Is Masashi Kishimoto Sexist?

[Jammin]

A note about the poll. It's quite old. I voted "No" a long time ago and vehemently would say "Yes" now. It might be time to restart that thing.

------------------------------

I don't believe for a second that women can't fight just as well as men. The reason I say this with such conviction is that I am a student of Wing Chun style Kung-fu.

Now I don't know how much everybody here knows about such things so I'm going to tell a little story about the origin of my martial art.....

After the destruction of the Shaolin temple in China one of the few Buddist monks to escape was named Ng Mui. The story goes that after she fled she witnessed a fight between a crane and snake and it inspired her to use the knowledge she had of Shaolin Kung fu to create a new martial art based on what she had seen.

One day she came to know a woman who sold her bean curd by the name of Yim Yee who had a beautiful daughter named Yim Wing-chun who had unfortunately caught the eye of a local warlord. Ng Mui took on Yim Wing-chun as a disciple and taught her the snake-crane kung-fu style she had created. Using this style Yim Wing-chun fought the warlord in a one on one duel and thoroughly beat and humiliated him She later passed this art on to her husband a merchant named Leung Bok-chau who is credited with naming the art Wing Chug Kuen in his wife's honor and spreading the art further. Bruce Lee would eventually learn Wing Chun style kung-fu and make it a major part of the foundation for his now famous hybrid martial art.... Jeet Kune Do.

So it's with considerable pride I say that I fight like a girl.
(Though a must admit that I had to google the story....it's been a while.)

[earthforge]

I think people are getting messed up on the definition of sexism. From Merriam-Webster:

1
: prejudice or discrimination based on sex; especially : discrimination against women
2
: behavior, conditions, or attitudes that foster stereotypes of social roles based on sex

While the first definition implies malevolence, the second does not. I think we should argue the second definition. There is also the aforementioned by Uriel cultural attitudes towards women. For instance, in Japan many women simply aren't marrying because they are expected to quit their jobs to look after the kids, and they can never be in the workplace again. There's actually a backlash against the expectations of women to become submissive once they marry (which has many many roots in Japanese history and mythology. Just learned myself that one of the traditional Japanese wedding hats, tsunokakushi, are intended to cover "the horns" of women and represent becoming a gentle submissive wife. o_0)

Now, Kishimoto himself doesn't seem to bear any malice. He's not yelled that women are devils or such. But he does seem strongly to believe that women are inferior to men, and he lets it carry over to his work. It is very bothersome to those of us who abhor such objectification of women. This doesn't mean that he's a bad storyteller. It just means that he exhibits behavior that promotes stereotypes about women. Case in point is Tsunade's "I know I'm weak because I'm a woman." So in that sense, Kishimoto is sexist.

If your sister is in the military she should be quite aware of why females aren't front line soldiers. Never said they shouldn't be in the military, but there are specific, heavily reasearched reasons why the don't go into front line combat situations.

Pray tell. I don't believe it. I can believe that women need different exercises than the guys, but that's because women have different muscle groups than men. If you want to be good physically, you have to develop them. When it comes to the firing line, trained women and men will take out anyone who isn't trained. You'd be gunned down by a girl in a second.

Oh, and probably every girl in my school's judo dojo can give you a broken arm. Probably Googlez's dojo too.

[LnDRash]

I think what some guys are arguing is that males, given the same amount of training, will outclass a women in combat because they have more muscle.

While that may be true if we talk about something like wrestling (not that TV entertainment stuff), sumo or maybe even boxing, I realy have my doubts if this would also apply to other martial arts, in which skill, talent and flexibility outweigh raw physical strength... and when it comes to firing guns or god forbid spitting fireballs and farting lightning, there should be no gender specific handycap at all.

I.e maybe being Kisame wouldn't be the most "realistic" role for a women, but I don't see any reason why it would be "unrealistic" for a women to wield the same power as Itachi.

Dude's one of the most powerful characters in the Manga thanks to stuff like Intelligence, Skill, Amaterasu, Susanoo, Genjutsu and Mythical Weapons... and not because of his super-duper heavyweight physique.

[Gats]

A few points :

*I'm not sure if Delbi is really questionning women's mental in the frontlines, it's more about their relationship with men, he said women have an "adverse effect" on men. Which doesn't make them (women) weaker, but the problem can be real.

