John Tierney of the NY Times is once more confusing sexism with rational thought.
In January he argued that men should tell women whether or not to have abortions. On July 11, 2006, he begs us to give poor, underprivileged, discriminated against college boys the chance to tell female athletes to shove off the field and let the males play. The playing field, Tierney cries, has tipped past level to angled in favor of girls.
I don’t know what field he’s talking about.
Athletic fields are still tilted to the right, toward men and boys. Young women make up 53% of the student body in Division 1 schools, yet they receive only 41% of the athletic opportunities, 36% of the athletic budgets, and 32% of the recruitment budget. Slightly more than one third, 34.9 %, of all women students are low income.
The economic field is tilting more and more, and women slide to the bottom. The U.S. Census Bureau says real earnings for women declined by 1% between 2003 and 2004. Women make only 77 cents for every $1 men earn. Women, especially poor women, return to school more often than men. As an additional burden, because of family obligations, 15% of college women take more than 10 years to complete a degree program. The educational system reflects the economic status of women in the US.
Tierney says Title IX, the 1972 statute banning discrimination on the basis of sex, is bad for boys.
Title IX reads:
No person in the U.S. shall, on the basis of sex be excluded from participation in, or denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any educational program or activity receiving federal aid.
The statute was designed to force colleges to accept women and to offer women the same educational and athletic opportunities they offer men. How is that bad for boys? Well, Tierney says, “besides enjoying the testosterone rushes, (men) have a better chance of glory — and of impressing the opposite sex” by playing sports.
Yep, that’s what women want, an athlete, a guy who is unlikely to be in the 1% of male college athletes who make it to the pros; a guy who, should he go pro, unless he plays golf, is likely to incur several concussions, broken bones and be away from home much of the year as a consequence of that career choice. Anyway, it’s nice to have Mr. Tierney answer the question of what women want. Clearly we can’t answer for ourselves.
Yet Tierney says, “some women are dedicated athletes, and they should be encouraged with every opportunity. But a lot of others have better things to do, like study or work on other extracurricular activities that will be more useful to their careers.” Well gosh, John, if it were possible for women to have a career in sports, wouldn’t athletics contribute to that goal?
Tierney says professional women’s sports don’t attract the audience or general interest that men’s sports do. True. Not yet. But how much does the male dominated sports media invest in promoting women’s sports? Not much. Not much more than white media of the 1920’s invested in the Negro League baseball.
Comparing the success of womens sports with other "upstart" sports leagues shows that women are moving relatively quickly. The Negro Leagues rose and fell over fifty years until their heyday during the 1930’s and 40’s. They were dead by 1951, killed by the goodness of major league integration.
It took Major League Baseball one-hundred-and-two years to sign Jackie Robinson. It took professional basketball fifty-four years to draft a black player. Willie O’Ree broke into professional hockey in 1958, but it was 18 years before another black man played the game professionally.
There is no research that says boys are more interested in sports than girls or that girls are more interested in guys who play sports. There’s a lot that says that exposure to sports, helps young people in a variety of ways. Students involved in sports are more likely to get better grades, to stay in school and to be responsible. Girls who play sports don’t get pregnant, quit school and sink into poverty as often as those who don’t play.
Plus, women and girls have come to sports. More women take up athletics late in life than do men. According to the Physical Activity Journal, Spring 2001, 86% of the women who played inter-collegiate sports in the 1960’s and 70’s have stayed active. There’s your new tradition right there.
The National Association for Girls and Women in Sport has studies showing that since Title IX, the number of male and female student athletes has greatly increased. “The number of male college athletes has increased from 170,384 in 1972 to 208,866 in 2001; the number of female college athletes has increased from 31,852 in 1972 to 150,916 - almost a five-fold increase. The number of high school girls playing competitive sports has increased from fewer than 300,000 before Title IX to 2.78 million in 2001.” Women's and men's interest in sports grows with their increased opportunities to play them.
George Bush attempted to weaken Title IX in 2003, but was temporarily disarmed by the volume and number of protests which his threatened to derail his 2004 campaign. Unfortunately, very quietly in early 2005, he had the Department of Education change the guidelines for Title IX, making it possible for colleges to comply with the statute by sending out e-mail surveys to judge the interest of girls in sports rather than providing opportunities for or encouraging girls to play sports.
If you built it they will come, but if there’s nothing there, there’s nowhere for them to go.
