Photo by Fred Lucas
I just read this from ChessToday.net:
GM Mikhail Golubev: In issue 9 of the European Championship bulletin an interview by Lejla Dimitrova with the women’s ex-champion Nona Gaprindashvili was published, which is certainly worth reading.
Nona Gaprindashvili:
– Yes, men and women should play separately, since male players have a number of advantages before the start of the game. On the one hand, ever since their birth boys are genetically predisposed to compete and fight.
On the other hand, the physiological processes that take place within the male and female bodies are not in favour of the latter chesswise.
Third – the nervous system, the psychological stability is better in men.
Fourth – the active chess life of a woman comes to an end when she creates a family, or best it can last until she bears a child. From this moment on she can never abandon herself to chess completely, while a man, if he has earned enough to take good care of his family, can be ‘exempted’ from his parental obligations.
If you take into account all these points you will understand why women should not compete in male tournaments.
Do you agree with GM Gaprindashvili?
Not convincing enough. Judith Polgar is the living answer.
Do you agree with Gaprindashvili?
I guess it depends what she meant by “women”. What is a woman? Exactly, I mean.
Normally, I agree, Nona is the big boss of women’s chess, decades-old champion, first woman to break the barrier of genders, I mean first woman to become a chess man, and so on and so forth, and so fifth. I am surprisingly happy she speaks such good english in the interview.
I expect that by now, in the 21st century, almost anyone disagrees. What she says are views from a distant past, maybe from the 1950s. It is strange to find someone thinking like that, after decades of feminism, even more if it’s a woman.
It is a male who writes this comment, but I hope a modern one. I have no problem to accept woman as entirely equal. Also, I don’t think that the “physiological processes” affect the ability to play chess. I mean, as far as we know woman play chess with their brain, just like men. 🙂
‘Not convincing enough. Judith Polgar is the living answer.’
Why?? If Judita played with womans only, she would be 50-year old champion, better than Kasparov and Karpov and Kamsky and anybody in the world. She choose to be nobody special in mans chess, top 10, so what? Only money and travelling around the world for free.
Sounds to me like Nona the oldest chess grandmother on earth is just about right.
“I mean, as far as we know woman play chess with their brain, just like men.”
You haven’t played often against women, have you?
“It is a human being that doesn’t have a penis (at least at birth).”
One in 10,000 men and one in 30,000 women are born transsexual.
Did you know?
@Anonymous of 3:25:00, you are right, I didn’t play against woman often. But what Gaprindashvili means are disadvantages she thinks woman have, not the advantages 🙂
1. Did Nona the Great really was the first to break the gender barricade?
2. Yes, women, men, boys and girls should play separately, that’s for sure. Mrs. Gapridashwilli is correct 100 percentage!
3. Is Nona her given name or nickname?
“Not convincing enough.”
Yup, rusticbull vs 7x World Champion, I’d trust the latter.
I love G. Nona. She’s the best. You guys can say about her what you want, but Nona is the best thing that ever happened to Russia and Georgia.
She is speaking from her life experience of being a champion, a souse and a mother. It comes a time in a woman life when nature call and she want to have her own family and that is a powerful drive. You also must ask, how long can a woman wait to have a family and it a short span of time. So, i think she is correct.
We must respect G Nona,s sentiments.She has been there,and knows what she is talking about.H’ever I feel that her perceptions are based in general,and there will always be a few exceptions. The Polgar sisters and Koneru Humpy (the 4th best chess player, male or female in India,a nation of over 1 billion )are able to compete with men on an equal footing.I have seen Humpy play. She is rock solid,tough and hard to beat.Perhaps she needs to improve her attacking instincts a bit more.
“One in 10,000 men and one in 30,000 women are born transsexual.”
LOL. You just refuted yourself.
“One in 10000 MEN and one in 30000 WOMEN…”
I see somebody edited my original message and replaced the p…. word with “something”.
Since when is a man’s sexual organ a forbiden word???
Her comments are more of the kind to defend her own position historically than constructive. Womens chess, I mean own olympiads, tournaments will be abolished in a decade or two when we´ve had more Judits around to prove Gaprindashvilis wrong. I hear the same arguments from sexist women and men that want women to stay at home with the kids, due to the biological/genetic “good mother”-gene and the special mother-kid bond. Someone wants us to believe in that kind of biological necessity. Except from mother milk theres is no difference in the ability to raise children. And if there is, we sooner than later have to change that ssystem, for after all its the children after these good-mothers who started all these wars.