*I'm not a specialist, but while every aspect of the body are important in military infantry, it seems logical that the most predominant ones (the most used) are endurance and strength. Because you essentially walk, run, while wearing quite heavy materials. So it's not scandalous to state that men are better in these fields. Sure melee fight is also very important, I'm not discarding it at all, but these situations are rarer (since you usually fight at distance) nowadays in ground military operations, which still favor the men, not because they aim better, but because we're going back to what it is used most of the time : endurance and strength.

*But all these points don't really apply to the Narutoverse. We're talking about ninjas, where endurance and strength are not necesserarily the essential. It's mainly about mastering our own chakra, good reflexes, agility, tactics, leadership... And women are logically not handicapped in these areas. Besides, I agree with eathforge and Uriel about Kishi's culture. I think people do not realize the harsh reality of women condition in the Japenese culture. And Kishi pushing Tsunade to say she's weak because she is a woman is quite illuminating.

[Ryr]

I don't believe for a second that women can't fight just as well as men. The reason I say this with such conviction is that I am a student of Wing Chun style Kung-fu.

Now I don't know how much everybody here knows about such things so I'm going to tell a little story about the origin of my martial art.....

After the destruction of the Shaolin temple in China one of the few Buddist monks to escape was named Ng Mui. The story goes that after she fled she witnessed a fight between a crane and snake and it inspired her to use the knowledge she had of Shaolin Kung fu to create a new martial art based on what she had seen.

One day she came to know a woman who sold her bean curd by the name of Yim Yee who had a beautiful daughter named Yim Wing-chun who had unfortunately caught the eye of a local warlord. Ng Mui took on Yim Wing-chun as a disciple and taught her the snake-crane kung-fu style she had created. Using this style Yim Wing-chun fought the warlord in a one on one duel and thoroughly beat and humiliated him She later passed this art on to her husband a merchant named Leung Bok-chau who is credited with naming the art Wing Chug Kuen in his wife's honor and spreading the art further. Bruce Lee would eventually learn Wing Chun style kung-fu and make it a major part of the foundation for his now famous hybrid martial art.... Jeet Kune Do.

Put a guy and a girl who received the same level of training in the Olympics and we can start talking.

Oh wait Olympics is gender segregated, ever wonder why.

Pray tell. I don't believe it. I can believe that women need different exercises than the guys, but that's because women have different muscle groups than men. If you want to be good physically, you have to develop them. When it comes to the firing line, trained women and men will take out anyone who isn't trained. You'd be gunned down by a girl in a second.

That's like comparing a 20 year old girl with a 10 year old boy.

The context here is 'with the same level of training, workout, age etc".

The guy will always have the advantage if the only difference comes down to gender.

[Delbi]

Pray tell. I don't believe it. I can believe that women need different exercises than the guys, but that's because women have different muscle groups than men. If you want to be good physically, you have to develop them. When it comes to the firing line, trained women and men will take out anyone who isn't trained. You'd be gunned down by a girl in a second.

Oh, and probably every girl in my school's judo dojo can give you a broken arm. Probably Googlez's dojo too.

Never said a woman can't fire a gun as good as a man, so not sure where you grabbed that from. I simply stated (and backed up with numerous facts) that men are superior to women physically. Also stated that women have an adverse affect on their male comrades in the front lines of combat, hence why they aren't there in the first place.

And while I won't point out how I highly doubt any girl in your schoo's judo dojo can kick my ass thanks to some training, given the fact that I have training of my own in various martial art forms, and probably have at least 40 pounds on the biggest of them, (I'm 205). I will point out that given the same training, a man would almost certainly always win in some form of martial art. Again, there is a reason why the Olympics, MMA, and Boxing matches are split by gender.

Now, an interesting tid bit I would like to point out. At a younger age, about 11-13 girls are typically bigger and at times stronger than their male counter-parts. I used to take Taekwondo as a child, and had my ass handed to me by girls older than me when I was young. I stopped training after I recieved my black belt at 16 and went to train at MMA gym to learn Muay Thai and Jiu Jitsu.

Went back to my Taekwondo dojo about a year ago and talked to my former sensei and noticed there were few girls in the class. Asked him why and he told me it was because he had been sued recently.

You see in our dojo once you reached black belt, you were allowed to spar with Olympic style rules. Want to know what happened? Two black belts, one male, one female were sparring in full gear. The male gave the girl a roundhouse kick to her side, broker her ribs. punctured her lungs, and nearly killed her. My sensei was thus sued by this girl's parents because he allowed a male, who was the same rank as her, who had the same training experience, to spar with her and hurt her so badly.

