Yup!
Too many of us men, to use the vulgar term, pussy out -- forgetting that we are putting our own worries about recoil as a prime concern for the ladies. It is not and should not be an issue. In fact, one school of thought has it that the lighter frame responds better to recoil than do we heavy brutes. Physics says that the lighter mass will move faster for a given impulse. So it stands to reason that the smaller frame may get pushed further, but is less likely to hurt as much.
While I don't recommend it for new shooters, the 7.62X54R has been used very effectively by both Russian and Vietnamese female snipers in past conflicts. These ladies learned to handle the recoil and shoot very effectively with them as the Germans discovered in WWII and we Americans learned to our sorrow in Vietnam.
The Model 94 Winchester in 30-30 has a fairly sharp kick compared to heavier rifles. Nonetheless, my grandmother used one to take a black bear in the late '30s. She said the men got "all excited" about the bear but for her it was no big deal!
Certainly, the new shooter needs to learn the basics with minimum recoil so that they learn good techniques without developing bad habits. Once the techniques are learned, they can move on to more significant recoil environments.
With reloading so easy, and reduced recoil loads available for a lot of rifles, there is little reason to go with bullets that are the weight class represented by .224 and .243 bullets.
If you want to use a bolt action, start with at least the .257 Roberts, or go with a larger cartridge and start with reduced loads.
If one must use the AR15 platform, take a look at the 6.8 SPC, the 6.5 Grendel and the WSSM offerings. These DO have big enough bullets and still have modest recoil.
