Personally, I don’t have any problem with the Augusta Country Club’s all-male membership policy, nor do I have a problem with the membership policies of fraternal organizations and other private men’s groups. Likewise, there’s no problems with “safe places for women” like the Junior League, Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival, and so on.
There’s increasing vocal opposition to the male-only policies of private clubs and fraternal organizations. If, for some reason, the men’s groups opened their membership doors to women, I really doubt that women’s groups would do the same.
Can someone here justify why it’s wrong to a country club or private club to exclude women, but it’s perfectly okay to protect the sanctity of “womynspace” by keeping it free of men?
I’ve always felt that the owner of a business should have the right to serve only who he/she wants to. Even when it comes to matters of race, religion or whatever.
NOW! let me say before I get flamed that I would only hope the the owners of such businesses would choose not to exclude anyone simply based on their race, gender or religion.
I agree. After all, the local population is equally free to boycott said store and run it out of business, if the store has a policy that they disagree with.
You can’t force people to be tolerant and intelligent, after all.
Or it’s just a way to reenforce the status quo. American society, for instance has certainly grown a lot more tolerant since segregation was forcibly ended. Most of the time people just can’t be fucked trying to change something if it doesn’t affect them (What, the guy doesn’t serve gays? Glad I’m not gay!)
The vast majority of Americans don’t get upset when their government imprisons people without charge (such as a citizen of my country who is believed to have associated with the Taliban). Would you expect them to care if Wal-Mart decided they didn’t want to serve a particular minority?
The theory - which I do not endorse, but offer for the purposes of discussion, and as I understand it - is as follows:
Racism and sexism, as used in this discussion, are both rooted in oppression and power. When a white establishment excludes a black person, or when a white person uses the ‘N-word’, it is racism, because the white power structure is so firmly entrenched in this country that such exlcusions, or insults, have a very real and potent effect, not to mention a historical precedent.
Similarly, when an all-male country club excludes women, it’s an expression of the traditional power of the patriarchy in business, the “old boys” network, which has historically denied women access to senior management and business opportunities - both of which are often conducted over the course of eighteen holes.
But when a black comedian uses the n-word, or when women form a gender-exclusive club, they have no real power to oppress. Indeed, their steps are taken in SPITE of their own oppression, not as oppression by them. It is, under this view, therefore perfectly acceptable and natural for women to form their own clubs, while still demanding equal access to male-dominated clubs. Women lack the possibility and power to oppress in this still-male-dominated society, you see.
The ladies always had access to our all-male fraternity;)
In regards to fraternities and gentlemens clubs - guys like to pall around with other. We men like to get together and do manly things - drink and smoke until 5:00 am, play and talk about sports, pool, darts, women, and whathaveyou. Women are like the brakes that keep a mans behavior in check (“haven’t you drank enough?”, “I’m tired”, “who are you looking at?!?!?”, “put that down”, “where are your pants?!!”, and so on). Ergo, while we enjoy the company of our wives and girlfriends and children, :rolleyes: we need time to hang out with the guys.
Women are not men. Because of this, their social organizations are different. Compare MTV’s Sorority Life reality show to Jackass. 20 girls living together is 20 girls acting bitchy and petty to each other, 20 guys living together results in jumping homeless people on dirtbikes and lighting themselves on fire.
Ditto what Bricker said about inability to opress. I think a power differential still exists between the genders, women having less access to power in our society. (where power= the ability to create movement, affect change, just do things in general).
If men want to exclude women from an activity, they have more capacity to do so legally and forcefully than women would have to do the inverse.
A golf club seems a silly place to take a stand on such an issue, though. Men not invited to the concert? Ah, so what? I’m not sure who played at Wyminfest, But if it was similar to the lineup at lillith fair, the wymin can have it all to themselves, alternative spelling and all.
In the utopian future that I dream of, there still exist these great bastions of gender segregation (strip clubs, bridal showers, wymin’s music festival, poker night) but they remain segregated by preference rather that pressure.