But wait...I thought girls could compete with boys! No they can't. This girl was not small, she was apprenly like 5'9' 140 lbs, but it just so happened the guy she was sparring was about my size, 6'1' 195 lbs. He hit her with enough force to break her ribs through her gear. And no, my sensei doesn't have old worn out stuff.

So of course, my sensei looked like an insensitive asshole, and this poor kid looked like a bully for nearly killing a girl.

So tell me, what would happen if I went to your dojo and broke a girls arm instead of her breaking mine? Is that suddendly ok? I would get labeled an asshole most likely.

I am not trying to act like some elitest male jackass. I have experienced things in the real world and have read and studied things that tell us men and women are not equally physically. The real world has plenty of examples that show this quite clearly. Why people feel the need to continue to argue with reality is beyond me. I am all for womens rights, but equality of the sexes does not mean that women have to be able to kick ass at the same rate men can in the real world.

[Dutchy]

Funny stuff, this thread. How is it okay to say that women are not physically as strong as men in the real world thus alright to show them as inferior in a manga where we have seen 3 - 4 male ninjas who have both chakra levels and raw destructive force equal to those of the Biju. Also, I don't buy all this crap about Kishi not knowing how to develop female characters, he simply doesn't see a reason to do so. Whether or not that makes him a sexist is hard to say, but his recent effort at putting Tsunade's medical ninjutsu as well physical strength on par with Hashirama's says quite a bit.

[Brill]

1
: prejudice or discrimination based on sex; especially : discrimination against women
2
: behavior, conditions, or attitudes that foster stereotypes of social roles based on sex

While the first definition implies malevolence, the second does not. I think we should argue the second definition. There is also the aforementioned by Uriel cultural attitudes towards women. For instance, in Japan many women simply aren't marrying because they are expected to quit their jobs to look after the kids, and they can never be in the workplace again. There's actually a backlash against the expectations of women to become submissive once they marry (which has many many roots in Japanese history and mythology. Just learned myself that one of the traditional Japanese wedding hats, tsunokakushi, are intended to cover "the horns" of women and represent becoming a gentle submissive wife. o_0)

That's great and all but how is the sexism portrayed in the manga? Where are the lines shown where women can't cross. I have yet to see Naruto's fantasy where Naruto goes off to work in his suit and tie and Sakura calls him back to give him his bento lunch in her fluffy apron. Why? Because it isn't there.

Now, Kishimoto himself doesn't seem to bear any malice. He's not yelled that women are devils or such. But he does seem strongly to believe that women are inferior to men, and he lets it carry over to his work. It is very bothersome to those of us who abhor such objectification of women. This doesn't mean that he's a bad storyteller. It just means that he exhibits behavior that promotes stereotypes about women. Case in point is Tsunade's "I know I'm weak because I'm a woman." So in that sense, Kishimoto is sexist.

So because Tsunade acknowledges her weaknesses (of which there were many) that makes Kishi sexist. Uh-huh. So let's go by definition #2 since #1 is ruled out. So where are these limitations? I've stated as others have that if women and men were equal they'd be in the same venues at the Olympics. They aren't. If you want to see why Kishi isn't sexist you needn't go further than Neji and Hinata. They both have similar techniques, they're both scouts for their teams and they're both front-line taijustu users. Is Hinata protected? Yes, because she's the heiress to the Hyuuga family. But are her movements restricted? Hell, no. Her ass was on the front-line fighting the enemies as they popped out fo the ground, just like Neji was. Was she forced to stay behind and pray for their safety return. No, she was deployed to ensure their safe return. That's not sexism, that's equality.

So the women are doing the exact same things as the men are, but their succeses rate is below that of the men. Neji is a proficient fighter while Hinata gets beaten over and over again. Guys outperforming girls in feats of strength is not sexism. it's reality. While this series is a fantasy setting, it doesn't mean it has to ignore reality. How shows typically do this is by implants like in Claymore, Freezing, or Magical Madoka to overcome the fact that men will win over women on equaling footing.

[earthforge]

Quite frankly, debating whether women are inferior to men in terms of physical fighting is irrelevant. We are talking about a character asserting that being a woman is a weakness, and another woman agreeing with it

Also stated that women have an adverse affect on their male comrades in the front lines of combat, hence why they aren't there in the first place.

This what they used to say about black men and still say about homosexuals. Over two centuries ago, I could've argued that a black man couldn't serve because a unit wouldn't function with him on the front lines because of "an adverse affect", like stupidity. And people did. It was only manpower shortages and the civil war the resulted in the compromise of units comprised of only black males led by white males. Ultimately desegregation was only mandated in 1948.

