Harvard has decided to ban men from certain gyms during some hours, catering to Muslim women who don’t feel comfortable exercising in front of men. The sexist policy certainly brings up fears of a slippery slope. If women can get men banned from gyms, why not ban blacks from gyms at certain times because some Southern whites don’t like to be around them? Why not just have separate classes for them? Next they’ll be banning gay men from gyms during certain times so homophobic men can exercised without being ‘checked out’ by gay guys. I simply don’t see how they can, in good conscience, kowtow to these Muslim women and not to every other group who has a problem with someone else.
Where have we come to when a supposedly “enlightened” institution like Harvard starts catering to the stupid, backward beliefs of some religious people? I thought institutions of higher learning were supposed to be teaching people to think for themselves, not to be slaves of a bygone religion that promoted the oppression of women (and now, it seems, men).
As Lucy Caldwell, a female student, said in the Harvard Crimson:
I think that it’s incorrect in a college setting to institute a policy in which half of the campus gets wronged or denied a resource that’s supposed to be for everyone.
Thank Allah I went to Stanford. -Cyd Zeigler jr.
on Mar 6th, 2008 at 2:12 AM
Glad to see someone has the stones to call Harvard out for this. In a lot of other places, there’s a pervasive climate of sniveling, whining political correctness which not only misidentifies “catering to the pathologically oversensitive” as a positive virtue, but also makes the rest of us afraid ro speak up against it for fear of being branded an ___-ist. The real kicker is that we’re subject to this kind of slander even if all our critique says is that everyone in a pluralistic society needs to live and let live — the original message of the people (mostly identified with the left) who first fought for the rights of African-Americans, LGBTs, and other minority groups!
Cyd is dead-on when he points out that this situation is no different from accommodating the “discomfort” of Southern racists. What a shame to watch the once-noble and righteous American left drown under its own foolish inconsistency. Living in a social setting inherently means encountering people who are different from you; if this bothers you badly enough, the appropriate response is to choose social settings that minimize this exposure, not to charge into the settings you find less than ideal and attempt to change everyone around you. If I’m not interested in hearing Islamic doctrine, I stay out of mosques; if you’re not interested in seeing men when you work out, you can join a women’s gym. At some point, the responsibility has to become personal if we’re going to maximize practical freedom for everyone (majorities and minorities alike).
on Mar 6th, 2008 at 7:50 AM
Cyd I think you too may be sliding along a slippery slope. I concur heartily with the notion that arbitrily banning one group from a public space – or even a private one that they have paid for the right to inhabit – is reprehensible and should be illegal. Should we ban Muslim women – and men for that manner – from a benefit of normal society because many of them are suicide bombers elsewhere in the world? However we should not protest “foolish religions” but misguided people who claim to be the priests of that religion. Islam was once tolerant in ways that Christianity and Judaism have hardly known. It could be once again. It could happen here.
on Mar 6th, 2008 at 10:08 AM
Newsflash: The South does not have a monopoly on racism.
on Mar 6th, 2008 at 10:42 AM
Sportinlife, not well taken. I removed “foolish religions” and substituted “religious people.” I agree with what you said.
on Mar 6th, 2008 at 2:12 PM
Holy cow. Yesterday on one of the message boards someone made a comment about OS being anti-religion. I started to write a response about how I don’t think the site is anti-religion but how disappointed I’ve been in the past at seeing anti-Semitic and anti-Asian remarks remain on the boards despite the posts being flagged. It also reminded me of an incident 2 years ago where I was called out publicly for calling someone else out about bigoted comments. Then I got an apology, but of course that was done privately, after the public grandstanding. Anyway, I typed all that, then thought “ah, let the past go” and deleted it.
Then I read this. One of the most widely-practiced faiths in the world is labeled “stupid” and “backward” because one of the tenets regarding female modesty is simply not understandable to one person? Wow, I think it’s mind-boggling. Maybe Harvard could have found a less-draconian solution, but I’m not about to criticize them for trying to find a way that adherents of an oft-misunderstood faith could feel comfortable. At a time when Muslims are treated with suspicion because of their faith, at a time when the ethnic cleansing of Muslims is still a fact of life in the Balkans, I think it’s more productive to find ways to accomodate faith rather than disparage it.
So IS Outsports anti-religion? No, as long as your religion doesn’t require an open mind.
I’ve had many disagreements with Harvard since grad school, but right now I’m so glad I DID go there.
on Mar 6th, 2008 at 2:37 PM
For myself, I would not label Islam “backward” because of “one of the tenets regarding female modesty”. I would label Islam backward, anti-science, homophobic, intolerant – I could go on and on – because it is all those things, as most fundamentalist religious practices are. Fundamentalist Christians in the US can for the most part be labeled in exactly the same ways. And they should be labeled, not accomodated, because as soon as you accomodate intolerance and prejudice you are indeed on the slippery slope. That is why a secular Islamic country like Turkey has such a problem with the wearing of head coverings by women; the secularists know that once the scarf is “accomodated” then soon the people who demanded the accomodation will demand that all women wear it. So those of you at Harvard should indeed protest and resist this institutional discrimination.
on Mar 6th, 2008 at 3:44 PM
Granting muslim women alone time in the gym is ludicrous…it’s basically a special right, most likely granted to avoid controversy. If the women are ‘uncomfortable’ around men when they exercise, go somewhere else.
