Men are better at math and spatial skills, both relevant to chess.
More importantly, men are far more likely to become obsessed with something, to spend hours and hours doing it. To think of nothing else. Being obsessed will make you better. That isn't even about IQ,

There used to be a men's world chess championship too but it was deemed too sexist. Now there is an ungendered and a woman's. Funny how feminists who foamed over there being a men's group don't care about a women's group. Kinda brings into question all those claims about being for equality.

"More importantly, men are far more likely to become obsessed with something, to spend hours and hours doing it. To think of nothing else. Being obsessed will make you better. That isn't even about IQ".

I think this is not accurate or at least it's taken out of context. From what I understand from that Meyer's Briggs Temperment Scanner, 40% of the population falls into 1 personality type and 40% falls into another personality type. I believe (I'm not prepared to present this accurately) that one of those 40% types has 'endless repetition' as a trait. Women of that personality type have that too, but I'm thinking that due to the behaviour restraints we put ON women in the USA, the manifestations are different or don't appear/are suppressed.

Perhaps freeing up women's behaviour restraints will facilitate excellence in things such as chess playing due to relentless practice.

A lot of people have explored the subject of why men tend to succeed more at chess than woman do, and their findings were different. Some believe it has to do with spatial skills, etc., as mentioned above; others think it has less to do with innate ability and more to do with women's lack of interest in something relentlessly analytical and socially boring--basically a big reason you see fewer women in STEM. Fewer women find it interesting enough to make it a career, including women who could excel based on their abilities.

It doesn't matter, though. There shouldn't be a "women's" chess championship. How mortifying. Do these women not understand the implications?

If you're competing only against the ~50% of the population that doesn't include the current champions, then what does your victory mean? You don't know where you stand. I'd rather get 200th place in an open tournament than 1st place in a women's tournament. At least I'd know how good I really am and can drive myself to become better.

Even if we isolate variables like interest and exposure, and we definitively establish that men are better at chess on average doesn't mean that a woman can't win an open tournament!

FWIW, many of the top women players will play only in open tournaments, and I respect them for that.

It's a twofer.

A women's only group in an environment where they are covered head to toe means that:
1. they avoid the rape culture present in open tournaments as well as

2. the unwanted attention from "butch" women who may unconsciously ape the same male behavior trait.

but I'm thinking that due to the behaviour restraints we put ON women in the USA, the manifestations are different or don't appear/are suppressed

So, what constraints do we put on women that we do not put on men that inhibits womens ability to concentrate for long periods of time?

Meyers-Briggs is actually not a good measure, though it's understandable that people use it as an example, because businesses pay big bucks for it.

As an aside; Meyers-Briggs = pseudoscience.

As for Iran - nothing "international" should be taking place there.

A country that calls for another country to be "wiped off the face of the earth" because of its people being the "wrong" religion while hanging people in the public square because they are gay should be an international pariah.

Thanks for giving them some legitimacy Obama!

As an aside; Meyers-Briggs = pseudoscience.

Thanks for that, also to Amy. I was about to go Mr. T on the subject...

Another reason for not traveling to Iran is that you can't be held for ransom, errr...accused of being a spy and tried, convicted and incarcerated.

Adam: you cite Myers-Briggs personality test. This does not explain the sex differences. Even in high school, I had multiple friends who had obsessions about cars or sports or other things. They knew everything about that topic. My brother and I knew everything about vikings, dinosaurs, and neanderthals. I had a cousin and some neighbors who were rebuilding cars at 15. Never heard of a girl obsessed about such things back then and still as an adult. Name a female you know who is such an expert. Boys are also prone to want to learn hands on things much more than girls without any forcing by anyone. If girls were prone to this no social pressure could stop all of them. Is all this "better"? That is not my claim. It is just different. Anthropologists who have studied how to make prehistoric stone axes have found it takes hundreds of hours of intense practice to learn to make them, yet for a man back then his life depended on it. Intense focus to track down a wounded antelope? Yes. So, it does make sense.