The spring-like weather last weekend has brought out many more climbers (I think there were two rescues last week in Boulder and Eldorado Canyon). As I go through my warmup circuit at Flagstaff, I have been encountering more than a few nervous boulderers out there. One of the more common scenarios is a young woman accompanied by one or more incompetent young male climbers. Through lack of fear and/or common sense or too much hormones, these young men often scrape up moderate highballs and then call down to the woman, "Go for it!" The other day, I actually heard someone tell a young woman to "Man up" as some kind of encouragement. Seriously?
Anyone who has been climbing a while will hopefully understand that climbing up little rocks next to the road has very little to do with real courage or depth of character. But associating courage or bravery in climbing with the male sex is a depressing trend which I am calling for an end to right now. "Manning up" or "sacking up" or any of the other equivalent phrases are simply bogus. If you really want to man up, get a career, have a family, serve the public in some important way, and especially don't perpetuate sexist stereotypes.
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Good call, but it should be expanded too. What about the situation of the novice boulderer being psyched to climb with a more experienced/knowledgeable boulderer for the first time. Male or female, they will be either so psyched that they will get on something waaaay over their head (and potentially injuring themselves), or they will try and "man up" to keep up with the better boulderer (and potentially injuring themselves). You see it in climbing, running, mountaineering, etc., whether it is said (yelled?) out loud or not.
I don't know if it is a "male" thing, or if it is more of a "subterranean psychological ego" thing, but I agree that it is not a very positive form of encouragement.
I completely agree with you Peter. Good point! I see plenty of that at Flag all the time.
"If you really want to man up, get a career, have a family, serve the public in some important way, and especially don't perpetuate sexist stereotypes."
Well said. If this kind of attitude was more prevalent in the climbing community (and everywhere else for that matter!) the world would be a better place.
But oh how our fragile egos love to attach significance to climbing on rocks...
Likewise the language of "crushing".
Peter- I fully agree. Funny, the women climbers in my group tell each other to "V-up", but they don't says "V".
Thanks for bringing this up - I totally agree.
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