And Ted, don’t confuse faith with the issue here of working out in a gym, a public place.
And OS is hardly anti-religion just because someone criticizes certain specifics of a religion. I would go as far as to say that most religions are incredibly backwards-looking and intolerant.
on Mar 6th, 2008 at 4:55 PM
Harvard is not the real world, thankfully. No worry about a slippery slope.
on Mar 6th, 2008 at 6:39 PM
I didn’t say the religion was stupid or backward. I said the BELIEF that a woman with shorts on can’t be seen by a man is backward. And you know, I’m sticking to that.
on Mar 6th, 2008 at 9:14 PM
“if you’re not interested in seeing men when you work out, you can join a women’s gym.”
Isn’t it just as much an issue of men seeing them? I imagine there are non-Muslim women who aren’t interested in having men leer at them at the gym. And though I don’t go to a gym, I can’t help but think I might be more at ease if only men were around.
And does Harvard even HAVE a women’s gym? Apparently not. So if they want to accommodate women who would prefer not exercising in front of men FOR WHATEVER REASON, there are two options: establish a women-only gym or set aside some hours where only women can work out.
To establish a women-only gym they’d either have to build another one or take one of the gyms and ban men completely. As it turns out, they’ve taken (as the AP article states) six hours out of the seventy hours the gym is open — that’s 8.57 percent — at the LEAST-USED gym on campus and set them aside for women only.
Somehow I think we’ll all survive.
on Mar 6th, 2008 at 9:47 PM
How sad that a few Muslim women can get ALL men banned from a PUBLIC gym on a College Campus. What’s next? No Infidels can work out when a Devout Muslim is in the Gym? What’s next? Gays can’t attend Harvard since it would insult the prophet Muhammed and his followers??
America is supposed to be an enlightened land and Harvard is supposed to be amongst the MOST enlightened.
I shudder to think of the horrific precedent that this sets.
Muslims have now received special treatment instead of assimilating into the fabric of American society.
Look out American Women: You better get shopping for your Burkas!
on Mar 6th, 2008 at 10:26 PM
I’m inclined to agree with Joe. There are women’s-only gyms, and if Harvard doesn’t provide them, well here is an opportunity for women (of all faiths) to be able to work out in the company of women. As mentioned, it’s only a small bit of time from one particular gym… and it’s a TEST.
Maybe it will work out, maybe it won’t, but I don’t think it’s so offensive. The university is trying to find a compromise. It may be misguided, but why not let them try it and see? At my gym (the YMCA), there are times when only children or teens are allowed to use the gym area. Is that unfair? Or is it so teen boys can play basketball without grown men dominating the court?
To compare a womens/mens gym to some sort of gym racism (“why not ban blacks from gyms at certain times because some Southern whites don’t like to be around them”), is totally unfair, and remniscent of the guy equating gay sports teams with “apartheid.”
on Mar 7th, 2008 at 12:27 AM
Apologetic attitudes will only lead us to a Society where Hateful Religions will be allowed to push Gays on to Reservations where “they” the “Chosen” people won’t have to deal with us.
Stop your PC Nonsense already.
Fancy talk doesn’t hide the smell of HATRED toward those who we are not comfortable with.
Have Gays asked that MUSLIMS NOT be allowed in the Gym while we work out? It’s the EXACT same argument.
on Mar 7th, 2008 at 12:53 AM
No one has mentioned that harvard has had a longstanding set of segregated facilities; they have separate Men’s and Ladies restrooms and the gyms have separate changing rooms. I don’t know anyone has has anything like that in their house. I am surprised that people aren’t protesting that.
on Mar 7th, 2008 at 1:33 AM
“Apologetic attitudes will only lead us to a Society where Hateful Religions will be allowed to push Gays on to Reservations where “they” the “Chosen” people won’t have to deal with us.”
A Hateful Religion like, say, the Southern Baptists?
on Mar 7th, 2008 at 3:29 AM
It seems that gender biases are only acceptable when women are the beneficiaries and gender discrimination is only acceptable when men are the target.
Maybe bald headed men or men with hairy backs or skinny men or fat men should get special hours at the gym so that they don’t have to feel self-conscious around women while working out.
on Mar 8th, 2008 at 7:15 AM
GREATEST. RELIGION. EVER!!!!!
on Mar 9th, 2008 at 9:06 AM
Religious people have got to stop imposing their lies onto others. Religious people have never proven a single thing has happened because of “god” yet we are supposed to believe them? No.
on Mar 10th, 2008 at 12:04 AM
Mulims, Christian Fundamentalists, Baptists, Catholics are all in the same boat when it comes to preaching hatred, fear and lies in order to advance their business goals (religions are among the World’s oldest businesses).
It’s just that the Muslims that make their women dress up like Bee-Keepers and don’t allow them to have equal rights.
Until the Muslims allow women to be on an equal footing as Men, why do we consider them a serious religion here in the world’s greatest democracy?
The US Government should strip them of any tax-free status until they move into the modern world with regards to Human Rights and Women’s rights in particular