Now it's homosexuals. The compromise was DADT, which ended last year. Have there been incidents of supposedly gay men having an adverse effect on their unit? Hell no. So how should women be considered any different?

I will point out that given the same training, a man would almost certainly always win in some form of martial art. Again, there is a reason why the Olympics, MMA, and Boxing matches are split by gender.

Anecdotal evidence and not a shred of historical reference? Realize that the Olympics are pretty old.

You see in our dojo once you reached black belt, you were allowed to spar with Olympic style rules. Want to know what happened? Two black belts, one male, one female were sparring in full gear. The male gave the girl a roundhouse kick to her side, broker her ribs. punctured her lungs, and nearly killed her.

You know, there's something to be said for going for blood instead of competition. This is more of a problem with the institution of martial arts right now rather than a gender divide. This could have happened to anyone, male or female.

If anyone was to be sued, it would be the other guy's sensei for failing to train him in balance. Martial arts is more than beating the shit out of anyone. When you're a black belt, you have to be controlled. This is a failure I've seen in modern blackbelts though.

Kano Jigoro, the founder of judo, said:
"Don't think about what to do after you become strong – I have repeatedly stressed that the ultimate goal of Judo is to perfect the self, and to make a contribution to society. In the old days, Jūjutsu practitioners focused their efforts on becoming strong, and did not give too much consideration to how they could put that strength to use. Similarly, Judo practitioners of today do not make sufficient efforts to understand the ultimate objective of Judo. Too much emphasis is placed on the process rather than the objective, and many only desire to become strong and be able to defeat their opponents. Of course, I am not negating the importance of wanting to become strong or skilled. However, it must be remembered that this is just part of the process for a greater objective... The worth of all people is dependent on how they spend their life making contributions."

I think too many people forget this, and thus injuries occur. I've also observed that the older practitioners don't cause injury like younger ones do. Also, older practitioners are less tolerant of such behavior.

But wait...I thought girls could compete with boys!
So of course, my sensei looked like an insensitive asshole, and this poor kid looked like a bully for nearly killing a girl.

The other guy obviously was poorly controlled, but I don't blame your sensei at all. Sounds more like an act of overreactive parents.

Regardless, fighting is more than muscle. Muscle can be overcome by cleverness and understanding. That is judo's strength - to utilize your opponent's balance against them. A girl can surpass a guy's upperbody strength that way (and I don't deny that men have more upperbody strength, though I also put forth that women have more stamina. Women have to survive childbirth, an insanely stressful process that used to result in death most of the time prior to modern medicine.)

Example: Keiko Fukuda. She was promoted to 10th dan last year. Very few men and women are promoted to 10th dan to begin with. It's considered to be more than training, but discipline.

So tell me, what would happen if I went to your dojo and broke a girls arm instead of her breaking mine? Is that suddendly ok? I would get labeled an asshole most likely.

I never said I would break your arm, I just said we could. There's a difference. I'm telling you the capabilities of the women in my school's dojo. By stating that you would break your opponent's arm, I can only conclude you are a bully. If my school's judo founder saw someone who learned martial arts just to be a bully, and exhibit it in shitty control to both men and women, he'd have sent them away for good. Because he didn't tolerate bullies.

I am all for womens rights, but equality of the sexes does not mean that women have to be able to kick ass at the same rate men can in the real world.

Who the hell are you to decide what anyone can or can't do?

[IChallengeYou!]

The posts I read here are shocking, to say the least. The ignorance and stupidity...No, I won't directly name who exactly are making these posts. Tyeah right, let's just throw logics out of the window, and then start to conspire some theories about how one sex who has not even got close to what another sex has achieved as far as warfare(this is the theme of the manga, after all) goes, is not worse at performing the said duties as the other sex who has proven in PRACTICE and not THEORIES to do so, and then we will just equalize them for no coherent reason, claiming that they are equal just because my anecdotes are better than yours! Things about girls breaking arms just to try and make a nonsensical point...Wow. That is a new low, really. There's really nothing to argue about when this coffin has been already shut by a thousand year old nail.

[Delbi]

Quite frankly, debating whether women are inferior to men in terms of physical fighting is irrelevant. We are talking about a character asserting that being a woman is a weakness, and another woman agreeing with it

This what they used to say about black men and still say about homosexuals. Over two centuries ago, I could've argued that a black man couldn't serve because a unit wouldn't function with him on the front lines because of "an adverse affect", like stupidity. And people did. It was only manpower shortages and the civil war the resulted in the compromise of units comprised of only black males led by white males. Ultimately desegregation was only mandated in 1948.

