Women in Boxing as Metaphor

Women in boxing as metaphor might be compared with women in combat and women firefighters.

How could a 5-feet 110-pound woman carry military equipment, dig trenches, and fire weapons at the enemy? How could a woman of equal height and weight carry a 200-pound man down a ladder during a fire emergency? Why should she when there are capable and willing men to carry out these tasks? During the various recent wars, women were required to be mother-father and began to cherish their independence from men.

Men returned from war and hoped to resume their place as head of the household, women resisted, and some men preferred military life because of loyalty to their country and the camaraderie, structure and purpose of military life as compared to the forward pace of domestic rivalry. Once women were emancipated, there was a demand for equal pay for equal work in such fields as accounting, engineering, and in the medical profession. As the population of women increased at a greater ratio than that of men, some women began to dominate the household and feel naturally superior to men, and in many cases, some women could not return to baking cookies, teaching the children, and weeding the garden.

Women in boxing as metaphor evolved because of a need to emulate the symbols of masculinity attributed to men.Some men want to protect women and open doors for women, but once women walk though the doors, the status is equal, and, if men do not acknowledge the merits of women’s intelligence and need for personal identity, women stroll ahead, and hopefully, look back smiling.