# Girls Vs Boys (strength) **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 22, 2011, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422 "2011-10-22T04:35:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![notsoheavyd3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/85e7bf/32.png) [@notsoheavyd3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/notsoheavyd3)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2011, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/61 "2011-10-23T14:22:08Z")
To the original poster I’ve got a question. Did they phrase the question to the effect “If you adjust for body weight the average woman is stronger than the average man” ? I’ve heard that one before and I figured it was true because the average woman is smaller than the average man. (I just figured it’s that old thing about proportionally speaking a smaller animal is stronger than a larger one. You know, like how insects and spiders are able to lift 40-50 times their own weight. It’s a mechanical thing they get from simply being small.) ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2011, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/62 "2011-10-23T14:50:22Z")
> [@notsoheavyd3](#): > > To the original poster I’ve got a question. Did they phrase the question to the effect “If you adjust for body weight the average woman is stronger than the average man” ? I’ve heard that one before and I figured it was true because the average woman is smaller than the average man. (I just figured it’s that old thing about proportionally speaking a smaller animal is stronger than a larger one. You know, like how insects and spiders are able to lift 40-50 times their own weight. It’s a mechanical thing they get from simply being small.) Excellent username/post combo, but I’m not sure this holds up either. The square/cube law isn’t the only effect in play - pound for pound men have proportionately more muscle. I’m unsure how we’d ever get a figure for the average man and average woman, but this [list](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Olympic_records_in_weightlifting) of weightlifting records shows how marked the difference is at the top end. Compare the women’s snatch (_stop_ that) for the _highest_ weight category with the men’s in the _lowest_ - the women win by only 2.5 kg; the men’s record holder under 62 kg beats _any_ woman. And the 77 kg men’s aggregate (375 kg) beats the 75 kg women’s (282 kg) by 33%! ---
**Author:** ![AaronX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/7bcc69/32.png) [@AaronX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AaronX)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/63 "2011-10-24T06:38:32Z")
Did they say physically stronger? Maybe they were talking about pain tolerance or something else? ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 10:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/64 "2011-10-24T10:43:41Z")
> [@hibernicus](#): > > As described, this exercise is trivially easy. I’ve been experimenting to try to figure out a version of it that would be difficult in some way, and give rise to a situation where a person would be unable to lift his head. But the dog came over and started licking my ear so I gave up. Well, my mother can’t even do the “get your forehead to the floor” bit, but she’s built like Santa. We did a similar exercise in “fitness for non-fitness people” a few times; the people who could get down but who had problems getting up would try to move sideways. Maybe their problem was having strong side dominance. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 11:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/65 "2011-10-24T11:24:44Z")
> [@Mahaloth](#): > > 😕 > > Wow, that is anecdotal evidence and not externally valid at all. I’m not sure it is even internally valid. > > If girls were equally strong as men, they would compete against them in sports on the highest level…in all sports. The person you’re responding to wasn’t arguing women are as strong as men. She was illustrating the fact that this fact holds merely “on average.” ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 12:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/66 "2011-10-24T12:07:14Z")
> [@Malacandra](#): > > Compare the women’s snatch (_stop_ that) for the _highest_ weight category with the men’s in the _lowest_ - the women win by only 2.5 kg; the men’s record holder under 62 kg beats _any_ woman. And the 77 kg men’s aggregate (375 kg) beats the 75 kg women’s (282 kg) by 33%! I would expect however that a far smaller proportion of women take up weightlifting, or ever consider becoming professional at it. Not that I’m arguing women are as strong as men on average just that extrapolating from sports is maybe misleading. ETA - and what he said about the top end and the average being too different things. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/67 "2011-10-24T13:18:05Z")
> [@robardin](#): > > I just tried it again and was more or less pinned to the ground, so perhaps I’m not describing it well. I getcha now. The thing is, this isn’t a strength trick. It’s a center-of-gravity trick. For men, the center of gravity is higher, so we cannot blance things out in a way which let’s us rise from this position. But it doesn’t really say much other than saying you can find a position that people can’t rise from if you strength them out enough. ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/68 "2011-10-24T13:33:10Z")
> [@Mijin](#): > > I would expect however that a far smaller proportion of women take up weightlifting, or ever consider becoming professional at it. > > Not that I’m arguing women are as strong as men on average just that extrapolating from sports is maybe misleading. > > ETA - and what he said about the top end and the average being too different things. Then perhaps you need to: 1. explain how your first sentence would lead to the figures misrepresenting the true position by such a huge margin; b) explain what better objective comparison is available; iii) explain how your ETA is consistent with your second sentence, and what point you actually _are_ making. ---