Now it's homosexuals. The compromise was DADT, which ended last year. Have there been incidents of supposedly gay men having an adverse effect on their unit? Hell no. So how should women be considered any different?

And if you knew anything about the armed forces you would know these problems still exist today just in smaller instances. There is still racism and sexism in the United States Military it is simply less wide spread.

You also didn't read, or simply didn't understand what I said about women.

Racism and the Gay-bashing happens because people gain views thanks to their enviornment and upbring.

The adverse affect women have on men is caused by years of psychological conditioning that tells men to protect women and that men are superior to women and women need help. It is also a maternal instinct of men to protect women.

SO, plainly speaking this problem is entirely different, and is thus handled different.

Anecdotal evidence and not a shred of historical reference? Realize that the Olympics are pretty old.

And despite being old they have changed with the times. What hasn't changed? Segragation of the sexes due to an unfair advantage in favor of men. Look at Olympic records and you will be hard pressed to find women holding any advantage in time trials, strength competitions, etc.

You know, there's something to be said for going for blood instead of competition. This is more of a problem with the institution of martial arts right now rather than a gender divide. This could have happened to anyone, male or female.

If anyone was to be sued, it would be the other guy's sensei for failing to train him in balance. Martial arts is more than beating the shit out of anyone. When you're a black belt, you have to be controlled. This is a failure I've seen in modern blackbelts though.

Kano Jigoro, the founder of judo, said:
"Don't think about what to do after you become strong – I have repeatedly stressed that the ultimate goal of Judo is to perfect the self, and to make a contribution to society. In the old days, Jūjutsu practitioners focused their efforts on becoming strong, and did not give too much consideration to how they could put that strength to use. Similarly, Judo practitioners of today do not make sufficient efforts to understand the ultimate objective of Judo. Too much emphasis is placed on the process rather than the objective, and many only desire to become strong and be able to defeat their opponents. Of course, I am not negating the importance of wanting to become strong or skilled. However, it must be remembered that this is just part of the process for a greater objective... The worth of all people is dependent on how they spend their life making contributions."

I think too many people forget this, and thus injuries occur. I've also observed that the older practitioners don't cause injury like younger ones do. Also, older practitioners are less tolerant of such behavior.

There was control involved, you miss read what I said. Olympic style rules allow for more contact. serious contact so that a simple leg kick does not score a point.

Given that these two students were black belts, and both willing spared means they were aware of the dangers. He was not going for "blood" he was executing a kick without holding back. Because if you do practice in a dojo, tell me, would you want a male holding back on you just because you were a girl? If he held back he would have left the mat bloody. He wasn't head hunting or trying to hurt her. He in fact struck her in one of her most protected areas with a foot of his that was padded.

The girl got caught off guard and took a kick to the ribs that broke her ribs which puncutured her lung. Freak accident, could have happened to anyone. But, we have to look at the fact that she was smaller than him, that he was much stronger than her, and despite being of the same rank, and having the same training, he was superior and it showed with one kick that he nearly killed her.

The other guy obviously was poorly controlled, but I don't blame your sensei at all. Sounds more like an act of overreactive parents.

Regardless, fighting is more than muscle. Muscle can be overcome by cleverness and understanding. That is judo's strength - to utilize your opponent's balance against them. A girl can surpass a guy's upperbody strength that way (and I don't deny that men have more upperbody strength, though I also put forth that women have more stamina. Women have to survive childbirth, an insanely stressful process that used to result in death most of the time prior to modern medicine.)

Example: Keiko Fukuda. She was promoted to 10th dan last year. Very few men and women are promoted to 10th dan to begin with. It's considered to be more than training, but discipline.

And what happens when you have someone who has the discipline of Judo and the strength and muscle to back it up? What can a female hope to do against a male who has the same discipline in terms of his Judo skills as her, but also more strength on top of it? Plainly speaking there are biological factors that make her disadvantaged.

Granted, can a female overcome her weaknesses in comparision to a man if she has more training and disciipline? Yes. But when the training and discipline is equal, then she doesn't stand much of a chance, which is the point I have been trying to make.

As for the bolded part, women do not have more stamina. Women survive child birth because they are made to survive child birth. Larger hips, and the release of different hormones prevent them from blacking out and allow them to give birth. Men don't give birth so their hips are narrower and they can't release the same hormones in a way women can.

