When baseball is only beginning and spring football is not for everyone.
Chess History in the Making — the 2024 Candidates
The Candidates Tournament in chess is second only to the match for the title of World Champion. It is the final stepping stone in an inevitable path every chess player has to cross if they want to get a chance for the world crown to be bestowed on their head.
Now, a new chapter in chess history will be written in Toronto, Canada, as some of the strongest world players gather to decide amongst themselves who will be the next Challenger for the title of World Champion.
This, the most important tournament of the year, will be held from April 2 — 23 in Toronto’s Great Hall, a historical venue which has hosted events for more than 125 years.
This will be the first time in the seven decades-long history of the Candidates that it will be held in North America.
Also, for the first time, both the Open and the Women’s Candidates will take place in the same place at the same time
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(2023) The International Chess Federation – also known as FIDE – says players who have transitioned from male to female have “no right to participate” in women’s events until the federation conducts “further analysis” and renders a final decision.
In a meeting earlier this month, FIDE’s council approved the updated policy which will come into effect on August 21.
The policy says that once a player informs FIDE they are changing their gender from male to female, they will be banned from competing in official women’s events.
Players then have to provide what FIDE describes as “sufficient proof or a gender change that complies with their national laws and regulations.”
At that point, according to the updated policy, FIDE will carry out analysis and make a decision on the player’s participation “at the earliest possible time, but not longer than within 2 (two) years period.”
However, the updated policy says: “There are no restrictions to play in the open section for a person who has changed [their] gender.”
The vast majority of chess tournaments are considered open categories with a select few – including the Women’s World Chess Championship – dedicated to just women.
The new regulations also state that if a player holds a women’s title, but changes their gender to male, their women’s title will be “abolished.”
However, if the gender change is from male to female, all previous titles will remain “eligible.”
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The land of gendered discourse is changing in some games, however slowly, as chess will eventually become more inclusive. Same place, same time.
In colonial India, a popular pastime was to put a wild cat in a pen with pigeons. Bets would be made on how many birds the cat would bring down with one paw-swipe. The period of the British colonisation of India may have introduced this concept, and hence the phrase to the English language.[6]
Sexism has always been rampant in the chess community. Bobby Fischer, arguably one of the greatest chess players of all time, once remarked that women are "terrible chess players" and suggested that they busy themselves with domestic affairs.