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TASK FORCE MEDIA NOTES
TASK FORCE MEDIA NOTES
VOL. 2, NO. 1 (January 15, 1998)
This is part of a series of regular reports
to update, inform, educate and stimulate public discussion
THE WOMEN’S SPORTS FOUNDATION SAYS DON’T DROP MALE SPORTS
Recently, the Women’s Sports Foundation (WSF), a national special
interest group, published a position paper entitled “Expanding
Opportunities for Girls and Women in Sport Without Eliminating Men’s
Sports.”
The position paper explains that the WSF discourages the practice of
eliminating men’s sports opportunities in order to provide opportunities
for women. This paper explains in detail what many women’s sports
leaders have said in public interviews during the past year. These two
excerpts from the position paper are enlightening:
l “The Foundation is not in favor of reducing athletic opportunities for
men as the preferred method of achieving Title IX compliance... the goal
should be to bring the treatment of the group experiencing
discrimination up to the level of the group that has received fair
treatment.”
l “Not only is this upgrading of treatment not happening when a men’s
team is eliminated in the name of Title IX, such action usually results
in the development of an acrimonious relationship between men’s
non-revenue sports and women’s sports...”
A number of suggested solutions are offered: 1) Raising new revenues;
2) Reducing expenditures and using savings to expand women’s programs;
3) athletic conference cost savings; 4) internal across-the-board budget
restrictions; 5) moving to a lower com-petitive division; 6) Using
tuition waiver savings to fund gender equity.
WHY WOULD THE WOMEN’S SPORTS FOUNDATION TAKE THIS POSITION?
You might wonder why the Women’s Sports Foundation, which has taken a
leadership role in pushing for aggressive enforcement of Title IX across
the nation, would come out against the dropping of male sports
opportunities.
The answer is simple. The truth is starting to come out. In recent
years, thousands of men’s sports opportunities and hundreds of teams
have been eliminated in the name of Title IX. The push for a numerical
equality for women has had a serious unintended consequence - the
elimination of men’s opportunity.
There has been a growing backlash against proportionality, which,
simply put, is a gender quota in educational programs. Mothers and
fathers, brothers and sisters, coaches, fans and the national media are
all beginning to understand that proportion-ality is destructive.
Proportionality is also coming to their local high school programs. They
also realize that gender quotas could spread to other areas of academic
activity. This position paper is a reaction to increased public pressure
against gender quotas.
THE WOMEN’S SPORTS FOUNDATION’S POSITION STILL FALLS SHORT
You might expect that those in men’s Olympic sports would be excited
that the Women’s Sports Foundation has publicly opposed the elimination
of men’s opportunity to achieve Title IX compliance. However, a closer
read of the document shows that the WSF still considers dropping men’s
opportunities acceptable, and is not philosophically against cutting
males to achieve a numerical quota.
The paper says that “the last alternative should be cutting
opportunities for students to participate in an educational activity.”
Nowhere does it say that it is wrong to drop a program. It is just not
the “preferred method.” But when push comes to shove, in the practical
world of college and high school athletics, the WSF still would accept
dropping a men’s team if it helps bring about a higher level of
proportional equity.
If the Women’s Sports Foundation truly wishes to eliminate the
“acrimonious relationship” between men and women in sports, it should
take the next logical step. Its position should be that it is wrong to
ever drop a program, for men or for women, in sports or in other
educational activities, in order to comply with Title IX. That position
would allow men and women to work together to eliminate discrimination,
which is what Congress originally intended when it passed Title IX.
PROPORTIONALITY IS WRONG, ACCORDING TO A HARVARD ETHICS INSTRUCTOR
It is not just those involved in men’s Olympic sports that are against
proportionality. Many people are against gender quotas in sports based
upon principle.
In a recent issue of the NCAA News, Louis M. Guenin, a Harvard
University ethics instructor, comes out against proportionality on
ethical grounds. His article, entitled “New season opens in Title IX
conference,” explains why proportionality (which he calls the
“enrollment standard”) is wrong:
l “No glimpse of the enrollment standard is conveyed by Title IX, which
prohibits discrimination ‘on the basis of sex’ but does not mention
athletics, nor by the implementing regulation signed in 1975 by
Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare Casper Weinberger. That
regulation makes ‘equal athletic opportunity’ obligatory. Only in a 1979
policy of the Office for Civil Rights -- a pronouncement that Weinberger
this year repudiated as contrary to the law and regulation - does the
enrollment standard appear.”
l “The enrollment standard therefore founders via the following fatal
objections: because of lesser demand for women’s varsity spots, the
enrollment standard establishes preferences for women whereas neither
Title IX nor the Fourteenth Amendment allows a preference for either
sex; the enrollment standard violates an express proviso of Title IX
against quotas; and the enrollment standard neglects the agency’s own
dictate that a college must accommodate student interests.”
l “Elsewhere in its regulations, the Department of Education has
directed that college housing be apportioned between men and women
according to demand. How could variation in demand have been ignored for
athletics?”
l “Federal courts appear compelled to invalidate the enrollment standard
as a denial of equal protection because Congress has articulated no
government directive that the enrollment standard serves. Congress
revealed no intent in Title IX to expand any athletic program; it did
disavow quotas about any activity.”
l “A majority of men and women are likely to agree that respect for the
aspirations of everyone in a college community requires that scarce
resources be meted out evenhandedly in proportion to relative demand...
The risk associated with policies loosed from the mooring of relative
demand is a backlash, of which there are already indications, such as
that against affirmative action.”
l “The way to avert such calamities is not by asking the word
‘discrimination’ to do more than it can, but by discussions in which we
seek a broad consensus about what justice requires. As respect for
individual interests is an indispensable part of many conceptions of
justice, we should expect to foster diverse consequences of diverse
interests.”
FACE THE FACTS... PROPORTIONALITY HAS CAUSED A DRASTIC LOSS IN MEN’S
SPORTS
A recent article in the NCAA News introduced the National Coalition for
Athletics Equity (NCAE), the new organization in Washington D.C.
battling the unintended consequences of Title IX. In the article, Patty
Viverito, the chair of the NCAA Committee on Women’s Athletics, is
quoted.
“‘From what I’ve seen and heard from their literature and rhetoric,’
she said, ‘their premise is that Title IX has diminished men’s
opportunities.’ Viverito disputes the notion and said that if the group
goes about its business in a ‘clearly skewed and biased manner, that
makes me a little nervous.’”
Viverito should be nervous. The NCAE is quoting unbiased facts,
straight from the NCAA Gender Equity Study published this year. It is
time that women’s sports leaders stop denying the truth.
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