Should Women Play Energetic Field Games?

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXII, Issue 18632, 16 February 1935, Page 10

Should Women Play Energetic Field Games ?

LONDON, .Tan. 5. THU. old question, whether women should play energetic field games has again cropped’ up, and opinions still differ, even among members of the medical profession. Addressing the British Association for Physical Training in London, this .week, Dr. Adolphe Abrahams, honorary medical officer to the British Olympic Games team, spoke ot: the nervous and bodily strain which athletes of both sexes hal-c to bear, to the detriment of their health. He was emphatic in declaring that girls and young women should not indulge in strenuous sports.

After alluding to the nervo-strain of the male athlete, he went on: “J would expect it to be much worse in the ease of a girl or voting woman. One visualises a higher type of nervous system, much less likely to stand up against the same strain. For that reason I have never hesitated to inveigh against Olympic games for women, and I urn 'strongly against highly competitive lawn tennis. 01 course, 1 may be wrong. A lady doctor I know tells me that 1 am. She holds that women are more flexible and adaptable than men. That is the point at which we differ. I may be old-fashioned, but 1 must say that when 1 visualise collapse and exhaustion in a male —an unpleasant enough spectacle in some circumstances- —i cannot bring myself to believe it cannot be worst) in the case of a woman." Of Lhe man athlete Dr. Abrahams said: “His life is one continuous anxiety lo keep in the limelight, realising that, the world' is a cruel place and has no incfcy for failure. People remember only that he has been beaten.”

But that, fear, it is agreed, is seldom present in women and girls. In sport they scetn to have a sense of proportion that, is lacking in men, and can face defeat, without, worrying unduly about it. But is Dr. Abrahams correct in asserting that strenuous games are beyond their powers and detrimental to their nervous system 1 ?