I don’t see women’s groups lobbying to get included in Poker night. Or for the opportunity to be a Shriner and wear a fez. And last I checked, I was a welcome patron at strip clubs.
Women’s groups do lobby and apply pressure (and rightly so) to be admitted to what they perceive as places of power. Note, they aren’t lobbying (for the most part, every organization has its loons) to write laws that would affect private clues. This isn’t so much of a big deal as it was 30 years ago, when the important business of the day took place at “the club” or on the golf course. With the balance of power beginning to equalize between genders, it doesn’t behoove men to make deals at exclusionary places - as often the very person they need to deal with is left out due to gender or lack of golf clubs.
Augusta is in a strange situation. The Men of Augusta had the opportunity to make a polite reply, and took it public - and rather nasty. They want a private exclusive club, they want to avoid controversy, but they also want to hold a very media intense event - moving their private activities into the public sphere. Augusta won’t hold out forever - eventually there will be a woman that they will desire as a member, and the chauvinists will eventually die, leaving the members a more inclusive generation.
I think I’ve mentioned it before on the board, but my wife belongs to a women’s-only gym. According to her, there are women who are owners of businesses, VPs of corporations, etc. who also belong. In what way is this different than Augusta (IIRC the main gist of the problem is that the “fat cats” and “good ol’ boys” are doing business and excluding women)? Why is it that, merely by benefit of owning a vagina, some are allowed access to this potential business and some are denied for penalty of having a penis?
But on the other hand, I’d love to have a men-only place where I could not only fart with impunity, but have it rated by volume, duration, and odor.
Part of the difference with a gym is providing the facilities for women.
Augusta does have a women’s locker room. (The wives use it as well as female guests). It wouldn’t pass muster as being an equal facility - but even if Augusta allowed women members, their wouldn’t be as many members on the course, and there is no need to provide as many lockers. And there is no reason it needs to be equal.
There are a number of men’s only gyms in my town. They simply don’t have locker room facilities for women members.
As a flaming liberal, I have to partially disagree. I boycott all clubs, businesses, religions, schools, social organizations etc. that engage in racial, sex, etc. discrimination. The only exception are organizations that require one adhere to certain beliefs.
An example is Soroptimists, a women’s business networking group. Twenty years ago this may have made sense. Today it is just bias. Nor will I go play golf at Augusta (not that they would allow a hacker like me on their fairways). I might consider something like the masons that has parallel men’s and women’s groups that intermingle, although the idea of masonic ritual bores me silly.
It is legal for the Boy Scouts (of which I was once one) to discriminate against women and gays. And they do. It is legal, moral and ethical for me to refuse to have anything to do with them until they change their tune.
Usually I would not agree with a statement like this. Afterall, Racism and Sexism are also rooted in the individuals mind and no one has any real power over anothers mind. However, you have qualified your statement with “as used in this discussion”.
I just want to highlight the difference between Sexism and what I’ll term “Offensive Sexism”. I think the “wymin” that we’re talking about are being sexist and they are demonstrating a least a small amount of power through discrimination (i.e. not letting men come to the concert, health club, or whatever else). However, since men are (or more importantly think they are) relative “haves” and women “have nots”, this is not “Offensive Sexism”. Why? Because “haves” don’t care about the petty spite of the “have nots”. THis is closly tied to the thread about the word “gringo” and whether it qualifies as offensive slang.
I personally have no problem with male-only social clubs and fraternal organizations, and I haven’t heard of women demanding to be allowed membership in the Knights of Columbus etc. But just because an organization is called a club and has “members” instead of customers, doesn’t make it a club and not a business. The Diamond Club at Shea Stadium is not a club in any real sense, and I’m not sure where country clubs fall. It would depend on how they are organized. Is it a group of people who get together , build an maintain a golf course for their own benefit and gain no profit. Or does a group of people build and maintain a golf course, selling memberships to outsiders for a profit?
