TITLE IX AND THE ASCENT OF THE AMERICAN FEMALE ATHLETE
games ended
recently and the world now assesses the meaning of a COVID-19 marred
Olympiad, while looking forward to next year’s winter
games and the 2024
summer games in Paris.
One thing stands out about the American effort in
Tokyo. U.S. women made their presence felt. They captured over 58% of
the medals Americans won. That didn’t just happen. It directly resulted from
action American legislators took almost 50 years ago. The success of U.S.
female athletes shows what can happen with a dedicated commitment to equal
opportunity. It offers lessons that apply across society.
The Governmental Action was Title IX
provision that said, “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be
denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education
program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.…” Before that enactment, one in 27 girls
participated in school sports. Now that number exceeds two in five. Despite
grudging compliance by school districts and universities with the requirement
of equal funding for women’s sports, over the 35 years after Title IX’s
passage, female involvement in high school sports jumped 904 % and college
participation increased 456%.
We shouldn’t forget the opposition Title IX encountered in its early
years, much of it from the National
Collegiate Athletic Association. The
NCAA feared loss of power and control over
lucrative men’s sports, especially football and basketball, if colleges and
universities had to fund women’s sports programs. The NCAA first argued for
exemption of college athletic departments from Title IX requirements,
contending the departments
didn’t receive federal funds. That argument ignored
the fact college athletic departments are part of institutions of higher
education, nearly all of which receive federal money. They also argued equal
sports funding for women would mean a loss of opportunities for men (a few
men’s programs did get cut at individual schools, though overall men’s participation increased).
Finally, the NCAA asserted Title IX equity formulas should exempt college
football.
Ultimately, courts and government agencies charged with enforcing Title
IX rejected these contentions. The NCAA decided it couldn’t beat the women’s
sports movement, so it took it over. In
1982 it forced out of existence the Association
of Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW),
the organization that had promoted women’s college sports while the NCAA was
doing everything it could to undermine support for women’s programs. Even
today, though, the NCAA often treats women’s sports teams as second-class
citizens, as last winter’s weight room fiasco demonstrated. It provided men
with state of the art weight training facilities at basketball tournament sites
while giving women a few dumbbells.
The Olympic Dividend
We can’t say Congress knew it was birthing an Olympic medals
bonanza for the United States
when it passed Title IX. The law passed because
of the efforts of a small, determined group of women (and a few men) who, in
the late ‘60s, began agitating for federal and state legislation assuring women equal rights in education. As noted, few people paid much
attention when it passed, though the NCAA soon perceived a threat. Then something
funny happened.
By the early ‘80s, U.S. women began excelling in international
competition in sports, like track and
field and basketball, previously
dominated by the Soviet Union and eastern European countries like East Germany (many
of those eastern Europeans probably were on steroids, but that’s a subject
for another day). All of a sudden U.S. women who’d gone through college and university
programs started winning championships.
By the ‘80s and ‘90s, the U.S. was producing female stars,
like Florence
Griffith-Joyner and Jackie Joyner-Kersee
in track and field and basketball greats like Cheryl Miller and Dawn Staley. In 1996, the U.
S. women’s basketball team kicked off a gold medal streak that has reached
seven and shows no signs of ending, despite the likely retirements of five-time
gold medalists Sue Bird
and Diana Taurasi.
In Tokyo, the American team won 113
medals (China finished second with 88). Women won 66 of
the U.S. total. Had the
American women been a nation, they would have placed fourth in the overall
medal count. Since 2012, American women have won the majority of U.S. Olympic
medals.
Pride and Inspiration–
for all Americans
Women can take great pride in what U.S. women
athletes have accomplished
in the Olympics, as can men. Those are our sisters, daughters, granddaughters, nieces,
even wives, winning those medals. Their achievements should inspire everyone. We’re reminded of what Arkansas football coach
Sam Pittman told his
players after the Arkansas women’s basketball team upset perennial power Connecticut
last winter. “They wear the same logo on their uniforms we do,” Pittman said.
“Let’s be like them.”
We also can take pride in the
progress American women have made in Olympic sports since the advent of Title
IX because of what that progress says about our country. The law’s role in the
development of American female athletes shows what can happen when a nation
decides it will treat
all its citizens fairly and equally. Title IX, especially
when juxtaposed with the NCAA’s obstructionism, stands as an example of what
happens when societies don’t engage in zero-sum game thinking.
Every time someone gains something doesn’t mean someone else must lose
something. The rise of the American female athlete lifts US all and serves as a model for the world.
