Sunday, June 24, 2007

Title Nine Celebrates 35th Anniversary

Title Nine is 35 years old today, and the world of youth sports in the U.S. will never be the same - thankfully. My eldest daughter, the serious jock in the house as I've noted in previous posts, reminded me of the milestone this morning. And of what still needs to be done to fully implement the spirit of the groundbreaking law.

To review, Title Nine prohibits federally-funded education programs and activities from discriminating on the basis of sex. Sounds simple, but of course it's not. Sports and a bunch of other programs in public education have always been unfairly focused on males. I can only think that this anachronism is a result of the puritanical fundamentalist view that only males matter and females are, after all, just chattel. It is important to remember that females now represent a majority of the U.S. population, are often wage earners, combat veterans and, well, you know the story. There's just no reason at all for any remnants of the exclusive, male-only fraternity to be holding on to any part of the old model. So happy anniversary Title Nine. Hoo-ya, have another micro-brew.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I think title nine is bs womens sports bring little to no money to colleges mens sports make up most of the money for the sports and now some mens sports are getting cut do to not enough money cause of womens sports

Charlie McHenry said...

Though men's sports do bring in more $$ than women's, just like you say, I'd answer that it's not all about money. Put gender equality in the equation (women are over 51% of our population), add equality and fairness and the picture is very different. I have a lady friend, now a physician, who was a world-class gymnast in college and had to buy all her own gear, arrange her own travel and pay for her away-costs including housing - just to compete. She did, but that's not fair. With Title nine, it's a lot better now. Yo-Duh

Anonymous said...

Title nine is one of the greatest things for women and their sports, it has changed how people view women and sports and though women still do not have as many equal rights as men it has come a very long way, i am a female athlete and enjoy sports just as much as any guy out there..a fellow classmate and i have been working on a powerpoint/essay for the last 4 months on title nine and i am sooo thankful for it THANKYOU TITLE NINE!