**Author:** ![Acid\_Lamp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Acid\_Lamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acid_Lamp)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/69 "2011-10-24T14:10:05Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > I getcha now. The thing is, this isn’t a strength trick. It’s a center-of-gravity trick. For men, the center of gravity is higher, so we cannot blance things out in a way which let’s us rise from this position. But it doesn’t really say much other than saying you can find a position that people can’t rise from if you strength them out enough. I’m still not getting it. I’ve tried all the variations described and had no problem rising back up. I also tried the wall trick and had no problem. You just have to use your stomach and lower back to pull you up over the center. I suspect that this is combination of center of gravity and just plain core weakness on the part of guys. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/70 "2011-10-24T15:00:40Z")
> [@Acid\_Lamp](#): > > I’m still not getting it. I’ve tried all the variations described and had no problem rising back up. I also tried the wall trick and had no problem. You just have to use your stomach and lower back to pull you up over the center. I suspect that this is combination of center of gravity and just plain core weakness on the part of guys. It just depends on where your CG is. If you are flexible enough you can contort your body to maintain a low enough CG to maintain your balance. I would be able to do there tricks because I have short legs and narrow hips, and the majority of my considerable weight is above my waist. Also, with the wall trick, your feet would have to be touching. It’s very easy to lower your CG by spreading your legs apart. But if your CG is above your waist (defined as the point where you bend), and the weight of your body above that point exceeds that below it to the extent it can’t be countered by the length of your feet (which moves the fulcrum forward) no amount of strength can keep you from tipping over. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Man\_In\_Black](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bcef8e/32.png) [@The\_Man\_In\_Black](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Man_In_Black)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/71 "2011-10-24T15:10:34Z")
> [@robardin](#): > > There are many “parlor tricks” that use this difference to make women seem “stronger” than men which are based on leverage and the difference in the center of mass. We tried one in college when three guys and three gals at random, aged 20-22 (well, semi-random - just the people hanging out in our dorm common area) were to kneel, put our hands behind our backs and touch our foreheads to the ground… Then, to try to get up without using our hands or rolling over. All the girls had no problems at all. The guys all had great difficulty: only one could do it at all, and he was the skinniest one there, a cyclist who’d gone vegan in his freshman year, and even he strained mightily to do it (“much harder than doing a sit-up”). > > One of the guys was a football player, really ripped, and when he gave it a try, it was comical. As soon as his head was about 2 feet from the ground he dropped forward like a rock - his forehead smacked the ground with a THUNK. While the rest of us guys could at least raise our heads off the ground a few inches, he was completely pinned there by the weight of his own shoulders and chest. Couldn’t budge an inch without putting his arms out to push himself up. I am having a hard time understanding this. So I kneel on the ground, hold my hands behind my back and put my forehead on the ground. I just tried this several times in a row. No problem at all getting up. Was this a joke or was some part of it left out? EDIT: I am male, 29, 5’9" and about 185lb ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/72 "2011-10-24T15:26:25Z")
I can’t even get my forehead off the ground. I’ll try to get my wife to do it when I get home tonight. ---
**Author:** ![Triskadecamus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b19c9b/32.png) [@Triskadecamus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Triskadecamus)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/73 "2011-10-24T15:58:11Z")
The argument that “It’s all social” fails spectacularly with comparisons among Olympic athletes, and world championships in various professional and amateur sports. The social filter is inherently eliminated when comparing these elite levels of accomplishment. Yes, girls are not encouraged to engage in athletics. But the world’s championship has some women present. That lack of encouragement is not a factor. No one gets to world class competition without extensive encouragement, not even the men. All the athletes being compared are extensively trained, and encouraged to the greatest fitness possible. Both sexes are already selected for exceptional strength, among many other exceptional aspects. World class athletes are much less than the top tenth of a percent of the population. In the 99.9[sup]th[/sup] percentile, all the men are stronger than all the women. (OK, so maybe one of the male marksmen is not as strong as one of the female weightlifters, but all the male weightlifters are stronger than she is.) In these groups it is well understood, and completely demonstrated that in the area of strength, men have a significant advantage over women. In some specific areas of competition there are advantages in lower center of gravity, or lower muscle tone, which can give advantages to women, but the advantage of strength, is always there for men. Tris ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/74 "2011-10-24T16:04:51Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > I can’t even get my forehead off the ground. I’ll try to get my wife to do it when I get home tonight. You’ll just have to remain there until she gets home, bummer. How did you type this response? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![robardin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@robardin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robardin)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/75 "2011-10-24T16:49:43Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > I getcha now. The thing is, this isn’t a strength trick. It’s a center-of-gravity trick. For men, the center of gravity is higher, so we cannot blance things out in a way which let’s us rise from this position. But it doesn’t really say much other than saying you can find a position that people can’t rise from if you strength them out enough. Yes, that is the underpinning of the trick - it relies on the typical man’s COG being higher than the typical woman’s. You’ll certainly find guys who can do it (in our small sample size of 6 we still found one, though he’s been the only guy over 18 years old I’ve seen in person able to do it), and women who can’t. My point in bringing it up originally was how easy it was to use some physical act that requires “strength” on the part of the doer to achieve, then use it as false compare between the sexes. ---
