2021 US Championship

[Brad Thomson]

Your idea is interesting and may be workable. But if fewer women than men are interested in chess, then so be it and so what? I agree that the programs today are meant to encourage more females to play and for the most part no longer contain the implicit suggestion that females are by nature inferior players to males. But if they are not then we do not need the programs. If men simply want more women around there are lots of other activities where there are plenty of women present.

[Pargat Perrer]

Your idea is interesting and may be workable. But if fewer women than men are interested in chess, then so be it and so what? I agree that the programs today are meant to encourage more females to play and for the most part no longer contain the implicit suggestion that females are by nature inferior players to males. But if they are not then we do not need the programs. If men simply want more women around there are lots of other activities where there are plenty of women present.

I agree with Aris in the covid thread saying that you Brad are one of the more open-minded and polite members of this forum.

Your last statement is true of course, but we don't want to remove any men from chess. Anyway I don't think the idea is to simply have more women around, i think it is to have more men & women around. Without the presence of women at all in competitive chess, you will only get some % P1 of the total population involved. The absolute numbers will grow with population, but that is a slow growth. If you add in women in significant numbers, you will bring in more men along with them, and competitive chess participation grows to some new % P2 involved, where P2 > P1. Then you get more corporate sponsorship, you get more $$$, and suddenly you now have % P3 involved, where P3 >> P1.

Therefore I think Brad it is actually wise to wish to see womens-only programs continue, with my added idea of restricting eligibility based on some number N career rated games, so that we get further along to attracting % P3 in competitive chess. And if we get there, the total prize monies will make everyone happier. That is what I meant in another post here about a rising tide lifting all boats.

[Bob Armstrong]

Hi Pargat:

1. Women are not inferior to men in chess.
2. Women have lower Elo ratings than men generally at the top level because they do not play the top players (Mostly men) ALL THE TIME. They spend much time playing lower-rated Elo top women players.....just not good enough to get them to the top echelons of open chess.
3. I favour women-only tournaments (Like Junior, Senior, Men-only, etc.). I am against a separate, parallel women-only title system.
4. FIDE brought in the "Women-Only" title system. So it is FIDE that has the power to eliminate it in the best interests of chess (Though some top women will argue it is neither in the interest of chess generally, nor women in particular). It will take some tanking for the politicos to decide to go ahead on this, in the face of a vigorous protest from top echelon women who's income will be substantially lowered without the separate system prize money.

Want to improve? Play the best! Well known in chess.

I believe this is clear....maybe someone might confirm my position is clear and comprehensive to Pargat.

Pargat..I was arguing this years and years ago in my chess newsletter Toronto Chess News & Views.......my position has never changed. Other long-in-the-tooth ChessTalkers can confirm this for you.

I am not sexist, though because of my view, I am often so smeared, and have been for years now.

Bob A

[Brad Thomson]

I think I remember, Bob, you making these arguments back in the mid-90s when I was with the CFC. I too was making the same arguments I am making now. There was an AGM back in those days, possibly London 1993, or Winnipeg 1994, where the question of abolishing the female-specific program was voted upon. In their wisdon the governors decided in favour of continuing, though the vote was not close to unanimous as I recall.

[Pargat Perrer]

Hi Pargat:

1. Women are not inferior to men in chess.
2. Women have lower Elo ratings than men generally at the top level because they do not play the top players (Mostly men) ALL THE TIME. They spend much time playing lower-rated Elo top women players.....just not good enough to get them to the top echelons of open chess.
3. I favour women-only tournaments (Like Junior, Senior, Men-only, etc.). I am against a separate, parallel women-only title system.
4. FIDE brought in the "Women-Only" title system. So it is FIDE that has the power to eliminate it in the best interests of chess (Though some top women will argue it is neither in the interest of chess generally, nor women in particular). It will take some tanking for the politicos to decide to go ahead on this, in the face of a vigorous protest from top echelon women who's income will be substantially lowered without the separate system prize money.

Want to improve? Play the best! Well known in chess.

I believe this is clear....maybe someone might confirm my position is clear and comprehensive to Pargat.

Pargat..I was arguing this years and years ago in my chess newsletter Toronto Chess News & Views.......my position has never changed. Other long-in-the-tooth ChessTalkers can confirm this for you.

I am not sexist, though because of my view, I am often so smeared, and have been for years now.

Bob A

Hi Bob,

Yes, I am clear that you are NOT sexist and I do believe it. I am not trying to prove anything otherwise about you personally.

Bob, I want you to imagine a parallel universe where women are the only ones playing chess. Let's pretend that all men hate chess and don't play it. So in that case, we'd have only the women playing women. Because of your statement 2 above, this would mean that women could not get to the same ELO levels that men are at now.

Can you see that that is a SEXIST view, even though I know you are not sexist? It says that women by the fact that they are women cannot reach the same levels that men have reached in chess. This explains why you have been smeeared as sexist even though you are not sexist. You are clinging onto a sexist view.

But if the men got there by playing only against other men, why can't women get there by playing only other women? Is there something wrong with women, some problem that men don't have? Please explain.

Now, you say "Want to improve? Play the best" to try and prove your view. So yes, women could perhaps improve faster by playing men. In fact, women have equal access to chess engines, so women could train by playing under tournament conditions against Stockfish / Komodo / Rybka / ... and improve even FASTER. They don't need men!

So my argument is, if women are more comfortable in the current chess environment playing against other women, then encourage them to do that with the goal of getting more women into chess. My new idea on top of this is to say, after N career rated games which includes childhood (junior) games, a female can no longer enter women-only sections and must play in the open events. I just don't know what the best value for N would be, that would require statistical analysis.

The reason for having this new rule is to allay concerns that some people like Brad have that women in competitive chess are having their cake and eating it too, as he puts it.

