I constantly hear women exhorting others to treat the women as people and humans first.

How does one square this with the fact that most women do not act considerate in kind towards men, preferring to push and encourage men to do things that dehumanize them and that limit them in term of gender?

tit for tat

According to Julia Wallace's story, Jennifer Sey claims "Whether or not it was true was kind of beside the point" after she accuses a gymnastics coach of felony sexual abuse, if not stauatory rape. This is after she strongly suggests/claims many male coaches must be sexually attracted to young girls because they themselves were not gymnasts and there is no more likley explanation as to why they would choose that profession. When asked for any evidence, the best she can come up with this that she thought a coach was "weird." At the same age, she claimed that healthy girls were "elephantine" because they were not starving themselves.

Sexual abuse of minors--regardless of the circumstances--should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. So should slander/libel.

They were slim, but muscular and many of the girls were in their late teens. It was common to see girls who had nice, curvy, womanly bodies -- even breasts, LOL.

My favorite gymnast of recent memory was Svetlana Boginskaya. She was old by gymnast standards (21 in the 1994 Olympics) and taller (5'4"!) and more adult-looking than her counterparts on other teams (eg she had a woman's figure). She was my favorite to watch, because her height and the length of her limbs made it easer to actually *see* what she was doing.

She was also a superior athlete, in my opinion, because her height put her center of gravity way higher than the tiny little creatures running around by her knees, which can be a disadvantage especially on beam. I did gymnastics for about six years when I was small, then I shot up about four inches and that was the end of that (also I was kind of klutzy, so it all would have come crashing down eventually!) My best friend who came up to my nose excelled at it, though, and she had that short, blocky gymnast build that is so common these days.

thank you for this interview and, Jennifer Sey, for the book. i've been waiting for someone to write a book that delves into the very complex world of gymnastics. i was a gymnast for 14 years. my club coach was flirtatious & lewd, eventually manipulating and having sex with me as a teen. i endured unimaginable psychological damage from the sexual abuse. i'm almost 30, and only now beginning to see my coach for what he was: a sexual predator, with a thing for young, vulnerable girls. the owners of my gym knew what was going on, and continued to allow him to coach (i'm pretty sure he still coaches). i absolutely love gymnastics, miss it terribly, but will forever have a love-hate relationship with the world of gymnastics b/c of all the abusive realities which are continually swept under the rug. mentors, teachers and coaches have the responsibility to care for their charges - it doesn't matter how much we can endure physically, or how much we want to win, we aren't robots - the psychological scars we're left with are real & far more damaging than the physical.

"Little Girls in Pretty Boxes," by Joan Ryan tells the story of Kim Kelly, a gymnast who may have been the healthiest, who did not make the 1992 Olympic team (perhaps) because she was unfortunate enough to have a "womanly" body, i.e. one with breasts and hips. Better have an injured athlete who is stick thin, I guess.

The young girl who has a strong perfectionist streak to begin with, is particularly at the mercy of a coach who urges her to be as close to perfect as you can get. Ryan interviews Olympic winners who felt like failures, thanks to the abuse they endured. One even attempted suicide.

The Lifetime movie "The Perfect Body" starring Amy Jo Johnson does a good job of showing the translation of an outgoing, confident young woman into a passive girl whose main goal is to lose weight and win. Incidentally, Cathy RIgby, a former Olympian who had an eating disorder, plays the assistant coach. The main coach, even after his athelete are injured, still maintains at the end that "he only wanted the best for them." To him, it's the parents' job to make sure their kids eat. Judging just by the competitions I see on TV, this is still a problem.

It is always been interesting to me that the majority the competitors in the category of women's gymnastics (and figure skating for that matter) are not women. Female, yes. Women, no. Older than 18, no. Capable of menstrating (based on age and/or weight), hardly. Breasts & hips, none.

Yet another case of women not making the cut, even in their "own" sport. And I always felt like the sport was pretty pervy, from the outfits, to the coaches and the announcers.

I meant to say "transformation" not "translation."

Gymnastics (Turnen) was invented in the 19th Century by Turnvater (Gymnastics Father) Jahn to improve the health of young people. Pretty soon gymnastics just for the fun of it and to build better bodies wasn't enough and they started competitions. In other individual sports competition meant "higher, farther, faster". In Gymnastics, judges have to declare a winner. The best way to impress a judge is to show ever more complicated and risky maneuvers. That's how we got to where we are now. But don't single out the Americans. Remember the Romanians and other East Block countries a few years ago? Only countries that abuse their young athletes have a chance of winning medals at the highest levels of competition. I wished gymnastics were relegated where it started 200 years ago: A means to give all young people a better body and coordination. That's where it belongs, not in the vicinity of circus performers.