@essence_of_soy
When I hear stories of young women having breast reduction surgeries, or developing eating disorders to stay painfully thin, or doing anything unnatural to delay puberty, it makes me incredibly angry and sad. Skating should add life to its participants, not take it from them. Is there not a better path? Do we need a champion who is a fantastic jumper, but has poor basics and immature presentation? If you are an experienced skater, especially someone who has a voice in the community, is it acceptable to just say "that's what the judges are looking for these days?" No, I don't think it is anymore. Maybe 30 years ago, all the top skaters had stronger basics, more refined presentation, and the only way to get ahead was add technical content. And women who wanted to compete reacted accordingly and harmed their bodies. But IJS has destructively sped up that process and given back nothing in return. The top skaters are usually not even good 'skaters'. They are 15 or younger. Their career is over in the blink of an eye and then they are saddled with lifelong complications and many of them, what did they achieve? Did they learn important life lessons regardless of medals or not? Or were they filtered into depression, body image problems, eating disorders, and cycles of self-harm?
@Frau Muller
Yes that's what I'm suggesting takes place. Essence_of_soy gave personal testimony to the fact that 30 years ago girls were trying to reverse puberty. It's the natural progression that at some point, girls (and the adults directing them) would try to one-up their competitors and delay puberty altogether. Yulia has hinted at this before. She weighed 80 pounds when she was competing, and bless her hopefully she is coming along now, but despite her improvements, I saw during the Olympics she called Nathen Chen "fat" on social media, telling you how much that mentality has been drilled into her from an early age that she has yet to overcome.
Take a look at Nathan Chen. Do you think he's fat? Nobody with a healthy psychology and understanding of the human body would say something like that.
As for your suggestion, I don't think rules or bans are the answer. Changing the incentive system would do much more. Will a skater starve themselves to be able to produce quads more consistently and neglect their basics if jumps were not so exclusively rewarded? Will adults take advantage of minors and lure them into destructive cycles if their undeveloped immaturity is not rewarded by the judges? Of course not.
@snoopy
You are absolutely right. It's the case of hoping for lightning in a bottle. And in sports even if you have all of those things, you also need luck. Sports are always a numbers game.
Japan-- millions and millions of lottery tickets. They are going to match the ping pong balls more often than we will here in the U.S. And then those girls will sharpen their iron against each other more often. It's hopeless for U.S. ladies with the current direction of skating.
Russia--willing to abuse girls unnaturally. Can we do it here in the U.S.? Of course not, it shouldn't even be a thought. And while girls and parents will often discard their own well-being to get ahead in life, there are so many more opportunities here compared to Russia. Good luck finding girls and their parents to sign up for starvation and life-long hip and back injuries when they could just go to school and get a nice job.
@brennele
What I would like to see is one of two things happen.
1. More focus on SKATING. More focus on mature presentation. In the judging. By the ISU. By the federations. Change the incentive system so skaters and their minders are not rewarded for producing 14 and 15 year old world champion jumping beans. Get rid of the undeveloped girls who are out of seniors in a year or two with lifelong injuries and eating disorders.
Ain't nobody in the developed world got time for that!
2. Otherwise, change your expectations. **** the Olympic competition results. Develop skaters who innovate in other ways. Develop them as artists with strong basics. Let them receive benefits from skating and enjoy their careers, even if they are placing at 10th or 20th at Worlds. Don't tell them they are fat behind closed doors when in reality they are 5'2 and 90 pounds. Don't write articles in the media telling them they are failures because they don't live up to your misguided belief that USA is the country of champion figure skaters and they are failing to live up to some legacy.