{"id":3052,"date":"2012-03-22T07:09:10","date_gmt":"2012-03-22T12:09:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/citings\/?p=3052"},"modified":"2012-03-21T17:27:25","modified_gmt":"2012-03-21T22:27:25","slug":"female-olympians","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/2012\/03\/22\/female-olympians\/","title":{"rendered":"Female Olympians"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"london<\/a>
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The Summer Olympics in London could be a watershed event in sports, as every country is expected to send female athletes to participate.\u00a0 In the past, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Brunei have only sent male athletes, according to the New York Times<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Saudi Arabia, a monarchy whose legal system is based on Islamic law, is considered the most significant of the three, given its size, international oil influence and severe restrictions placed on women in daily life. While female athletes from Qatar and Brunei have participated in national and regional competitions, Saudi Arabia has essentially barred sports for women, according to Human Rights Watch.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

According to a recent Human Rights Watch report, women in Saudi Arabia are systematically discriminated against when it comes to sports. \u00a0There is no physical education for girls in state schools, and gyms were closed for women in 2009 and 2010.\u00a0\u00a0So, while senior Human Rights Watch researcher Christoph Wilcke welcomes the participation, he notes that the International Olympic Committee should work toward more systemic change.<\/p>\n

However, even this change might have effects beyond Saudi Arabia. \u00a0Saudi Arabia\u2019s sending of female athletes could put pressure on other countries with similar restrictions to do the same, said Martha F. Davis, a professor at Northeastern University School of Law.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s a savvy move,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s trying to make sure there isn\u2019t a groundswell of Arab Spring-like activities and being responsive to those yearnings to participate. It\u2019s being proactive.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Professor Erika George (S.J. Quinney College of Law at the University of Utah) noted that there may be some negative reactions as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are people who may think it\u2019s inappropriate,\u201d George said. \u201cBut there\u2019s precedent for this. It\u2019s going to be hard to argue that a woman can be an Olympic champion but not be behind the wheel.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Summer Olympics in London could be a watershed event in sports, as every country is expected to send female athletes to participate.\u00a0 In the past, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Brunei have only sent male athletes, according to the New York Times. Saudi Arabia, a monarchy whose legal system is based on Islamic law, is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":337,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[39074],"tags":[461,120,108],"class_list":["post-3052","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sightings","tag-human-rights","tag-sex","tag-sports"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3052","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/337"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3052"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3052\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3063,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3052\/revisions\/3063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3052"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3052"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}