Season-ending “locker room talk” at elite colleges
Last month, Harvard cancelled the season of its men’s soccer team because it found that team members were producing documents that rated members of the women’s team on their physical appearance and sex appeal, and that included vulgar comments. This practice had been discovered in 2012, but unbeknownst to college officials had continued up until the present.
Harvard cancelled the season, as opposed to disciplining individual players, because it found that the practice of making demeaning the women athletes was widespread. It also found that players had not been honest when questioned about the matter.
As is often the case, Harvard turned out to be the pacesetter when it comes to cancelling sports seasons due to sexist comments by athletes. Consider:
Washington University (in St. Louis) suspended its men’s soccer team indefinitely for generating an online document with “degrading and sexually explicit comments” about women.
Princeton suspended its men’s swimming and diving team over “misogynistic and racist” comments about the women’s team circulating on an electronic mailing list.
Amherst suspended its men’s cross-country team after members described one female runner as “meatslab” and another as a “walking STD.”
Columbia University suspended its wrestling team for the writing of sexually explicit remarks about women on a blog.
what Men @ Elite Colleges engage in locker room banter / talk that maybe demeaning to women say it ain't so