the men's category by society is down to historical factors based in sexism. Not because it isn't the "best".

I didn't say men wouldn't have an advantage on beam. I think they probably would, although it would be marginal because the strength and power advantage would be mitigated by the size disadvantage. It's the only women's artistic gymnastics apparatus where it isn't clear that men would have a large advantage. So men would definitely have an advantage in women's artistic gymnastics. If someone created some kind of mixed sex artistic gymnastics blending events from WAG and MAG the men would have a huge advantage since they have a definite advantage on 3 of the 4 women's events, maybe a marginal advantage on the other one, and women would barely even be able to do 3 of the 6 events on the men's side.

In rhythmic gymnastics, however, which is a completely different gymnastics discipline to artistic gymnastics, men wouldn't have an advantage because there is no tumbling and it is very much flexibility based. I realised now I put a typo and said tumbling isn't allowed in artistic gymnastics, but of course it is. That's what Simone Biles (and Shawn Johnson and Nile Wilson) do/did. Rhythmic gymnastics is the balletic one with the balls and ribbons, and contortion style stuff, and men would definitely have a disadvantage there.

Not that this has anything to do with snooker, but just for the sake of accuracy, and being armed with facts so that we are all able to make our best case.

Your figures are not in dispute. It is your opinion about

We judge the best by competition in sport. the best is the one who wins the league beats the opposition the best women's team isnt the most skillful one but the one that wins the league best means beating the others in competition.

that I and others robustly dispute. And the fact you keep stating no one 'knows' outstanding sportswomen, which is an over exaggeration.

And the fact that any people who disagree are in some kind of *Mumsnet bubble and missing an "obvious".... difference in interest. *I mean what other interpretation is there for that statement other than you believe that you and your colleagues have some kind of superior knowledge and that you should be considered an authority.

Your assertion that the world 'only remembers' the best of the best and will not remember the best male and the best female, so females with natural disadvantages need to compete with males to determine who is the 'best' at that sport is absurd.

Just as absurd is the notion Let women compete with men and you will see what is the best and in some sports this is eminently possible.

It is just the continuance of 'female sportspeople are just not trying hard enough yet'. A misogynistic point of view.