So who is going to tell Ava "Lady of Boxing" Knight that she isn't allowed to fight a man?

Without too much in the way of dramatic fanfare, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has lifted the US military’s ban on women serving in “combat roles” this week. In truth, American women have been bleeding into the same mud as their male counterparts for some years, flying helicopters, lobbing grenades and facing down suicide bombers overseas in a variety of different roles, but up until now they’ve been excluded from missions the direct purpose of which was to engage an enemy on the ground.

No more.

Good. If a woman wants to make the same sacrifice for country as her father and brothers, why should someone be able to tell her no?

Interesting then that the women’s IBF flyweight champion, Ava “Lady of Boxing” Knight has chosen this moment to challenge a male counterpart, Edgar Sosa, to an exhibition bout—and this is my favorite part—but only if he beats Ulises Solis in their March rematch.

In coming months in Afghanistan and in coming years around the world, American women will swap bullets, blades and fists with men intent on ending their lives—so who is going to tell Ava Knight, boxing out of Chico, California, that she isn’t allowed to meet a man ring-center?

Long of limb and quick of hands and feet, Ava’s physical equipment should probably see her shaped as stylist and a slickster in the ring and no question, the girl can box. A decent jab and fine footwork make for smooth viewing, but Ava fights hard. Aggressively stalking her foes she is happy to lead with either hand, winging in uppercuts or a rather lovely straight right hand as naturally as her jab. She also goes to the body like an absolute champ—check out her highlight reel KO of the favored Arely Mucino for evidence of this. Few of her male counterparts have the gift of delivering such blankness to their opponents with a body attack.

So who’s going to tell her that whilst she can join the army and get stopped by a Taliban bullet she doesn’t yet have the right to get stopped by a Sosa right hand? Well, Sosa, probably.

Sosa seems raised right, so he knows you don’t strike a woman. Even a man who has been raised wrong knows you don’t strike one in public.

So just like that, almost overnight, this has ceased being a women’s problem and become a man’s problem. Women won’t be allowed to box men because men don’t want to do it. At some point in the not too distant future though, a woman is going to return to American soil from a foreign war, turn pro and having swapped bullets with men in defense of her country she is going to demand her right to swap leather with men for pay.

“I fundamentally believe that our military is more effective when success is based solely on ability and qualifications and on performance.”

That’s Leon Panetta on the American war machine.

I’m glad it won’t be me that has to tell her “no.”