**Author:** ![robardin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@robardin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robardin)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/76 "2011-10-24T16:52:30Z")
> [@The\_Man\_In\_Black](#): > > I am having a hard time understanding this. So I kneel on the ground, hold my hands behind my back and put my forehead on the ground. I just tried this several times in a row. No problem at all getting up. > > Was this a joke or was some part of it left out? > > EDIT: I am male, 29, 5’9" and about 185lb See my second post clarifying the position which as a picture linked - your back should be straight and your body leaned forward as a result. It could be that you can do this with no problem, I’m sure there are guys who can - but I’m definitely not, and so far my ex-roommate in college has been the only 18+ year old guy I’ve seen do it in person 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![robardin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@robardin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robardin)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/77 "2011-10-24T16:56:46Z")
> [@Acid\_Lamp](#): > > I’m still not getting it. I’ve tried all the variations described and had no problem rising back up. I also tried the wall trick and had no problem. You just have to use your stomach and lower back to pull you up over the center. I suspect that this is combination of center of gravity and just plain core weakness on the part of guys. True, if you have really strong abs and lower back muscles it probably can be done - just like I could still manage to win out over a bunch of 4-6 year olds at a science center tug-of-war demonstration of leverage - but it sounds like you’re an outlier here 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![DaveBfd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c6cbf5/32.png) [@DaveBfd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DaveBfd)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/78 "2011-10-24T17:14:05Z")
What angle do your thighs make with the ground when it is done properly? If your thighs are at a 90 degree angle it is near impossible, if your thighs are flatter it becomes super easy. I suspect this is what is causing all of the differences. ## I can not even move my head if my thighs are at a 90, but can get up without any trouble if they are flatter. ## As to the earlier comment about her wording, it was worded in a way to clearly talk about physical strength. > [@](#): > > Then perhaps you need to: > > 1. explain how your first sentence would lead to the figures misrepresenting the true position by such a huge margin; if only 5% of the population tries something in one society, and 100% tries it in another, you can expect the second society will be much more proficient at whatever the subject is. It would be impossible to measure what effect this has, and for that reason we credit this as altering the results but cant say by what amount. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Man\_In\_Black](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bcef8e/32.png) [@The\_Man\_In\_Black](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Man_In_Black)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/79 "2011-10-24T18:40:23Z")
> [@robardin](#): > > See my second post clarifying the position which as a picture linked - your back should be straight and your body leaned forward as a result. It could be that you can do this with no problem, I’m sure there are guys who can - but I’m definitely not, and so far my ex-roommate in college has been the only 18+ year old guy I’ve seen do it in person 🙂 I just read the rest of the thread. I tried it that way and you are right, I can;t do it. But like others have said, it has nothing to do with strength, just center of gravity. I put my feet under my couch and got down in the strict position you mentioned and was able to get up no problem. Kind of like glute-ham raise. It is just a position that makes it impossible for a person who’s upper half outweighs there lower half to get up unanchored. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2011, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422/80 "2011-10-24T19:41:16Z")
> [@robardin](#): > > The point is that “strength” is not a one dimensional, single figure measurement, and the distribution of physical strength between genders overlaps. To say that “women are just as strong as men” is pretty much completely against most people’s every day common sense experience of the world, leading me to assume that the basis for the statement was based on some very circumscribed definition of “strength” where things like leverage, weight distribution, etc., are brought into the equation. > > Most people’s intuitive definition of “strength” would be defined by what you can do with your body to manipulate foreign objects: to lift them, pull them, push them, throw them. Not to do push-ups or pull-ups, which activities depend on how heavy one’s own body is, and are used as conditioning exercises to maintain or increase one’s strength. > > To manipulate foreign objects using only one’s body automatically depends on differences of leverage and weight distribution over the body, even between people of the same gender. For example, similar to the earlier example of lifting one’s forehead off the ground in a kneeling position with one’s hands behind the back, men typically cannot lift even a light folding or plastic lawn chair into the air while bent over it ([like this](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRixqIAsXa0)), while women typically have no problems. But how often is it necessary in everyday life to lift objects while bent over them like that? Pretty much never. > > On the other hand, men are, on average, much better at generating higher forces at things like punching or throwing objects, and at dead lifting weights. Certainly at the elite level, top men in boxing, baseball pitchers and weightlifters clearly and by far outdo what is attainable by equally top women in the same activities. There is also a reason why the East German doping programs in these types of activities involved giving young women male sex hormones. Is the lawn chair exercise a bit like carrying plastic carrier-bags - the type used in all UK supermarkets and in at least a few US ones - over your arms or in your hands? Women tend, on average, to be better at that, because of the way the different genders’ wrists grow: if a woman stands at rest with her hands loose by her side, her palms will point towards her thighs, but men’s palms will point towards the back or at least partly towards the back (source: a book about the science of being a teenager whose title I can never remember, and general observation of people after reading the passage in said book). This makes it easier for women to carry things in their hands and arms. That’s just as an aside - I think the OP has been comprehensively answered. TBH, as a feminist I’d never claim that the average woman is as physically strong as the average man, because that’d make it seem strange that it’s hard for women to fight men off even when the man is the same height. Well, I’d also never say it because it’s not true. Metaphorically it’s true. Perhaps that’s what they meant. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-vs-boys-strength/600422.md?page=5)