SHE weighs about the same as a supermodel, but as far as everything else goes the two are Mars and Venus.

Queens of the catwalk are held together by cigarettes, water and the odd grape; Nicola Adams entered the ring at her Olympic boxing final yesterday looking as if she had just finished a five-course meal of confidence. Determined and brave, she was a thing of sinewy beauty, like her heroes, Sugar Ray and Ali.

The 29-year-old flyweight from Leeds has made history by becoming the first woman to win a boxing gold medal in this, the first Olympics to feature women's boxing. Adams and her sisters in arms have been lauded as pioneers and mould breakers, the new face of feminism, one that just gets on with it, gets in the ring, gets the job done.

As a feminist – there, I've admitted it, slap the cuffs on officer – one grows used to seeing the F word being attached to the strangest of causes. The right to have bigger breasts, for example. Pole dancing/stripping/Fifty Shades of Tripe as expressions of female sexual empowerment. Ludicrous claims, every one. But boxing as a feminist issue? Now that's a tougher one to tackle.

Not for everyone, judging by the support women's boxing has been given. Women might remain Eddie the Eagle when it comes to equal pay and securing seats in boardrooms, but deny our right to knock seven bells out of each other for a medal and it seems we'll make Joe Bugner look like Jo Whiley.

To doubt whether this is progress is to mark yourself out as the feminist equivalent of lace doilies and whalebone corsets. Get with the 2012 programme, grandma, supporters of women's boxing might say. It's not about lobbying Parliament or marching any more (where did that get you anyway?). It's about women doing what they want, what they really, really want. The personal is still the political, but we lead by example. If that means getting into a boxing ring, why not?

They have a point, up to a point. But after that it becomes trickier. Any contemplation of boxing, never mind women's boxing, leads a body into a minefield with a dirty great sign at the entrance. That sign reads: "Abandon those pinko liberal views, all ye who enter here."

First, the easy stuff. There is no doubt that boxing is a sport that carries serious risks. The British Medical Association opposes it because of the hazards it poses – of brain injury in particular – to boxers of both sexes. Other sports are dangerous too, rugby, for example. But in rugby the ultimate aim is scoring tries; in boxing it is to score direct hits against another person. Though supporters will say boxing has never been better regulated and therefore safer, particularly with headguards, injuries remain part of the game. Wearing a headguard, in any case, offers no guarantee of avoiding injury.

A risky business, then, but one in which men are already engaged and have been since the original Olympics. Unless boxing is to be banned for men it would seem unfair to deny women the chance to do it. This was one of the arguments raised when Jane Couch won her sex discrimination case against the British Boxing Board of Control in 1998, a decision that led directly to where Nicola Adams stood yesterday. In denying her a licence, Couch argued, the Board was subjecting her to a restraint of trade based on her sex.

The same complaint could be made against the ban on women serving in frontline combat roles in the armed services. One might believe that warfare, like boxing, is detestable, but if it is going to happen, it would seem illogical and sexist not to give women the same rights as men to fight. Will that be the next citadel to fall? And will David Cameron, the Prime Minister, who cheered Ms Adams on from the stands this week, support that?

There we go again, tiptoeing through the minefield with gut instinct warring with logic, heart doing battle with head. Those who work in boxing clubs in the poorer parts of Glasgow and other Scottish cities take a more clear-eyed view of boxing, arguing that it has saved more young lives than it has ruined. When school is a bust, when home is a nightmare, when the playground is littered with needles, the gym is a place of safety. What these youngsters need is confidence to stand up for themselves, to plant their feet on solid ground and say this is my space in the world, and I have the right to be here and be respected. It sounds like the worst sort of sentimental, Cagneyesque, Angels with Dirty Faces, old bunny, but it's true.

Mention of the boxing gym's place in poorer communities brings us to one of the most dangerous parts of the minefield, the one marked "class". It is one that is deeply unfashionable to wander into. Yes, even more unfashionable than feminism. Boxing has always been the working-class child's finishing school. Sometimes it is their only school. If a youngster turns professional and stays safe it can provide a good living, riches even. For every one that makes it, however, there are many who don't. They may leave the sport with nothing more than a half-chewed caramel nose, or they may find themselves carrying far heavier burdens.

The class point is where I part company with boxing. If we ever reach that hallowed day where the kids doing the boxing are called Rupert and Pippa and come from the chintzy suburbs, and the kids doing the showjumping are ordinary Janets and Johns from the council estates, then equal rights will have arrived in boxing, for men and women. Until then, I'll consider my decision split.

Looking at the joy on Nicola Adams's face yesterday, it's a hard stance to take. What a fantastic young woman. Her mother is rightly proud. "To hear 10,000 people cheering for your daughter is just something else," said Mrs Adams after an earlier victory. "This isn't like when somebody wins the X Factor or Big Brother."

Quite. Adams has fought long and hard in every sense to become an Olympic champion. She is the picture of young, modern, healthy, confident womanhood. If it comes to a choice between Ms Adams and Ms Supermodel as to who is the best role model, there is simply no contest. I wish her every success, but I can't wish away my worries about boxing, for women as much as men.