I'm sure you missed it and I don't blame you but a few pages back I talk about endurance and men and womens ability to deal with pain. So if you want to read it go ahead. But facts are facts, men have more endurance than women and while their bodies cannot sustatin more pain than women, they deal with it better.

I never said I would break your arm, I just said we could. There's a difference. I'm telling you the capabilities of the women in my school's dojo. By stating that you would break your opponent's arm, I can only conclude you are a bully. If my school's judo founder saw someone who learned martial arts just to be a bully, and exhibit it in shitty control to both men and women, he'd have sent them away for good. Because he didn't tolerate bullies.

Did I say I would? Please re-read what I said and do not put words in my mouth. I said what would happen if I did?

You talk of control? The amount of force it would take for a female who weights 70 lbs less than I to break my arm is much more than it would take me to break hers. IN FACT, she would almost certainly have to exert herself in order to break my arm. If you are talking about tearing ligaments in a joint, that is different, but to break one of my bones she would have to LOSE CONTROL and try and PROVE A POINT that she could just because I was a man who was bigger than her.

I simply stated if I did what would happen and you jump on me calling me a bully. While I am not trained in Judo, what would happen if I was and I executed a move perfectly, with CONTROL, and the girl still got hurt? The logical conclusion would be she shouldn't have been my partner because she's smaller and more fragile than I am.

Who the hell are you to decide what anyone can or can't do?

Never said I'm here to decide it. First and foremost I believe women should be allowed to decide things that have to do with them personally, for example abortion. I think it is an atrocity that middle to elder age white men for the most part are in control of the abortion issue.

However...in terms of the Armed Forces, whether you look at the "Old Army" or "New Army" perspectives in all branches of the military, there is a consensus among those who are much more educated in the matter than you and I, that women are not "fit" for the frontlines of combat. This was the point I wished to make many many posts ago.

[Kusachu]

Put a guy and a girl who received the same level of training in the Olympics and we can start talking.

Oh wait Olympics is gender segregated, ever wonder why.



That's like comparing a 20 year old girl with a 10 year old boy.

The context here is 'with the same level of training, workout, age etc".

The guy will always have the advantage if the only difference comes down to gender.

Unless the battle is waged with weapons, speed, stealth, intelligence, experience, fantasy ninja techniques, etc...then I don't see a reason why a woman can't be equal and/or better than a man, such as is the case in Naruto. Fact is that woman are still either inferior or simply insignificant in those scenarios. Just sayin'. But we are reflecting reality here, so women are inherently inferior.

Odd though, that out of all the ninja in her class, Sakura is the "smartest", even in mathematical calculation, which is traditionally viewed as a "male" subject, and even though Sasuke scored top marks in all subject areas (how does that work if Sakura is academically his superior?), he still had to cheat to pass the written chuunin exam and Sakura was the one that got cheated off of.

*shrug* Whatever. Carry on.

[Rikudou King]

Well in that particular situation, Sasuke's higher grades were in the three areas of combat. I don't think things like mathematics played a role in their school grading, so her being better wouldn't have factored in to their ranking.

[Jessie]

Plus Shikamaru was the smartest kid in their age group, but never bothered to answer any of the questions on any test. So Sakura having the top marks sort of meant nothing, since the actual smartest one in class was too lazy to write down the answers.

[Jammin]

I just do not buy into the perception that women are not as effective of a fighter as an equivalent man.

While it's certainly true that women, lacking the same amount of the hormone testosterone, tend to develop less muscle mass and physical strength as an equivalent male counterpart. The reality of non-contest fighting is that the strength and muscle mass is not as big an advantage as people often consider it to be and often limits flexibility.

A true grappler, like someone skilled at judo for example, will use skilled footwork to conquer your center of gravity and then use minimal force to break/dislocate bones and hyper-extend joints. Skill is far more important then strength for this; and this is true of most really effective combat arts.

Another example would be that I might be able to beat a female kung fu practitioner more skilled than myself in arm wrestling, but if I were to fight that same person she'd probably break every one of my fingers and just generally demolish me as I writhe in unimaginable pain. Strength isn't even really a part of that equation; and it's amazing how often that's true.

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I just think the reality is that the actual combat difference between trained men and women is insignificant. And that should only become more so when you apply weaponry and supernatural ninja skills.

I mean, if two people are trying to stab each other to death what does it matter who can bench press more? The one who is faster, more skilled, and more fearless is the one with the real advantage.