By Jeff Lipton
Ilyse Gellar Sternberg of Woodmere may have been denied an opportunity to compete on the world stage in the sport she adores, karate, but she is trying to deliver a blow that will open the door for other women.
Sternberg has sued the U.S.A. National Karate-Do Federation Inc. for $1 million after she and other women were barred from competing in the world championships of karate in South Africa in 1996 and Brazil in 1998. The suit was served last summer on the federation, which has been the national governing body for karate since 1995.
In a recent victory for Sternberg, U.S. District Judge Jack B. Weinstein denied a defense motion to dismiss the case.
Sternberg, 38, an attorney in Cedarhurst, has been involved in karate since 1987, working her way up to second-degree black belt. As a lightweight, she has competed in many karate competitions but was barred from the one that counted most, the world championships. (Karate is not an official Olympic sport.) The federation, she said, refused to field a women's karate team because it did not want to see the women get hurt. The federation has fielded a men's karate team both in 1996 and 1998 for the biannual world championships.
"I was upset," Sternberg said. "I thought we should be entered [in the competition]. I knew we wouldn't get too many chances to compete on that level. To say that we could get hurt is sex discrimination. To me, the men have a greater chance of injury than women."
The suit marks the first time a woman has sued a national sports governing body on the basis of sex discrimination.
In 1998, the federation actually selected a women's team, which was flown to Brazil to compete in the world championships. But at 10 p.m. on the night before the competition, the team was told it would not be entered in the competition. "And we flew there at out own expense," Sternberg said.
The federation said it pulled the women's team out of the competition because two women refused to fight, an accusation the women denied, Sternberg said.
Sternberg said the two women were actually persuaded not to fight by the team coach and the federation because they feared the women would get hurt. "They didn't want to see women fight because they could get black eyes and cut lips," said Sternberg, a four-time medalist in national competition.
In addition, nine days after she filed her lawsuit, the federation dismissed her husband, Alex Sternberg, who runs a karate school on Central Avenue in Lawrence, as chairman of the Referee Council for the federation, where he served as chief referee for the U.S. And two months later, the federation suspended him from his status as a licensed official.
After the suit was filed, the federation fielded a women's team for the world championships in Germany in October, said Sternberg, who is retired and was unable to compete.
Although the suit seeks $1 million for her being barred from championships, Sternberg said the money is not the important thing. Allowing women to compete on equal footing with men is the key issue, she said. "To me, it's a matter of principle. I have the right to go forward [with the lawsuit] at this point, and I am prepared to do so," said Sternberg, who is a commercial and residential real-estate tax attorney for Rosenfeld and Maidenbaum. "This is a big victory, really."
She said she bypassed many opportunities to do things for years so that she could train four hours a day for the world championships. "To have that taken away from me by a whim is unfair."
A trial date has been set for April.
"We're thrilled," Sternberg's attorney, Joseph Grob of Cedarhurst, said of Judge Weinstein's decision. "We think this gives us a real chance [at winning].
"They [the federation] participated in what essentially is gender discrimination," he said ."They violated equal protection laws."
He said the governing body for U.S. karate worked against the women in their hopes of becoming U.S. amateur athletes on the biggest stage of all for the sport - the world championships. He said if the lawsuit had not been filed, there probably would not have been a women's karate team fielded in 2000.
"At the very least, it keeps them honest. The lawsuit stops anything like [discrimination] from happening again and places it under a microscope," Grob said.
Attempts to speak with the lawyer for the federation were unsuccessful.