But G. has one point that is true. That Chess is made by men and designed after mens lives. It is true that women, more than men, have to take care of the famlies etc, while men can have a “weekend of”. So instead of having separate tournaments for women and men, which I guess most women ont like (?), I Sugegst that we look upon how we arrange torunaments etc. I mean, how we make chess more available for women. Susan has sais a lot about this earlier. Dont tell me about different brains, nervous systems etc. Chess is made by men, for men. Wwe have to start from that point, not the biological ones.
Lars
What Gaprindashvili says is pretty sexist. I’m surprised.
Personally, I think there is no reason – genetic, psychological, physiological or otherwise – that women can’t compete with men and do well. Just look at the Polgar sisters 🙂
I am still posting under the handle “anonymous” because I can’t find my password, but I am Peter Harris from Lubbock, Texas. I didn’t know what Gaprindashvili had been doing since she lost the title. I am glad to hear she is alive and well. I did not know if she had a husband and children.
GM Gaprindashvili was actually one norm short of the GM title when FIDE handed it to her in 1978 (reports at the time said she had played 20 games in FIDE-sponsored tournaments), and probably would have earned the title had she wanted to. Instead, Susan Polgar started the “Group of Five” (Judit plus Koneru Humpy, Xie Jun, and Pia Cramling) that earned the title in FIDE competitions. I am not entirely sure that having children makes it impossible for female chess players to continue their playing careers — there are many working mothers, some of them professional athletes. But I am male and have no children, so I will back down on that pointfor now.
Nona’s comments on the difference between male and female make sense. But women should play with men in tournaments to get more skills.
As for championship, we absolutely need WWC.
Do you agree with Gaprindashvili?
No. I do not buy into her eugenics argument. Google eugenics, it is scientific socialist dribble. It is a typical failed Russian philosophy. Sort of like saying white people are better swimmers because their afros don’t get in the way. Garbage!
As for Nona speaking for women in chess, I think it mighty presumptious considering many young women GM’s would clean her pieces out.
Nona is a relic from an age where national politics dominated the chess board, not raw talent such as Almira Skripchenko, Irina Krush, Zhu Chen, Koneru Humpy, and Xu Yuhua to name a few!
Chess is a game for ideas and imagination, not hate baiting or sexual discrimination. Don’t buy into the lie!
Of course men and women are not born equal. So, why do we have to force them to be equal? There are different genetic predispositions between men and women (chiefly certain hormone levels), and this accounts for differences between them. For example, because of more androgens, men are more focused, more logical, stronger physically. Women’s more estrogen on the contrary makes them more sentimental, more artistic, etc., etc. This is not to say that one is “good” thing and the other is a “bad” thing. In certain things, men and women differ by nature. So, what GM Gaprindashvili said was the plain truth about biological and social differences between men and women. Now, if this is a reason not to include women in “men’s” tournaments, that’s probably another discussion. However, the biological differences between sexes are bound to play some role in achievements. The same happens in biological differences (so called “genetics”) between members of the same sex. Someone who can run 100m very fast, would suck in marathon, etc.
The truth is obvious.
I totally disagree. My daughter has been competing against boys since the age of 6. She is now 10 and she has done very well. Her remarks are due to a mentality issue. Girls can compete equally as boys but until you have more women doing it and believing it then that sector will not grow.
I would understand if this were soccer or football where both are mixed, but not chess. A brain is a brain.
A.M.
womancandidatemaster.blogspot.com
Ah, what I’d like to know is who I’d play, if not men? Because, surprice surprice, there aren’t many female players. Actually, to seperate female and male players would mean I wouldn’t have games at all in the smaller tournaments! So I think this lady would need to specify when women and men must play seperately, because as a general rule, it’s damaging to women chess players and that can’t be her intention?
“A brain is a brain”. So, you are saying that under intense psychological pressure, men and women will keep their calm to a similar extent? I beg to differ.
Doesn’t testosterone have larger effects on concentration and fighting spirit?
womancandidatemaster.blogspot.com
If you were womangrandmaster.blogspot.com
I’d might be reading your post. To read a CM post only?? You got’ta be kiddin’ me!! What a waste of energy!!
“First of all, don’t be rude and disrespectful!”
I second the motion. It’s high time we learn to behave in blog community and stop insulting everyone. Bloggers are lost souls walking on earth.
Hey Anon 7:21, what’s YOUR title?
In the words (from another context) of late Tony Miles:’Utter crap’. Women’s chess is completely futile. There should be only chess.
– Mr X –
Please leave political correctness where it belongs, in the garbage bin. Nona realises that men have a more in depth linnear thought process and more logical and mathematical thinking, not to mention men’s visuo-spatial advantage. Intelligent people realise this. If it was a social intuition contest or communication skills contest, women would probably have an advantage.