The International Olympic Committee is due to give the go-ahead to the sport for the London 2012 Games. Boxing is the only Olympic sport women are currently barred from entering.
A similar request was knocked back in 2005 on the grounds of medical safety.
Jane Couch, Britain's first professional female boxer "It's just a lot of older generation men that believe that women should be at home washing the pots, doing the ironing and cleaning the kitchen floor," she says.
Couch had to take her fight to an industrial tribunal in 1997 to receive a professional licence from the British Boxing Board of Control.
Then, the argument was that pre-menstrual tension made women too unstable to box.
"It is a sport, it is a very tough sport, but at the end of the day it's a controlled sport. If you're going to oppose women's 
then you have to oppose men," says Couch.
Earlier this year, IOC president Jacques Rogge indicated he was in favour of the new discipline. "Conditions are totally different now," he said. "The timing is right, because the sport has evolved a lot."
The proposal by the governing body calls for 40 women to compete in 2012.
Due to the IOC's limit of 286 boxers the number of male fighters would then have to be reduced.I am not a great fan of
( whoever is fighting) and so I am not too sympathetic to the call that women's
should be recognised as a sport and included in the Olympics.
The argument that the sport has evolved and conditions are different now completely confuses me ....I don't see what has changed in all these years. The principle is that you get into a confined space and knock out the person in there with you, still stands ( oh and you have to give most of your winnings to your promoter / agent / bookie etc).
Ok your protective head gear might have been improved but what else
Spouting the argument that men expect to see women in the home and not in the
ring is also too easy. Lets face it most men and women would not be interested in watching female
( unless it was in mud / foam or jelly
) .
Isn't this more about certain women that are determined to break the last few 'male' dominated areas left - this is not for the sake of equality but for their own individual reasons. There is no greater cause being sought here - to my mind anyway.
Just go to any nightclub at closing time to see proper women's
, hair pulling, kicking and talon scraping
