Iowa Wrestler Joel Northrup Forfeits Match … “As a matter of conscience and my faith, I do not believe that it is appropriate …”

Iowa wrestler Joel Northrupt forfeited his match against Cassy Herkelman because as he stated it was a matter of his conscience and faith not appropriate for a bot to engage with a girl in this manner. Northrup is a home-schooled sophomore with a 35-4 record this season prior to defaulting in his match. Cassy entered the tournament 20-13 record. What a position to put kids in. Boys are told from birth to never hit a girl, now they are forced to wrestle them and put themselves in an uncomfortable situation. Its the law of unintended consequences of equal opportunity. VIDEO can be seen HERE.

“I have a tremendous amount of respect for Cassy and Megan (Black, the tournament’s other female entrant) and their accomplishments. However, wrestling is a combat sport and it can get violent at times. As a matter of conscience and my faith, I do not believe that it is appropriate for a boy to engage a girl in this manner. It is unfortunate that I have been placed in a situation not seen in most of the high school sports in Iowa.”

ESPNraises the question, was Northrup more concerned about harming a female or touching one in an inappropriate manner? Good questions. Wrestlers can certainly get into some pretty contorted positions. Many wrestling moves if a highschool kid ever performed on a girl would get him arrested.

WHAT WOULD YOU HAVE DONE?

6 Responses to “Iowa Wrestler Joel Northrup Forfeits Match … “As a matter of conscience and my faith, I do not believe that it is appropriate …””

1. A Texas Grandfather on February 18th, 2011 10:35 pm

   The young man did the right thing.

   I question the fact that these two young women should be allowed to compete with young men in a tournament such as this one.

   MY choice would be for the girls to wrestle girls and leave the boys alone.

   There is always someone or several someone’s who want to make a name for themselves by forcing an issue such as this.

2. Austen Ballad on February 18th, 2011 11:18 pm

   Ask Lara Logan if Joel Northrup did the right thing.

3. willyum on February 19th, 2011 5:44 am

   I agree 100% with Texas Grandfather. What is happening to American women is they are losing there femininity. I am now retired living in Thailand where this nonsense is unheard of.

4. J. Wilson on February 19th, 2011 9:30 am

   Good for you Joel. I agree!!

5. A Texas Grandfather on February 19th, 2011 7:13 pm

   Austen

   I am certain that you have a point. Lara Logan probably thinks that Joel is a wimp for not taking the match.

   IMO this is female nonsense. She will continue to press the issue until some guy will take her on and promptly hurt her in an attempt to teach her a others like her a valuable lesson.

6. Scared Monkeys on February 19th, 2011 7:39 pm

   This reminds me of something that I was presented with in the 70′s in Elementary School, 6th grade. Our gym teacher thought it would be cute to have the winner of the padded combat sticks (boy & girl) face each other in the final round.

   It was myself against a girl named
   “Jenny” (name changed to protect the innocent). Needless to say I wanted no part of hitting her with a padded, cushioned sticks. I had know her since the 1st grade, let alone liked her.

   Keep in mind J was what we would have called a tomboy back in the day who would later be a part of the US Jr. Olympic ski team. She could kick most boys butts.

   However, I refused to hit her so I played along and tapped at her with the sticks. Then she nailed me in the head with two direct blows and I almost saw stars. Unfortunately, my adrenalin got the best of me and I tapped her twice with rabbit rights and then a left and down went Fraiser.

   We were able to laugh about it later.

   R

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