[Fred Harvey]

My new idea on top of this is to say, after N career rated games which includes childhood (junior) games, a female can no longer enter women-only sections and must play in the open events. I just don't know what the best value for N would be, that would require statistical analysis. blah blah blah

Why do all you "sexist old farts" keep trying to tell women what they should do? Why not simply try to encourage as many organizers as possible to organize as many tournaments as players want in whatever format they want? It will all work out in the end......

[Brad Thomson]

Why do all you "sexist old farts" keep trying to tell women what they should do?

Simple. Men are getting cheated in the process.

[Fred Harvey]

Simple. Men are getting cheated in the process.

I don't get it! Surely if any group of players can persuade an organizer to arrange a tournament, and prizes, for themselves, there's nothing for outsiders to lose. It was never theirs to be cheated out of. We are talking about money aren't we?

[Brad Thomson]

We are talking about money aren't we?

Yes, and as Neil pointed out earlier, the men are entitled to play for $195K while the women are entitled to play for $295K simply and only because they are women. This is not fair to men. It is blatant sexism.

[Fred Harvey]

Yes, and as Neil pointed out earlier, the men are entitled to play for $195K while the women are entitled to play for $295K simply and only because they are women. This is not fair to men. It is blatant sexism.

I still don't get it! The women are playing for $100K, not $295K? You're surely not resorting to bafflegab ala Belzberg are you?

[Bob Armstrong]

Hi Fred:

I'm unclear where you stand. Are you in favour of:

1. Women-only tournaments, organized through private profit enterprise (An organizer), who runs around trying to figure out how to accrue prize money for this one tournament?

2. A whole parallel, separate, women-only title system operated by FIDE?

Bob A

[Bob Armstrong]

Hi Pargat:

a. Women have lower ELO ratings purely because they fail to play THE BEST (Mostly Men in the open tournaments) all the time. They spend a lot of their time playing lower-rated top FIDE Women in the FIDE women's system - not as productive for improvement. It has nothing to do with sexism nor women being inferior in chess.....I stated this clearly in my post.

b. I have no problem with women enjoying the atmosphere of women-only tournaments, over open tournaments. So they can ask organizers to have women-only tournaments (Same as Junior, Senior, Men-Only, et.) This is a totally different thing than the separate, parallel, women-only title system that FIDE brought in ages ago.

c. Junior girls now make up a large percentage of all club juniors. They play in open tournaments mostly at that age. The times they play women-only is when it is set up under the separate women-only FIDE title system (FIDE World Girls Championships). And women are now playing much more and I think this parallel incubator system, to graduate women to the open tournament, is now not only not needed, but holding back top women players from reaching the pinnacle of chess.

Bob A

[Fred Harvey]

Hi Fred:

I'm unclear where you stand. Are you in favour of:

1. Women-only tournaments, organized through private profit enterprise (An organizer), who runs around trying to figure out how to accrue prize money for this one tournament?

2. A whole parallel, separate, women-only title system operated by FIDE?

Bob A

When I can stand without falling over, I stand for freedom of choice. A responsibility of any national or international organization should be to encourage as many choices are available as possible, and therein lies the problem. Perhaps......

[Brad Thomson]

I still don't get it! The women are playing for $100K, not $295K? You're surely not resorting to bafflegab ala Belzberg are you?

No. Women are eligible to play in the Open section, and thus play for the bigger prize money (there simply happen to be no women there at this time), but men are not allowed to play in the Women's section. Thus females are eligible for all of the prize money, men only for some of it. This strikes me as sexist.

[Pargat Perrer]

a. Women have lower ELO ratings purely because they fail to play THE BEST (Mostly Men in the open tournaments) all the time. They spend a lot of their time playing lower-rated top FIDE Women in the FIDE women's system - not as productive for improvement. It has nothing to do with sexism nor women being inferior in chess.....I stated this clearly in my post.

I have explained to you now 3 times that you are wrong in this belief. I have explained it clearly, that if women were the only ones playing ELO rated chess and they aren't inferior to men, they should eventually have about the same % of players with a 2800+ rating and that is without ever playing any men. If men can do it playing only men, and women aren't inferior, then women can do it playing only women!

You just don't get it, so I must conclude you really don't understand the ELO rating system. I do NOT BELIEVE you hold this view because you are sexist, even though this view itself is sexist. I think you are just hung up on this notion that women have to play higher-rated men in order to progress to men's ratings. But no, they do NOT. If they want to learn from better players, they are free to play under tournament conditions against 3500 rated chess engines, and they would eventually become BETTER than men, who won't play such engines because of their egos.

But even if women only played women, they would eventually have their own 2800+ rated players. How many? That depends on how many women players there are. But the % of the total players that are over 2800 would eventually be the same for both men and women, because we are agreed women are not inferior at chess.

b. I have no problem with women enjoying the atmosphere of women-only tournaments, over open tournaments. So they can ask organizers to have women-only tournaments (Same as Junior, Senior, Men-Only, et.) This is a totally different thing than the separate, parallel, women-only title system that FIDE brought in ages ago.

I have no opinion on the title system, since I don't know enough about it and I don't know how much women are motivated by these titles.

c. Junior girls now make up a large percentage of all club juniors. They play in open tournaments mostly at that age. The times they play women-only is when it is set up under the separate women-only FIDE title system (FIDE World Girls Championships). And women are now playing much more and I think this parallel incubator system, to graduate women to the open tournament, is now not only not needed, but holding back top women players from reaching the pinnacle of chess.

You could be right that the time may be at hand to remove the so-called "incubator system". I didn't realize that as Brad pointed out this goes all the way back to the mid-1990s. I thought it was much more recent than that.