Yesterday I rolled with a guy in my class I’d never rolled with before. He’s all muscle, had about 4 years of no gi training, plus about 3 or 4 years of wrestling, yet he’s really new to the gi.
I’m new to all of it. June 1, 2010 baby! Also, a bit of a fattie, especially compared to this beefstick. I think his shoulder muscle was as big as my head. o_O
He looked a bit like this!
So we’re rolling and he is clearly trying to point out the weaknesses in my game (I like to say I don’t even have a game yet–I am collecting pieces), but he’s just knocking me over, knocking me over, knocking me over. Then he grabs my collar, setting me up for a cross collar choke and says “I’m not going to roll with you differently because you’re a girl (okay, he might have said woman or female). It wouldn’t be respectful to you” and then chokes me, but my neck/hair got caught and it cricked my neck. For the next full minute I couldn’t get full rotation of my neck without pain. Thanks, dude.
Still, his statement bugged me. Did he think that I was thinking “omg boy is beating me up?” Did my face say something that my mind wasn’t thinking? Why would he SAY that to me? Grrrr. This really is the first time a guy has brought up me being a woman. And in such a weird way.
Do I respect him saying it rather than thinking it? It was really weird to hear and really weird timing. In short, it felt really confusing–frustratingly so. Honestly, I don’t care about him rolling with me like I’m a man–but I would certainly hope he’d roll a tiny bit differently with someone who CLEARLY is not as strong as he, and who CLEARLY doesn’t have an athletic background, and who CLEARLY has not been doing this long. Yeah, dude, I get that you’re better than me.
What do you think? I can’t figure out if it’s slightly douche-baggy, cool, his excuse to be aggressive with people, or answer d.
Impossible to tell until you know him better. A statement like that can have a radically different meaning coming out of one person’s mouth as opposed to coming out of a different person’s mouth. I would tend to give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he was trying to be a good feminist, until further behavior either proves or disprves the theory.
Geez, that’s a distracting picture. đŸ˜›
*frowning* The fact that he said this and then immediately choked/cranked on you points me mostly towards answer “a,” he’s a douchebag, because it sounds then like making an excuse for the following unnecessarily violent action. Do you know if he’s ever rolled with females before?
The first time a guy says something dumb to me — “I don’t want to lose to a girl” and the like — I’m always struck speechless. You said… what? Why? My brain sputters to comprehend and come up with something wise, witty, or just coherent to throw back, and it always fails. But the next time someone says something similar, I’m not so thunderstruck and can come up with something to address the situation.
Maybe the next time he says something like you, you can respond with your own observations on size, strength, and experience differences, which should have more precedence over gender in how he rolls with you.
To be fair, I think my head was at a weird angle and not that he was super charged Hulk cranking. But it was somewhat ironic? that it happened directly after he said that to me. He did apologize for hurting my neck.
I don’t know if he’s ever rolled with women. Most of the Korean women in our class won’t roll with men, or won’t roll with most men. I don’t really care who I roll with usually.
Yeah, I wish I had said “Why don’t you respect that I’m not a supercharged athlete and roll with me like I’m someone brand new to sports, because I am! That has nothing to do with me having bewbs.”
So I’m a guy, but I weigh about 125 lbs. I’ve been training for about three or four years.
If some huge jacked up wrastler came in and started throwing me around like that and cranking on submissions, I’d be upset.
Guys should roll any differently with women than they should with guys, BUT everyone should be aware of their partner’s relative size, strenght, and skill level and train apropriately. We have girls that compete at the Mundials every year, and do kettlebells, and will rip your head off if you give them the chance. They get treated the same as any other guy. We also have girls who are kinda new, not that athletic, and not that competitive. When I train with them, I go light, let them work techniques, and don’t smash them.
So yeah, he’s slightly douche baggy, and may have a problem with a woman being on the mat, and needs to learn how to chill. Just ignore it, and keep training. Don’t let bad attitudes bring down your emotions or commitment to BJJ đŸ™‚
Small, bookish, nerdy purple belts were invented to smash roided up gym wankers – it’s only fair, we wouldn’t roll with them any different.
He’s a douche. If he were really interested in being “respectful” to you he would have ASKED you how hard you wanted him to go, or he would have just kept his mouth shut. Just TELLING you he’s going to go hard is pretty disrespectful. What are you supposed to say to that? “Oh…ok…thanks?”
Next time you could respond with “could you please not do that?” You don’t even have to roll with him if you don’t want to.
+1 to what Frank said.
Julia, I saw your post on Jiu Jitsu Forum. I can’t find my username, if I’m even registered there, so here’s my answer to your question:
#2 – We call that an “elevator sweep.” #1 sounds like just a variation of the elevator sweep, though someone else may have a specific name.
People have said that to me before, but it is usually followed by something to the effect of, “I’m going to roll with you like then 135 pound white belt that you are.” Which I do, 110% appreciate. What is under my gi has nothing to do with how a person should roll with me. (There is one guy though, who will never, ever RNC a girl. He says it just feels too inappropriate. lol)
One of my very good friends is a really big guy, and sometimes he can accidentally do douch-ish seeming things without realizing. Being one of the biggest men in the class, it is rare he gets tooled by sheer size, so he has no idea what it is like, or what it feels like…. and normally he doesn’t even know he did it, until I point it out…. at which point he apologizes.
I will also mention, there is another blue belt guy I train with, named Rhino. I’m sure you can deduce his physique by his nickname, but the guy is so freaking insanely technical and calm when he rolls he has never ONCE even come close to cranking, squishing or smashing me… and he has 100 pounds on me. In fact, he is the only person, short of the instructors who I can say that about.
So anyway, 10 paragraphs later… my point. Just because someone is big doesn’t mean they can’t help smashing you, but I honestly do think it is sometimes hard to not accidentally smash someone who is much weaker/smaller/crappier then you are. Unless I feel like they were being excessive or purposeful in the squish-iery I will generally give them the benefit of the doubt.
From his statements it seems as if he is hard on the guys too. I am one of the bigger guys in my class but I like to use technique rather than strength. So when I roll against a guy who likes to spaz out I try to avoid them later on. If I can’t avoid them I ask them to roll at about 50% or some random percentage that gets them to slow down.
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I’m afraid of being “that guy” so I make a point of working technique and just taking the strength down several notches when rolling with women. I end up getting some of my best matches with experienced women.
Unfortunately, right now we only have one woman who trains at our academy. She’s pretty dang good, too. I outweigh her by at least eighty pounds, yet I get some of my best rolls with her! Her technique is legit, so I really have to think when we roll and I end up developing my own game even more. I’ll admit, though. I hulked my way out of an armbar recently, but hey, I panicked! Oops.
That’s the thing about being much smaller – you HAVE to be very good in order to be on the same playing ground as the big dudes. Before she was very good, she was getting smashed smashed smashed. Had she had dude size and dude strength, she wouldn’t NEED awesome technique, she would be doing better BEFORE her bjj was awesome. I like to compare it to a D&D game – if we’re sparring, it’s my jiu jitsu vs your jiu jitsu, but if you have a higher strength, you get bonuses. If you have a higher dex, you get bonuses. I don’t have those bonuses, so it’s a straight roll. So basically, the small folks stay at the bottom longer, but once they get good they get really good. Or they continue to stay at the bottom.