Mustafina appointed acting junior coach

[ArnoldRimmer]

Dex, you cannot simply expect to employ massive great sexist double standards and not be challenged about it. It is not biting your head off to point out when you’re doing this.

So I ask again, why do you only have a problem with Aliya? If you want to say that parents should ensure they spend a certain amount of time with their children, and by extension that this common practice in a number of cultures is undesirable, that means all parents. Not just the female ones.

In this setup, the child’s other parent doesn’t appear to be present at all, and you’ve not a word to say about him but reserve ire for the one who’s actually seeing the child and is evidently substantially financially providing too. Why was it ok for Alexei to have a child if he wasn’t going to be there? Why is it ok for Epke to choose a schedule combining elite gymnastics training and work as a surgeon, but be exempt from any criticism because of his *****?

 

[JaJa]

I don’t think it is as simple as a double standard though or sexism. I really don’t agree with Dex, I sure was not Susie Homemaker myself. I had both of my children while working in an extremely busy profession, ultimately building my own firm and relied heavily on hired help. There was never any question that I was going to give up my career to be home more and I do not think that made me a bad parent. And I think that when people have children they need to figure it out themselves how they will be raised and as long as the kids are well taken care of by someone its fine. But I do not think we can overlook biology completely. Women are the ones who bear children and I do think that like it or not it makes our relationship with them different from the relationship the father has. And the notion that child care responsibility is a shared responsibility is a relatively new one. So while i do not agree with Dex I do not think his perspective is that far out.

 

[ArnoldRimmer]

It can’t not be a double standard if there’s a different standard being applied to the male parent than the female, which there obviously is. Now if he or anyone else wants to argue it’s justified, they can do that. But nobody has actually made out an argument in favour of that principle yet. In fact we’re being told that parents, not mothers but parents, should ensure they spend a certain amount of time with their children, but only the female in the setup is being criticised despite doing an objectively better and more involved job than the male.

And really, the idea that the mother is automatically the one whose obligations are greater devalues the importance of care provided by fathers. You’re correct that often this hasn’t been well recognised by many societies in the past, and many men haven’t been empowered to be caregivers for their children: all the more reason to name and address that problem now.

 

[JaJa]

A double standard is the application of different standards for situations which are in fact the same. So of course you can say it does not apply here if you think there is legitimately a difference between the male and female parent.

That’s first of all. Second of all I think it is frankly shallow thinking to assume that once a child is born and breast fed there is no more implication for differences in the parental relationship between male and female. As if the nine months in utero and the birthing process itself has no long term impact on how you relate to a child. We spend 9 months interacting with the baby in ways that men just do not and can not. And then we go through the ordeal of birthing the child. Men do not. It has to have consequences.

Look, I really don’t care all that much about this issue, it was never a big deal in my own life. We just figured it out and it worked out fine for our family even if we were somewhat unconventional by more old fashioned standards. And I do agree that Musti did absolutely nothing wrong and that she for sure seems to be the more responsible parent. And yes, I even agree that women absolutely do get blamed very unfairly in situations like this while people let men off the hook.

I’m just saying that its not a completely simple thing and while I do not agree with Dex there are many sides to this, all of which are colored by class, culture etc etc And with that I pss the baton back to Dex. Feel free to jump back in. I do not think anyone is biting your head off just engaging in a bit of debate

 

[ArnoldRimmer]

The thing with the double standard point Jaja is that Dex has used unisex terminology. He or she cites a belief about obligations of parents, but then applies it only to the mother and not the fathers. That’s the application of a double standard.

In terms of your argument about biology, this is a profoundly complex argument and one for which you cite no evidence, but let’s assume for the sake of argument that you’re correct. It’s still not immediately obvious what you think it means in the context of this discussion.

So we’ll take the view that the mother having been the one to gestate and give birth innately means the relationship is always different to and potentially more important than those between the child and the other parent/caregivers who didn’t engage in this process, well beyond babyhood. That still doesn’t mean that the father is so unimportant in comparison that his being absent doesn’t even merit a mention. That attitude doesn’t help mothers, fathers or their children: you can hold the view you espouse here without getting anywhere near saying what Dex has.

 

[Dex]

Why is it so wrong and narrow minded to feel that a child should be raised by a parent (M OR F, though in Mustafina’s case M is not an option I guess)?

 

[ArnoldRimmer]

It’s important to clarify that what’s wrong here isn’t simply that view. It’s the fact that you evidently don’t care about one class of parent being entirely absent, and that you hold fathers to a vastly lower standard than mothers. Whatever your rationale, if you look at the Mustafina situation and only criticise her, the parent who is actually involved and providing, something has gone very wrong somewhere in your line of thinking. The casual dismissal of Epke’s decision to organise his elite training and financial provision in a way that likely doesn’t leave him any more time with his kid than Aliya has with hers simply reinforces that.

 

[megansothername]

Why is it so wrong and narrow minded to feel that a child should be raised by a parent (M OR F, though in Mustafina’s case M is not an option I guess)?

Because it ignores the way much of the world does now and always has raised children. Ignoring the sexism for the moment, because others have discussed that at length, it simply isn’t the normal standard in many cultures today or throughout much of history for the parents to be almost entirely responsible for raising children. As numerous people have pointed out, across different cultures it is variously the parents, or the grandparents, or the village as a whole, or a cooperative group of women, or any other range of arrangements (including boarding schools and nannies among the wealthy) that is most typical for children to be raised in.

Believing that there is some inherent value to the “parent” raising the child is narrow-minded because it takes a cultural value that you hold and assumes that anybody using a different model is normatively doing things worse. As far as I know, there is no evidence that children raised in stable homes by grandparents, or in communal arrangements within villages, have worse outcomes on average than those raised by birth parents. So the idea that the parent has a specific obligation to be the sole or primary caregiver isn’t grounded in some particular understanding of the value of that in child development, but in your own cultural or personal values. Using that to apply judgement to those with a different set of values or circumstances is narrow-minded.

 

[alattejava]

If able. She is a single mother who needs to work to earn a living. She is very lucky to have parents who are willing and able to watch her daughter. Her ex is a full time athlete.

 

[YurchenkoLoop]

One of the Russian juniors playing around with a hip to double front dismount. Mustafina recorded this video. I think it’s Elizaveta Us.



Here’s a video of Elizaveta on bars from the 2021 Moscow Junior Championships–didn’t know this was happening

 

[ArnoldRimmer]

Oh wow I don’t think I’ve ever seen that dismount before! Nowhere near being landed of course, but still fun to see something so original.

 

[irichluck21]

Pavlova’s “Winter” FX music in the background brings back memories.

 

[RAFIKI]

Cool bars dismount and I’m impressed how much height she gets above the bar. Bonkers that irichluck21’s comment about that beautiful music made me click on the video rather than to see some gymnastics! I’m off to YT that floor routine…